Tips For Healthy Grocery Shopping

Grocery stores are full of unhealthy food. Don't think that because it's in the store, it's good for you. Remember, the grocery store is in business to make money. With most Americans unknowingly addicted to sugar, the grocer plays on that addiction. Your grocer loves it when you do your grocery shopping hungry. Then those sugar cravings really kick in. Most people have no idea what they're eating. They don't know if it's processed, if it contains saturated fat or unsaturated fat, if it has a lot of sugar or a little sugar, etc. They buy food that they have been programmed to buy by commercials, magazine ads, and in-store displays. Good marketing works in America, and it sells a bunch of junk full of sugar, saturated fat, cholesterol, sodium, additives, and chemicals.

Whether you know it or not, this marketing and your addictions are slowly causing you to kill yourselves from long-term, degenerative diseases. Hopefully there will be a time when the public will stop buying the poisonous food that fills the aisles of our grocery stores. If we don't buy it, they won't make it.

You should have a pretty good idea of what kind of foods you should be looking for in the grocery store-natural foods that are low in sugar and saturated fat, cholesterol, and sodium; foods made from whole grains; fresh fruit and vegetables; and lean meats.

Your first mistake when you go grocery shopping is not to bring a list. This means you are basically walking up and down aisles and throwing whatever strikes your fancy into your grocery cart. Stores thrive on impulse buying. Why do you think they have all of that junk-magazines, candy, chocolate, knick-knacks, etc.-by the checkout lines? They know that a certain percentage of you will pick at least one extra item from that area and throw it in your cart.

Go through your kitchen and pantry and make a list of exactly what you need. The list helps battle impulse buying. Go to the grocery store and buy exactly those things you have on your list and nothing more. The longer you are there, the more likely you are to leave with extra junk. If you bring it home, you'll eat it. Keep your environment free of bad food. Also, try not to shop between 4 PM and 7 PM-that's when the stores are the most crowded.

How can Americans be consuming less fat, yet become fatter than before? There is a whole new marketing craze in grocery stores now. In every aisle, you see the words "fat free." These labels cleverly disguise this food as healthy. People blindly buy anything fat free, thinking it is okay. But because something is fat free doesn't mean you can eat unlimited amounts of it.

These fat-free items are simple carbohydrates (mostly sugar) that have little or no nutritional value. The fat is removed and replaced by sugar. People are gobbling down cookies, cakes, and other sugar-loaded carbs by the truckload. The simple carbs are broken down in the body and stored as fat if they are not used for energy. Most candy is fat free. Does that mean it's healthy for you? Once again, it is simple sugar, which is stored as fat if not used by the body. Look at the amount of sugar in candy like Twizzlers and Skittles. Eat just a few, and you've ingested twenty to over thirty grams of sugar. Remember going to the movies and consuming half a box of candy, such as Dots, Junior Mints, or Milk Duds? You put between 50 and 100 grams of sugar in your body. Ten grams of sugar is equal to one teaspoon of sugar. Do you think you could eat five to ten teaspoons of sugar?

When you see an item in the grocery store labeled fat-free, check the sugar content. If it is over six to eight grams of sugar per serving, let it stay on the grocer's shelf. If you make a conscious effort to break the sugar habit, you'll see and feel a whole new you. This is a scientific proven fact, not a guess.

Learn to read labels. Almost every food item sold in the grocery store has a "nutrition facts" panel on it that shows how many calories, fat, saturated fat, cholesterol, sugar, sodium, and other nutrients are in the item. When you start checking nutrition facts of the foods that you've been consuming for years, you might be a bit startled. Chances are a lot of it is loaded with all the bad things we've been talking about. This could be the single most important health habit you could practice. Know what you are putting into your body instead of blindly trusting your grocer and the food manufacturers. Start eating healthier and exercising daily to reduce your chances of chronic disease to almost zero!

