This video is funny and I love the video presentation

I like Pad Thai so I’m going to give this recipe a try, I will replace the sugar with Stevia, use tamarind with soy sauce instead of base otherwise its all good vegan stuff.

 
The video is funny have a look if you have 8 minutes, I will use my own utensils and wear my usual cloths when I try it. Enjoy!

http://thestir.cafemom.com/food_party/120490/devour_vegan_black_metal_chefs

Vegan Garlicky Humas

• 2 cans of chick peas (garbanzo beans)
• Reserve liquid from the canned chick peas
• Juice from 4 medium lemons (about 4 ounces)
• 7 oz of Tahini (sesame seed paste)
• 6 cloves of chopped garlic
• 2 oz. Nutritional Yeast (optional)
• ¼ teaspoon sea salt (optional to taste)
  Mix the drained chick peas, ½ cup reserve liquid, garlic, nutritional yeast, salt and lemon juice in a food processor or blender with half the Tahini. Run the processor until all ingredients are blended to a smooth consistency. Add the balance of the Tahini. Mix again adding small amounts of the reserved chick pea canning liquid until you reach the desired consistently (similar to mash potatoes or a vegetable dip).

Low fat hintOil will separate in prepared Tahini.  To reduce the fat, pour off some of the oil that separates on the top of the Tahini before mixing. Save that oil for later use (on a salad or other dish) because it is pure sesame oil.
Variations
The nutritional yeast in the hummus is optional it adds a mellow taste and gives you all the nutrients that the yeast is famous for.
For spicier Hummus add a dash of Tabasco sauce or cayenne, or add more garlic. Garnish with a few sprigs of fresh parsley.

 Left Overs Humus can be diluted into a sauce for salad dressing by adding warm water and lemon juice, add it slowly while working with a whisk to make a nice creamy consistency.

Global obesity rates double since 1980

Study: Global obesity rates double since 1980

By MARIA CHENG
AP Medical Writer



Feb 3, 7:02 PM EST


LONDON (AP) -- The world is becoming a heavier place, especially in the West.

Obesity rates worldwide have doubled in the last three decades even as blood pressure and cholesterol levels have dropped, according to three new studies.

People in Pacific Island nations like American Samoa are the heaviest, one of the studies shows. Among developed countries, Americans are the fattest and the Japanese are the slimmest.

"Being obese is no longer just a Western problem," said Majid Ezzati, a professor of public health at Imperial College London, one of the study's authors.

In 1980, about 5 percent of men and 8 percent of women worldwide were obese. By 2008, the rates were nearly 10 percent for men and 14 percent for women.

That means 205 million men and 297 million women weighed in as obese. Another 1.5 billion adults were overweight, according to the obesity study.

Though richer countries did a better job of keeping blood pressure and cholesterol levels under control, researchers said people nearly everywhere are piling on the pounds, except in a few places including central Africa and South Asia. The studies were published Friday in the medical journal, Lancet.

The research confirms earlier trends about mounting obesity and the three papers provide the most comprehensive, recent global look at body mass index, cholesterol and blood pressure. Body mass index is a measurement based on weight and height.

Experts warned the increasing numbers of obese people could lead to a "global tsunami of cardiovascular disease." Obesity is also linked to higher rates of cancer, diabetes and is estimated to cause about 3 million deaths worldwide every year.

In an accompanying commentary, Sonia Anand and Salim Yusuf of McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, said the global forecast for heart disease was "dismal and comprises a population emergency that will cost tens of millions of preventable deaths" unless countries take quick action.

Even without the encroaching empire of Western fast food, Ezzati said waistlines are already expanding in parts of Latin America, the Middle East, and Western and Southern Africa.

Among rich countries, the U.S. had the highest average body mass Index, at 28. Rates were the lowest in Japan, ranging between 22 for women and 24 for men. Women in Belgium, France, Finland, Italy and Switzerland also stayed trim, with virtually no change in their BMI.

People with a BMI of 18-24 are considered to have a healthy weight. Those with a BMI of 25 or above are overweight and people with a BMI of 30 or more are classified as obese.

Two other studies also published in the Lancet on Friday surveyed blood pressure rates and cholesterol levels. Western countries including Canada, South Korea and the U.S. had some of the lowest blood pressure rates thanks to medication, while rates are highest in Portugal, Finland and Norway.

