All about Tomatoes

Inspired by the beautiful image above, taken by my friend, Lucie. I dedicate this article to tomatoes. Though I have to eat this fruit carefully as I'm histamine allergic, but who can resist not to talk about it, when you see the photo above?

Solanum Lycopersicum is the latin name for tomato. Originally from South America, this fruit can be served as appetizer, main dish, juice, sauce and even dessert. Rich on Lycopene, tomato has very good benefits for health. Only as little as 540 ml of liquid tomato product is enough to get the full benefits of Lycopene.

Varieties of Tomato
There are around 7500 varieties of tomato. Cherry tomatoes (as in the picture) are the small one to eat as appetizer, Beefsteak tomatoes are the big ones to serve with steak, Pear Shape is very tasteful for gourmet paste, Plum tomatoes are useful for salad and juice. There are even tomatoes with different colors than red, such as violet, black, ivory, yellow or orange.

What is Lycopene?
It is a vital anti-oxydant to fight against the cancerous cell formation as well as other health complications and diseases.

What is health benefit of Tomato?
Preventing cancer of prostate, cervical, colon, rectal, stomach, mouth, lower high cholesterol, heart disease

Recipes of Tomatoes
Appetizer : Tomato & Avocado Salad
Main Dishes : Omelet Confit of Tomatoes
Homemade Tomato Ketchup 
Tomato Juice with Basil Aroma






Sources : wikipedia, healthfood-guide, 
Image : Lucie Breton

Basil Tomato Juice

Ingredients
2 ripe tomatoes
4 basil leaves
5 parsley
salt pepper
100 ml water
lime juice from half one
a bit of sugar if needed

Blend everything together, filter if needed, serve with ice cubes

Image : lacuisinedenatalie

Homemade Ketchup

You can easily buy tomato ketchup at the supermarket, but nothing is better than homemade one. Easy to make, cheaper and healthier.

Ingredients :
2 kg ripe tomatoes
2 onions
2 garlic
150 ml vinegar
100 gram sugar
2 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of pepper
half teaspoon of powder chilli

How to make :

• Put tomatoes inside boiled water for 30 seconds, peel the skin, unseed
• Cut tomato into 6 parts and cook with garlic & onion for 30 minutes in low heat
• Blend the mixture and add vinegar, sugar, salt and pepper, cook again for another 30 minutes in low heat until thick
• Put inside a bottle and you preserve for two weeks.

Image : notthatsnifty.com

Kulit Buah Manggis (KBM) penyembuh kanker & berbagai penyakit

 

Vonis itu datang tahun lalu, kakak saya didiagnosa kanker paru-paru. Bukan main-main stadium sudah cukup tinggi, tapi untuk memastikan diperlukan analisa melalui biopsi bahkan ada dokter yang menyarankan untuk kemoterapi langsung. Namun  banyak orang menyarankan untuk tidak dilakukan karena khabarnya biopsi bisa memacu berkembangnya sel-sel kanker ke lokasi lainnya ditubuh manusia. Sehingga kami sekeluarga mendukung keinginan kakak saya untuk tidak menindak lanjuti melakukan analisa biopsi, apalagi kemoterapi, yang hanya membuat orang menderita karena efek sampingnya sangat menakutkan.

Selama beberap bulan, kakak saya selalu kecapekan, nafasnya tersengal-sengal dan paru2nya menghasilkan cairan yang banyak. Bahkan sampai dua kali disedot cairan tersebut, yang tiap kali sampai 2000 liter.

Suatu hari ibu saya mengajak sang kakak untuk konsultasi dengan dokter spesialis penyakit dalam, Dr. A. Beliau seorang dokter yang "bermoral" tidak terlalu memaksa konsumsi obat-obatan, saat konsultasi sang dokter menyarankan agar kakak saya mengkonsumsi kapsul KBM Kulit Buah Manggis yang diracik sendiri.

Mengenai Buah Manggis :
Dalam bahasa Inggris Purple Mangosteen, bahasa latin : Garcinia mangostana,  berasal dari pulau Maluku
Buah ini bahkan dicari oleh Ratu Inggris Victoria pada tahun 1930-an. Karena rasanya yang segar, manis-manis jambu.