I don't know why people, when armed with information like this, continue to sabotage their health and cut years off their lives! All I can say is I want to live the longest, healthiest life possible-don't you?

Get more Health Tips at http://blog.totalhealth4life.net/ by Rico Connor a 54-year-old, self-taught Health & Fitness expert reveals his "Ultimate Health Regimen", the ONLY TOTAL, ALL ENCOMPASSING program that trains your mind as well as your body, which will transform your body in just 7 hours a week and improve your quality of life in every way. Achieve optimal health, reverse aging and fight disease.

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The Virtues of a Well-Selected Wine Glass

My Cup Runneth Over

So, you've come to realize that your home is in one of the premier wine regions in the country. You begin to make the rounds to the various wineries, engage in critical wine tasting and develop a cultured palate for the stuff. Over time you begin building a well-represented wine collection and consider yourself somewhat knowledgeable on the topic. Family and friends turn to you when it comes time to select the perfect wine for a particularly well thought out meal or event. You have become the very image of refinement and sophistication. You ascend from the depths of your wine cellar with a choice bottle of merlot, selected for its unusually productive and climatically sound year. You share the fact that it has been aged in French oak and will blend handsomely with its myriad of peppery flavors to accentuate the meal. Uncorking the bottle, you smile with a confident satisfaction. You turn to the credenza and bring over a silver tray filled with glasses. Not just any glasses, but mugs adorned with the logos of your favorite National Hockey League teams. Oh, the horror. Your guests have been insulted and all hastily leave in utter disgust. Your spouse faints with a mournful groan and a dramatic flourish of the arm and the dog relieves himself in your favorite slippers. You have revealed yourself as an uncultured heathen; a veritable barbarian.

Could this tragedy have been avoided? Sure it could. Had you taken but a few moments to learn of the virtuous nature of the well-developed wine glass, this ugly matter might never have happened. Fortunately for you, we will start your wine glass education here and now, before it's too late. Before you begin an irreversible, irretrievable journey into the dark depths of what we now recognize as a disease. A disease called Vitis Vinifera Ignoramus. It's too awful to even contemplate.

First, we will have a look at prices. Since you may still be in the infantile stages of wine glass appreciation, you should start with a more inexpensive glass, since breaking them is not uncommon. In that vein of thought, you should also be mindful to purchase a higher number than those you intend for immediate use or entertaining. If, for example, you consider a home-based wine-tasting event, perhaps with other members of your Hells Angels chapter, you might want to have enough glasses to provide several for each participant. The experience of comparing good wines with their color and bouquet will surely bring delight to your friends as they reflect back on the moment, roaring down the road on their Harley hogs.

Next, we will consider the exterior of the glass. Wine glasses can be purchased in a myriad of sizes, shapes, styles, and exterior designs. Even the glass itself can be tinted in a seemingly limitless selection of colors. While it is nice to have the friendly face of Sponge Bob Square Pants looking back at you while sipping a precocious Beaujolais, it is best to have nothing at all imprinted on the glass. Part of the experience of sampling a wine is peering through the glass, like a lusty peeping Tom, to better ascertain its rich colors.

The rim of the glass should be thin and not overly large. Inhibiting the flow of wine is bad. Very bad. Also, a large rounded rim induces an annoying dribble that trickles down the side of your glass, ultimately dripping onto your freshly pressed leather butt-less chaps. No one likes to appear more like a drooling monkey than is absolutely necessary, unless of course it is for the benefit of your mother-in-law. From here, we shall examine the stem. The stem should be long enough to allow for a firm grip without jeopardizing the stability of the freestanding glass. One must be discouraged from holding a glass of wine by the bowl, as it is likely to warm the wine above its optimal drinking temperature. The stem can be simple or ornate, depending on the stylistic preference of the owner. A pistol grip is particularly handsome.