Cholesterol levels were highest in countries like Iceland and Germany and lowest in Africa.

Ezzati said national measures like reducing salt content in prepared foods or banning transfats could make a big dent in lowering blood pressure and cholesterol rates.

He added that it was uncertain if the world's obesity rates had peaked and predicted other health complications would soon follow. "We don't know how much worse the obesity problem will get," he said. "While we can manage blood pressure and cholesterol with medication, diabetes will be a lot harder."

When Friends Ask: “Why Don’t You Drink Milk?”

By Dr. John McDugall MD
Nutritionally speaking, dairy foods are essentially “liquid meats”-but worse, because people drink milk, and eat cheese, guiltlessly-often thinking “milk makes my bones unbreakable, helps me lose weight, and makes my skin as soft and beautiful as a baby's tush.” In their haste to sell products, the dairy industry has created an obsession over calcium that has become, in effect, a major contributor to the suffering and death of more than one billion people annually on Planet Earth from diseases of overnutrition-obesity, heart disease, stroke, arthritis, and diabetes. In the late 1970s when I was developing the McDougall Diet-after reading the bulk of the nutritional science published since the early 1900s-I came to the conclusion that starches, vegetables and fruits were ideal for human nutrition. I then asked myself, what would be gained and lost by adding other food categories (dairy, meats, poultry, fish, free-oils, sugars, etc.) to this elemental foundation? In the case of dairy foods, I quickly eliminated the “calcium advantage” because Nature packaged her foods so efficiently that developing a disease due to calcium deficiency is nearly impossible on a diet of plant foods (See last month’s newsletter-February 2007). After almost three years of exhaustive research I concluded: adding dairy foods to my original plant-food-based diet would only supply more calories, fat, animal protein, cholesterol, sodium, microbes, and chemical contamination-ingredients that were making most of my patients ill in the first place. In the final analysis, I found myself unable to discover any reasons to add dairy into the McDougall Diet-the hazards weighed heavily and any benefits were overstated, or blatantly falsified. Yet the drone from the dairy industry’s propaganda continues three decades later. I am the uncommon voice out there in the wilderness; people tired of listening without questioning will find my analysis of some of the dairy industry’s most familiar messages refreshing. Dairy Products Taste Delicious-Actually the Additives Do The National Dairy Council refers to their products as “Nutritious and Delicious.” Undoubtedly, consumers love ice cream, cheese, yogurt, and butter. But the reason is, they are loaded with sugar and salt; otherwise no one would eat them. The National Dairy Council knows the importance of adding sugar and other flavorings, reporting, “Studies show that elementary school kids drink 28 percent more milk when offered in “cool” flavors and packages.”1 When I was a child, my school required all students to drink milk daily. A small carton of white milk was 2 cents and chocolate was 3 cents. I always splurged, because I gagged from the taste of white milk. The reason plain milk is at all palatable is because it naturally contains about 30% of its calories as sugar (lactose). Chocolate, strawberry, and other flavored milks contain additional sugar. The more sugar, the greater the attraction to dairy; witness ice cream with 52% of the calories as sugar. My patients taught me how really disgusting basic dairy foods taste. During my residence training in the mid-1970s, I cared for people with kidney failure, who were required to be on very salt-restricted diets. One of my duties was to recommend they eat salt-less butter and salt-less cheese. Their response was, “Doc, I can’t eat a glob of greasy lard.” Without the salt, these yellow blocks of fat are unpalatable. Sodium: mg/100 calories Sugar: grams/100 calories Whole milk 80 8 Chocolate milk 72 12 Yogurt (plain) 76 8 Yogurt (fruit flavor) 53 17 Chocolate ice cream 35 13 Cheese (American) 383 1 Cheese (cheddar) 144 0 Cottage cheese (1%) 560 4 Butter (regular) 114 0 Unsalted butter 0 0 Adding salt and/or sugar to enhance the taste of potatoes, beans, rice, vegetables and fruits would be a much healthier and tastier choice, rather than mixing it with all that fat found in dairy products. Dairy Products Build Bones - Actually They Damage Them, Too The National Dairy Council writes, “A large body of scientific research collected in recent decades demonstrates that an adequate intake of nutrients (e.g., calcium) from dairy foods such as milk, cheese, or yogurt positively affects bone health by increasing bone acquisition during growth, slowing age-related bone loss, and reducing osteoporotic fragility fractures.”2 The truth is dairy