Cara membuat kapsul KBM :

1. Cuci & jemur satu kulit manggis, yaitu bagian yang berwarna merah hati dan agak keras
2. Setelah cukup kering, giling sampai halus
3. Siapkan kapsul kosong yang bisa dibeli di apotik
4. Masukkan tepung KBM kedalamnya, kira2 dengan satu KBM bisa menghasilkan 10 butir kapsul KBM
5. Minum 3 kali sehari, tergantung berat atau tidaknya penyakit

Selain mengobati kanker, ternyata kapsul KBM juga berkhasiat mengobati penyakit lainnya :

1. Asam urat
2. Post Menstuation Sickness, penyakit datang bulan
3. Pegal-pegal
4. Anti inflamasi dan infeksi
5. Anti alergi
6. HIV
7. TBC

Inilah kesaksian pribadi dari kakak saya M.P. yang sekarang sudah berangsur-angsur sembuh, terakhir kali diperiksa dokter dengan rontgen dan dinyatakan tidak ada lagi cairan yang berkembang diparu-parunya.

Dedicated to my sister M.P. thanks for giving me inpiration in love & survival

Free of Charge Exercise

Everything is expensive nowadays. But everybody needs some exercise to loose weight or even to be fit. If we are fit, we are in good health, means we don't need to spend money for medication.

Here are some tips for Free Exercise (especially if you live in France)

1. Park Your Car and Walk : Find nearby  Free Parking spot and walk to your office, supermarket or school. Begin with slow walk slowly and make it faster, you can also add up the kilometer. All you need is a pair of walking shoes and more time !
2. Free Gym Tryout : very useful in big cities, as the competition, we want to do some try out of classes before deciding to pay 50€ monthly. But we can't do only once, we can negotiate with the gym coach to get several time of free class.
3. Urban Training : copy of Chinese Park, there are more and more of this programme, running in the city, work out your abs and shoulders on the park bench, in Paris there is session every Saturday, Free of Charge with a coach too..
4. Online Coach : There are lots of online coach propose 15 days Free Trial.  All you have to do is signing up, answer some questions about your goal to do sport and you can start your free gym online. Otherwise check out Youtube or Daily Motion

Removing Blackheads

Not recommended for acne or pop up blakchead
There are several ways of removing blackheads using products you can find in your kitchen :

• HONEY, warm up the honey a bit and place it on your blackhead pores, wait for 15 minutes. Rinse with warm water
• BAKING SODA, mix 3 tablespoon of baking soda with the same amount of water. Put on your skin 5 minutes and wash off
• POTATOES, put grated potatoes on infected area, they will extract the blackheads

Image from : talkskincare.com

Zumba Exercise

New way of having fun while doing exercise ! If you like latin dance and want to have a fitness level after aerobic. You can try Zumba.

Creator : Beto Perez from Colombia
Definitions : Mixture of aerobic, body sculpt and Latin dances. Its unusual sequenzes make its difference but students can follow without difficulties and  having fun. Zumba is not technical diciplines, it just a happy mix of : Salsa, Samba, Merengue, Jive, Reggaeton, Calypso, Mambo etc
Advantage : In one hour exercise you burn 800 calories ! With the cardio-rythme, students can control their breaths and improve endurance. All parts of body is included with this excercise, silhouette is refined, tone the muscles and  the main advantage of Zumba is happy & fun  atmosphere, no one takes seriously. Even those who are 'bad dancers' dare to let go and move their bodies.
Not recommended for those who have heart & knees problem.

Cleansing Your Face Without Facial Cotton Disc

Some among us has very sensitif skin that we became reactive with the Chlorine content in Facial Cotton. A tip from French Beautician : use a Towel made of Microfiber, they are on sold at Decathlon only as low as 3.95€. Microfiber is new material that is water absorbant, light and soft for your face.

10 Natural Way of Preventing Cold & Flu

1. WASH YOUR HANDS : Bacteries and germs can be everywhere, after people sneezing or coughing, they touch the telephone, door knob etc. They can live for hours even weeks for some case. Washing your hands regularly, will help to get rid of those germs & bacteries. 
2. WATCH WHILE SNEEZING & COUGHING : do not use your hands when you're sneezing or coughing but use a tissue paper, throw it away immediately !
3. DON'T TOUCH YOUR FACE : Cold & flu viruses come through your eyes, nose & mouth.
4. TAKE A SAUNA : High temperature above 80° kills cold & flu virus
5. DO AEROBIC REGULARLY : Aerobic exercise speeds up the heart and  pump larger quantities of oxygen to your blood; makes you sweat, this increases the body's natural virus-killing cells
6. DRINK LOTS OF FLUIDS : lots of water drain & cleanse your body out of poison & rehydrate. How to see if you need to drink more? Check out your urine, if the colour is yellowish means you need to drink more, if it's clear means you drink enough
7. EAT YOGHURT : the bacteria in yoghurt can increase the immune system to fight disease
8. DON'T SMOKE : smoke dries your nasal passages, thus cause the cold & flu virus stay longer
9. NO ALCHOHOL : alchohol suppresse our immune system
10. RELAX : by relawing you activate the immune system of your body, preventing virus. How to relax ? Relax is not doing nothing & sleep, but thinking about all pleasant thing in your life for about 30 minutes & take deep breath & listening to your body.