Contrary to consoling comments from some women, size is important. A wine glass that is too small leaves the wine drinker with an awkward, unsatisfied feeling. One should be invited by the sense of abundance awaiting in the glass. But it should not be so abundant as to create chandelier swinging events or the old lampshade on the noggin routine. It is universally considered to be in poor taste to spoil a wine tasting event by prodigious amounts of projectile vomiting. Not that people won't find that entertaining.

That said, we press onward. The final consideration in examining the elegance and functionality of a wine glass is how to properly fill it. Pour from the decanter or bottle in a controlled, even flow. One should pour to the halfway point to allow the bouquet room to flourish. You will need room to swirl the wine in the glass to determine the amount of sugar present, a process not to be confused with the swirly, which so aptly set your hairstyle in college.

Thus, we have arrived at the end. You are now qualified to select the proper wine glass for your drinking pleasure. We hope you have found some benefit in this brief, humble tutorial, and we leave you with a few words of wisdom. In response to wealthy socialite Bessie Braddock observing, "Sir, you are drunk!" Winston Churchill responded with these fitting words, "Madam, you are ugly. In the morning, I shall be sober." His wisdom knew no bounds. So enjoy your wine with unfettered ebullience and remember to use the valuable tools gleaned from your wine glass education.

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An Introduction to Wine Tasting

Wine tasting is the sensory examination and assessment of wine. While the practice of wine tasting is as ancient as its production, a more formalized methodology has slowly become established from the 14th century onwards. Wine tasting is an art and not every person can be a perfect wine taster. One needs to have a very fine sense of smell and taste, together with the ability to distinguish subtle color differences. Experience of tasting several wines of different aromas, grapes and blends is essential.

Learning Wine Tasting

It is not too tough to learn the art of wine tasting. You do not need to be an avid drinker, but you should have the three basic senses as stated

1) ability to discern subtle color differences

2) a keen sense of smell, and

3) a keen sense of taste. If you have these three qualities then you only need some dedication and extra bit of interest in this art form. If you have knowledge of different wine varieties, their areas of production and the wine making process, along with knowledge of the grapes used in making wine, then that will surely be a helpful factor in assessing the quality of a wine as well as enabling you to make judged comparison with other varieties available.

It is easy to learn the practice of wine tasting and if you already enjoy wine, learning the nuances will increase the pleasure that you get from tasting and drinking wine.

Appearance - The color of wine is a major deciding factor, it varies tremendously even in same type of wines. Therefore, wine should be poured in a clear glass in front of a white background to appraise the color of wine. It is a fact that a white wine is not actually white. Its color can vary through shades of green, yellow or brown.

Deeper colors in white wine often indicate greater flavor and advancing age. Similarly, red wines are not just red. They can be pale red and range from almost purple to deep brown red; the color usually becoming lighter with growing age. With time, many red wines may improve but generally age will ruin most white wines. Do seek sound advice if you intend to buy wines to store for more than a few months.

Smell (Bouquet) - Move the glass of wine in your hands in a circular motion, this releases molecules in the wine allowing you to smell the aroma. Take a light sniff first and catch the aroma of the wine properly, then take a deep whiff and concentrate on the depth of aroma. Do not try to taste it too early. After tasting and smelling several wines, you will start to notice the similarities and differences that exist between them.

Taste (Palate) - The most important deciding factor of any wine is its taste. The balance between fruit and acidity is a vital factor. Initial taste, and aftertaste, both are important. Give proper attention to both and note whether it is light or robust? Is it smooth or harsh? After swallowing wine, feel how long the flavors last in your mouth. Was it pleasant?

These are three deciding factors in wine tasting. The more diverse the selection of wines you try, and the more attention you pay to each wine, the better you will become at ascertaining and describing each wine's characteristics. If you really want to become an expert wine taster, you should visit wine tasting events in your area or arrange a wine tasting event at home for a few like minded friends.

Winelines was founded by Martin de Rusett, an established Wine Merchant and lecturer in London. The Company aims to expose the mystery that surrounds wine tasting as well as wine making, storing and serving, in order to educate and entertain.