products can have bone-growth-stimulating effects. The primary biologic purpose of cow’s milk is to cause growth-from a 60 pound calf to a 600 pound cow in less than 8 months. This “miracle-grow” fluid has several qualities that help accomplish this feat. Cow’s milk is 50% fat, providing 600 “growth-supporting” calories per quart.3 Cow’s milk also has high concentrations of protein, potassium, sodium, calcium, and other nutrients to sustain rapid growth. (In comparison, these nutrients are at a three to four times lower concentration in human milk than cow’s milk.3) Dairy foods increase growth hormones: In addition to calories and nutrients to support growth, cow’s milk increases hormones that directly stimulate the growth of the calf. The most powerful of these hormones is called insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1). When cow’s milk is fed to people, IGF-1 levels also increase. Studies funded by the dairy industry show a 10% increase in IGF-1 levels in adolescent girls from one pint daily and the same 10% increase for postmenopausal women from 3 servings per day of nonfat milk or 1% milk.4,5 This rise in IGF-1 level is an important reason for the “bone-building” effects of cow’s milk. IGF-1 promotes undesirable growth too-like cancer growth and accelerated aging. IGF-1 is one of the most powerful promoters of cancer growth ever discovered for cancers of the breast, prostate, lung, and colon.6 Overstimulation of growth by IGF-1 leads to premature aging too-and reducing IGF-1 levels is “anti-aging.”7 Dairy Foods Raise Estrogen: The message that estrogen builds fracture-resistant bones (prevents osteoporosis) has been hammered into women’s minds over the past 4 decades by the pharmaceutical industry, selling HRT formulas, such as Premarin and Prempro. Food also raises estrogen levels in a person’s body-and dairy foods account for about 60 to 70% of the estrogen that comes from food.8 The main source of this estrogen is the modern factory farming practice of continuously milking cows throughout pregnancy.8,9 As gestation progresses the estrogen content of milk increases from 15 pg/ml to 1000 pg/ml. Estrogen (estrone) production Non-pregnant: 15 pg/ml First half of pregnancy: 151 pg/ml Last days of pregnancy: 1000 pg/ml Well-recognized consequences of excess estrogen are cancers of the breast, uterus, and prostate. The overall effect of the Western diet is bone damage: The National Dairy Council would like you to believe, “There is no evidence that protein-rich foods such as dairy foods adversely impact calcium balance or bone health.”10 But these same dairy people know this is untrue and they state elsewhere, “Excess dietary protein, particularly purified proteins, increases urinary calcium excretion. This calcium loss could potentially cause negative calcium balance, leading to bone loss and osteoporosis. These effects have been attributed to an increased endogenous acid load created by the metabolism of protein, which requires neutralization by alkaline salts of calcium from bone.”11 Thus, dairy products have bone-building effects-IGF-1 and estrogen; and bone-destroying effects-dietary acid and protein. The net result depends upon the final balance of these accumulative effects. (Note that calcium consumed results in little of either a positive or a negative change for the health of the bones. See the February 2007 McDougall Newsletter for details). A common practice of researchers designing studies to show dairy is beneficial to bone health is to first neutralize the dietary acids with lots of fruits and vegetables or add antacids (like Citracal) to the experiment.12 By this means, the positive effects, like bone growth stimulation from IGF-1, will dominate. Compare the acid load of various foods:3,13 (Renal Acid Load per 100 calories) Cheddar Cheese 10.0 Fish (Cod) 9.3 Chicken 7.0 Beef 6.3 Peas 1.0 Wheat flour 1.0 Potato -5.0 Apples -5.0 Banana -6.0 Tomatoes -18.0 Spinach -56.0 (A positive value indicates acidic, whereas a negative value indicates alkaline.) Consistently, when populations of people who eat different diets are compared, rates of hip fractures increase with increasing animal protein consumption (including dairy products). For example, people from the USA, Canada, Norway, Sweden, Australia, and New Zealand have the highest rates of osteoporosis.14,15 The lowest rates are among people who eat the fewest animal-derived foods (these people are also on lower calcium diets)-like the people from rural Asia and rural Africa. 