Resource :  webmd.com

Cookbook for Histamine

It is really hard to find cooking book for histamine intolerance, I guess this will be the first real book for me... When I started to have new passion in cooking, I also realized that I am condamned to be histamine intolerance, but life must go on, I must be positive and I still can do my hobby without suffering myself with flush, rashes, migrain and eczema, so spending lots of hours in front of the laptop to check out some menu idea for me.

Until one day I fell into a site called : Red Wine Headache Cookbook, thanks to Ella, the owner of this site who is also Histamine Intolerance just like myself, she wrote a book with the same title and you can be fans of her facebook page

So happy to finally get this book in my mailbox, honestly the recipe are difficult to follow, cause the diet is really strict, but I do some variation to meet my taste.

What you can eat if you're allergic to Histamine

There are many food to avoid when you have histamine allergic, that people want to invite me for dinner will ask me, what actually I can eat. That's too bad in most of the list I got from internet, magazine and even my allergist are saying what to avoid. That's why with all of experience I have with this allergic and ideas from people who share the same problem, I come into the conclusion of food ingredients that I can eat, which is easier to do cause the list isn't that long :

1. Poultry : chicken, turkey, rabbit
2. Fish : freshly caught fish from fisherman
3. Meat : all kinds in small quantity, but not the processed ones
4. Green Vegetables : lettuce, batavia salad
5. Vegetables : potatoes, beetroot, carrot, zuchinni green beans, celery, cabbage & cooked leeks, pumpkin, onion, garlic, cucumber
6. Grains, pasta, rice noodle, yeast free rye bread, corn, oats
7. Fruits : apple, pear, melon, blueberry, cranberries, litchi, mango, kakhi, rhubarb, cherries, apricot
8. Oil : olive oil
9. Tea : only herbal tea, not green, black tea
10. Egg : only yolk
11. Tofu ? some said soja it's no good for histamine, but I can manage to eat this favorite food of mine without problem, of course just a little bit like 80 gram...

Links to histamine related :

Histamine relief

Histamine medication (I dont test it yet)

Forum about allergic & histamine

Foto from: esltogo

Banana Loaf

3 over-ripe bananas
113 gram sugar
1 tspn baking powder
56 gram melted margarine/butter
170 gram self-raising flour

Thoroughly mash the banana and the sugar together. Add the rest of the ingredients and mix well. Put into 2 1lb loaf tins and bake in the oven at 150C for 1 hour. Cool on a wire rack, cut into slices to serve. Freezable.

Turkey breast marinated with thyme

350 g of turkey breast

2 TBS olive oil

1 TSP thyme

smashed garlic

1 TBS lime juice (not too much, this one contains of histamine too, but in small quantity)

salt & pepper

marinate the breast for 2 hours minimum & put on the barbecue or grill for 8 minutes each side

served with boiled potatoes or green beans

Apple dessert (Compote de pomme)

1 kg apple peel & cut into 4

250 ml water

10o g sugar

a bit of vanilla

put the apples inside the boiling mixture of sugar, water & vanilla

cook through 30 minutes in low fire until the apple become purée

Menu for low histamine diet

Since I'm diagnosed histamine intolerance last January 2010, I took some pills before taking the food contains of histamine. It was OK until end of July 2010, I was very anxious cause my family is coming in September and lots more good news, that I suddenly have rash & flushy, allergic again...

I went back to the allergic specialist and she gave me one month treatment with list of food that I should avoid.

It's quite tough to make the recipe of low histamine, as most of the food I like, again I say, the food I like, contains of histamine. Seashell, fish, pork, tomato, white egg, eggplant, cheese, yoghurt, soja products, dry saussage, conserved food & alcoholic drinks.

I try to search from internet, a site dedicated to the recipe for low histamine diet, but couldn't find any. So now I'm trying to write down some menu, could be good idea for those 2% of the population who suffer histamine intolerance like myself.