For more information visit : Winelines

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Ten Tips to Enjoy Your Cooking

Do you cook? If yes, do you really enjoy your cooking? Most probably you have relegated cooking as a daily must-do drudgery, a boring chore that has to be gone through. You can enjoy your cooking if you set your mind to do so. No one can deny the fact that they feel a peculiar pleasure and thrill when the dish that they cooked turned out to be a masterpiece. You can really enjoy not only the food you make but the way you make it.

Cooking, I believe, is an art in itself. Like Music and Dance, making a good dish or recipe is a fine art. Every dish is a perfect blend of ingredients and the chemistry between the ingredients. If one loves the job of making a fine dish then the taste and feel of the dish gets doubly enhanced. If you have the taste and affinity for Cooking, here are a few tips to make your dishes look, feel and taste better. :

1. First make sure that you really want to prepare that dish.
2. Keep all the condiments and other ingredients ready at hand, in the correct measures.
3. Wash, peel, cut and keep vegetables ready
4. Clean, chop and cut meat and fish. Keep ready.
5. Choose method of cooking- Gas, Electricity or Microwave :Keep utensils ready.
6. Read the recipe once again, if you are cooking by the recipe. If not, just recollect the methodology.
7. Keep sufficient water, oil or fat ready at hand.
8. Always note to keep the heat at the medium level to avoid overcooking your dishes
9. Use teflon-coated thick copper bottom vessels or glass cookware for your cooking.
10. Always rely on your taste buds to ensure that your cooking has come out right.

Pleasure stoke your passion for cooking by reading, getting people to appraise your dishes by tasting and getting first hand knowledge of all the spices and other condiments and what they do to enhance the flavour and taste of your dishes.

Happy Cooking! Enjoy!

PKP Iyer

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Crock Pot Cooking Tips For Everyone

One of the least used and yet most versatile tools in the average kitchen is the slow cooker. With just a few crock pot cooking tips you can turn this dust collector into one of the most useful items in your kitchen

This is some of the best crock pot cooking tips obtainable out there.

Buying roasts and other big cuts of meat that will go into in your crock pot easily is important. If the cut wont fit it into the container, trimming the piece down works better than attempting to stuff it further. This is one of the most significant tips on using crock pots that people will learn to appreciate.

Before cooking, you must get rid of the skin and cut away any extra fat from the poultry and other meats. This will assist to lessen the quantity of fat in the completed serving of food as well eliminate any oily flavor.

Some of the best crock pot cooking tips involve using vegetables. Fresh root vegetables, such as potatoes, carrots, and onions, should be placed in the bottom of the pot, under the meat, for more even cooking. These types of vegetables tend to cook more slowly than meat.

This is another neat trick you can use. You can pace the process of thickening the sauces near the end of cooking time by turning up the heat setting. Tasting the liquid to ensure that it has had enough time to flavor is advisable. Leave it on low heat and let it sit a little bit longer until you start to taste the flavor that you want.

Another important point to remember is seasoning in crock pot cooking. Periodically seasoning and tasting prior to taking away the dish is important. This is because crock pots, after sitting for some time, will tend to sometimes water down the flavors. Being resourceful with your seasonings is a good practice. Adding seasoned salt, garlic powder, seasoned pepper, and complementary herbs and spices is also an excellent way to complete the cooking.

Another important thing to remember is that in slow cooked foods, the dish will tend to lose its color. Utilizing certain garnish such as chopped fresh parsley, chives, tomatoes, and red or green peppers when the cooking is nearing completion, helps by adding color to the dish.

Buying a cookbook that has been written especially for crock pot cooking is amongst the best ways to learn to use your slow cooker more effectively. Not only do they offer delicious recipes but also lots of crock pot cooking tips that can help you use your slow cooker with ease and you can find these types of books either online or offline. The slow cooker can really earn its keep once you know how to put it to work, in today's busy world of working families.