14,15 Dietary protein correlates directly with the dietary acids consumed. Dairy Products Make People Trim-That’s Not What They Tell Each Other The National Dairy Council writes, “A growing body of research indicates that enjoying 3-A-Day of Dairy as part of a reduced calorie diet can give adults better results when it comes to trimming the waistline than cutting calories alone.”16 The dairy industry promotes dairy consumption for weight loss, even though they know their campaign is false. Consider the conclusion of a review article they funded that was published in a 2003 issue of the Journal of Nutrition, “Nine studies of dairy product supplementation were located: In seven, no significant differences in the change in body weight or composition were detected between treatment and control groups. However, two studies conducted in older adults observed significantly greater weight gain in the dairy product groups.”17 At the Dairy Product Components and Weight Regulation Symposium held on April 21, 2002 in New Orleans, LA. Dr. Susan Barr (who frequently works for the dairy industry), said “In conclusion, the data available from randomized trials of dairy product or calcium supplementation provide little support for an effect in reducing body weight or fat mass.”17 See, they know the truth, but fail to share it with the customers. Research published since this review has been supported largely by the dairy industry and fabricated to support their profitable weight loss campaign. Recommending Dairy is Racist The National Dairy Council says, “Minorities who have experienced gastrointestinal problems consuming milk are learning new strategies to enjoy milk and other dairy foods. This means that minorities (and non-minorities) with lactose intolerance no longer need to miss out on essential nutrients provided by dairy foods. The health consequences of avoiding dairy foods, the major source of dietary calcium, may be especially serious for African Americans, Hispanics, Asians, and Native American Indians. Many minorities are at high risk of hypertension, stroke, colon cancer, and osteoporosis - diseases in which a low calcium intake can be a contributing factor.”18 This is fear-mongering at its worst. White people have a high tolerance for the sugar found in milk, known as lactose. Non-whites commonly have a normal, natural “intolerance” to milk sugars, and such sugars consumed after the weaning-time cause them intestinal distress with flatulence, cramps and diarrhea. Milk makes 60 to 90 percent of these people sick. An editorial from the October 2006 issue of the British Medical Journal addresses this, “Furthermore, we need to ask the question of whether we are doing children a disservice by encouraging them to meet recommendations. Childhood obesity is on the rise in westernized countries, and dairy products-the main source of calcium recommended by nutrition guidelines-contribute greatly to the intake of fat and sugar in children. Nearly three quarters of the world's population are estimated to be lactose intolerant after the age of weaning and therefore do not tolerate the consumption of milk and other dairy products well. In addition, some studies suggest that the consumption of cow's milk increases the risk of some types of cancer.”19 Diary products do essentially nothing to help prevent or treat hypertension either-at best, a review funded by the dairy industry showed a reduction of 1.44 mmHg systolic and 0.84 mmHg diastolic.20 (By comparison, our results from the McDougall residential center show a 23/14 mmHg decrease in blood pressure in people with high blood pressure (150/90 mmHg or greater) in less than 10 days; and almost all of these people were taken off all of their blood pressure medication during the 10 days.) Dairy foods are high in calories, fat and cholesterol; contributing to the cause of heart disease, strokes, type-2 diabetes, and obesity. They are high on the food chain so they accumulate, in sometimes dangerous amounts, environmental chemicals. Dairy protein is the number one cause of food allergies and can cause more serious forms of “food allergy” called autoimmune diseases. Dairy products are also known to be infected with life-threatening microbes, including E. Coli, listeria, salmonella, staphylococci, tuberculosis, bovine leukemia viruses, and bovine AIDS viruses. A more complete discussion of the hazards of cow’s milk is found in my May 2003 newsletter article, “Marketing Milk and Disease.” The Dairy Industry Remains Unaccountable Because of their financial power and political connections, the people in the dairy industry can say whatever they want and no one can stop them. Questioning consumers, however, might ask themselves, “Why are humans the only animals that drink milk of another species, and continue to drink it after normal weaning-time?” And “Why would Nature (or our Creator) design us so that in order to get a necessary nutrient, calcium, we must risk our lives? With a $206.5 million annual budget dedicated to confusing people and covering up the truth for the sake of profits, and with the current political climate, there is no hope of regulating the dairy industry-or more appropriately for such a hazardous substance, outlawing these cow products for human consumption.21 Fortunately, thinking people are freeing themselves and their families from sickness and obesity by learning that human nutritional needs are far removed
from those of baby cows.