Menu 1

Apetizer : Cucumber with cider vinegar dressings (not wine vinegar coz it contains histamine)

Main course : Turkey breast marinated with thyme & garlic with boiled potatoes

Dessert : Apple dessert (compote de pomme)

Menu 2

Apetizer : Goat cheese pastry

Main course : Duck breast balsamic vinegar & honey

Dessert : Banana loaf

Cake au chévre (Goat cheese cake)

Ingredients :

180 g flour

1 sachet of yeast

3 eggs

100 g mascarpone

200 g goat cheese take out from fridge & cut into small cubes

bit of chopped basil leaves

bit of chopped chives

50 ml olive oil

50 ml milk

salt & pepper

How to make :

• Heat oven for 180°, put in a recipient : flour & yeast
• Mixer the eggs, oil & milk together, add salt & pepper
• Put the mixture into flour & yeast, add mascarpone
• Add the goat cheese in cubes & herbs
• Put inside the cake mould & cook for 50 minutes

Yoga versus Pilates

Yoga was founded thousand years ago, originally from India. Pilates was founded over 80 years ago by Joseph PILATES.

Yoga & Pilates both are known to support the development of long, strong, graceful bodies that move efficiently without creating bulky muscles. They both are associated with stress reduction and can be adjusted for a wide range of people, age & fitness level.

The difference from yoga. For me, yoga is more like spriritual, it's not a sport but a meditation of movements. But pilates is a sport to enhance fitness level. Also about breathing, yoga breathing is inhale & exhale from the nose but pilates breathing is inhale from nose & exhale from mouth.

Yoga focuses on stretch and Pilates focuses on strenght.

I do both, Yoga for my self consciousness and Pilates for my core strenght.

pilates.about.com

Nature and Beauty

My mom always uses cucumber or avocado or even white egg over her face, and I wonder what's the use of it, until I found this book with its explanation. The book is in French that I translated into English

REFRESHING MASK

Oily skin

3 tablespoon of gelantine

1 cup of lemon juice or tomato juice (recommended for acne) or grape juice (for aging skin)

Dry skin

3 tablespoon of gelatine

1 cup of rasberry juice or peach (hydration) or apple (astrigent) or pear (softening effect)

FIRMING MASK

1 white egg

1 teaspoon of glycerin

1 tablespoon of honey

add slowly 5 tablespoon of flour to make a paste

Put on the face and keep 15 minutes, then rinse with warm water

FRUIT MASK

Pores & hydration

1 banana smashed and mix with a bit of olive oil or sesame oil

Softening wrinkle skin

1 apricot smashed and mix with a bit of olive oil or sesame oil

Wrinkle skin

1 avocado smashed and mix with a bit of olive or sesame oil

Scrub

a bit of papaya seed is good for scrubbing the face, avoid the eye contour !!

HYDRATING MASK

mix one part of milk with two part of honey, put into the face, wait for 15 minutes, rinse

or

2 tablespoon of avocado, 2 tablespoon of honey and 1 egg yolk, mix together and apply

ACNE SKIN

mix one apple (peeled) with 1 tablespoon of honey

or

1 carrot (shredded) with a bit of lime juice

or

boil one carrot in boiling water and smash and mix with yoghurt. 3 part of carrot for 1 part of yoghurt.

CLEANSING MASK

use the smashed rasberry

mini-encyclopédie des trucs & astuces BIO pour la maison

NATURAL REMEDIES for HEALTH [C]

Cellulite

Drink a lot of infusion of verveine or java tea (orthosiphon stamineus; kumis kucing in Indonesian) dilute 1 teaspoon of java tea leaves in boiling water for two minutes & drink everyday.

Massage the part of body with 10 part of hazelnut oil mixed with 1 part of essential oil such as : sage or pine oil (try first to small part of the body cause it may cause allergic to some case)

Colic

Drink the mixture of 2 teaspoon of lemongrass in 1 litre of boiling water

NATURAL REMEDIES for HEALTH [B]

BACK PAIN

• try hot bottle compress or using ice pack
• do some back strecthing
• hot bath may help
• yoga for backpain is also good, try this : 
• Laying down, inhale and slowly raise your head, shoulders and body up to the dorsal part of your back. 
  Raise your arms up to shoulder level. But see that they are parallel to the ground.
  Retain the pose for some time.
  Exhale and come down to the floor. Relax.
  The same movements must be repeated 5 times

Bacterial Vaginitis

• Eat or apply plain yogurt directly to the vagina. Alternatively, a tampon soaked in yogurt can be inserted.
• Garlic has antibacterial and antifungal properties. Garlic can be taken internally or can be applied directly on the vagina.
• Use calendula herb to reduce the inflammation.
• Herbs like tea tree oil, black walnut, Echinacea and goldenseal are effective in treating bacterial vaginitis.
• Use boric acid douche to acidify vaginal pH.
• Douche to reduce inflammation Add 12 tsp of calendula to boiling water, steep the mixture and cool it before use.
• Soak a tea bag in water and cool it in refrigerator and then apply it to the vagina.

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