Feel free to browse our Online Cooking Guides You may also want to receive our Special Report "Master Chef Secrets"

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El Patio Restaurant in Havana, For the Best Gourmet

José Lezama Lima (1910-1976), a very polemic Cuban author, who wrote the novel Paradiso chose El Patio restaurant in La Habana Vieja as cuisine headquarter, a site of many aromas and a daydreaming environment.

For the writer, who compared once the lamb to the reading and placing them in their corresponding place, without discrediting one before another, it was a pleasant place worth to be visited in order to try some of its excellent dishes served in a unique decoration environment.
A site declared World Heritage by UNESCO in 1982 has been opened for more than 40 years February 28, 1965) in the Plaza de la Catedral at the ancient area of the capital, ideal to know about its history.

Lezama Lima chose the best, as hundreds of tourists do day after day, who walk alone or in group the historic-cultural areas in this neighborhood, through stone treets, and fachades that still have the traces of the colonial architecture.

The restaurant is located in a house of the 18th century, the Casa del Marqués de Aguas Claras, that was used for different purposes until it was a very luxury dining house.
It is worth passing by for those who have a demanding taste. The facitlity features 350 seats, spread in four restaurants, a coffe shop in the portal of the house and two snack-bar, as well as a show room with 13 seats, that makes it a renewing complex.

The Patio gives service to approximately 25 thousand customers yearly, as well as it is integrated to cultural galas in the Plaza de la Catedral due to the parties for the New Year and they supply those events with their dishes, where thousands of people attend yearly.

The staff tells that their marketing strategy is client oriented, the quality of the offer, historic-cultural potential of the facility and a greater publicity of their dishes.

Of course, there is a range of the Cuban intellectuality that is bound to this trategy since, apart from Lezama Lima, there are frequent comers such as the painters Victor Manuel, Posada, the Ecuadorian Oswaldo Guayasamín, the writer Alejo Carpentier, the Nicaraguan politician Daniel Ortega, the Cuban musician Frank Fernández and Juan Formell, as well as the Ministries of culture from different countries.

Some of them dead, giving supreme soul and spirituality, other alive, renewing each day the linage of the restaurant, they enforce a unique environment that many people claim not just to eat by to live an incomparable moment.

Spanish, Italians and French prefer them due to their variety in a carte of 32 dishes of international food and local (typical) above all, supported by national renown products such as the rum, the cigar and the coffee.

An excellent wine carte ends the list, where the meats could be very well accompanied, but also seafood is demanded in order to taste them with white wine and then to complete the dinner. The Patio is a truly Cuban feast.

Jose Mauricio Maurette is a Tailor-Made Cuba holiday specialist and has a vast experience in organizing holidays to Cuba. This is one of a series of articles devoted to promote the Cuban Culture and to give information on what to do and see in your Holidays to Cuba.

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Basic Tomato Sauce For Pasta

A basic recipe that is good just as is, or add an endless variety of ingredients to suit your taste!

• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 small onion finely chopped
• 1 stalk celery finely chopped
• 1 small carrot finely chopped
• 2 tablespoons dried parsley flakes
• 1 tablespoon dried basil
• 1 tablespoon dried oregano
• 1 28 ounce can crushed or diced tomatoes
• 1/2 of 6 ounce can tomato paste
• 3 tablespoons dry sherry or 1/2 cup red wine
• small pinch red pepper flakes or powder
• 4 tablespoons olive oil
• ground black pepper to taste
• salt to taste

Cook onions, carrot and celery in olive oil over low heat for a minute or two. Add garlic and cook until onions are translucent, about 10 minutes or so. Be careful not to burn the garlic! Garlic is usually added after the onions and celery cook for a few minutes because garlic will burn faster. Burnt garlic turns bitter!

Add parsley, basil, oregano and pepper. Increase heat to medium and add tomatoes, tomato paste and sherry. Cook for a few minutes while stirring. Add pepper flakes, cover and reduce heat to low simmer and cook for 30 minutes.

And that's all there is to it! You can make the sauce thinner by adding a little tomato juice or water to it, but I like it thick! This sauce is an excellent base that you can add many things to. Add meat, sliced mushrooms, zucchini, artichoke hearts, green peppers, you name it! If you're going to add meat, cook the meat first, and add before the tomatoes. Any vegetables can be cut up and added just before the tomatoes.

2 pounds of fresh peeled and seeded tomatoes may be used instead of canned. If fresh tomatoes are used, more salt may be needed and the sauce may need to cook a little longer.

The flavors in this sauce get even better if it is frozen or kept in the refrigerator for a day or two.

Alan Beggerow owns and operates Cathleen's Bargain Basement, an online business that offers custom made apparel and hand crafted teddy bears by Cathleen, and also offers a selection of jewelry, home decor, Asian motif items, and much more. http://www.cathleensbargainbasement.com

Alan Beggerow is also a free lance writer. Visit his writing services website, Ghostwriter, at http://www.ghostwriterboo.blogspot.com

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Can You Wonder the Benefits of Wine?

One of the oldest alcoholic beverages is wine; its existence has been since thousands of years since 6000 B.C. It is made from the fermentation of grape juice. There is whole lot of varieties of wine available. One among these wines is the red wine which in recent days has been proven that it has a variety of benefits. Although red wine has gamete of benefits, but it is to be worth noted these benefits can be derived from moderate consumption and if the consumption is excessive it can have negative impacts on our health rather than its benefits. Current statistics suggest that red wine can provide much more benefits than just relaxation.

Increases the longevity of life:

Current data suggests that red wine has an element in it which extends the longevity of life .An article research suggests that in 2000 there were more than 600 million people above the age of 60 years and this figure in 2025 will reach about 1.2 billion in 2025.

The presence of this element in red wine thus helps to increase the life span of human beings and they could also remove the age related illness of human beings. According to surveys in France, Denmark, UK and Finland limited quantity of red wine consumption is more beneficial than the consumption of beers and other spirits.

Smoking

Intense smoking damages the vessels and they tend to lose the natural ability to relax. However red wine has some beneficial impacts to remove the negative impact of smoking. Red wine in the presence or absence of alcohol form a layer of cells called endothelium cells form a friction reducing lining in the blood vessels, heart and the lymph vessels, thus reducing the negative effects of smoking.

Effects on heart

One of the most proven and studied benefit of wine is that it is very much heart protective effect. Limited consumption of heart disease acts as a protection against the coronary heart disease. It reduces the production LDL (bad cholesterol) and it boosts the production of HDL (good cholesterol).

Blood clotting

Another very important feature of red wine is its ability towards anticlotting. Consumers who consume wine to light and moderate levels have lower levels of protein fibrinogen which promotes blood clot formation.

Hypertension

When the wine is consumed in excess it acts as a risk factor for hypertension .However there have been studies which have proved that if 250ml of wine is consumed along with the meal it can reduce the blood pressure in hypertensive persons.

Kidney stone formation

It also reduces the risk of kidney stone formation.

To conclude with I would not suggest everyone to drink wine wholeheartedly but I would
suggest that if you fall in the above situation that it would be a good idea to consume wine in moderate quantity.

Shijina is an expert SEO copywriter for Napa valley wine tours.

She written many articles like Napa valley articles, wine country tours, napa valley tours For more information visit our site Wine country tours. Contact me at shijinaseo@gmail.com

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Cake Decorating Ideas

A delightful cake is all that we require celebrating an occasion. It not only adds color to our joy but also transcends us into a glorious world of fashionable food.

No cake is complete without its decoration. In fact decoration makes the cake fancier and makes us more eager to have it. For decorating a cake all that is required is sugar for icing and plentiful creative ideas to enhance the look and feel of the cakes. Moulds are available in the market in various shapes and sizes such as flower moulds or moulds in the shape of some cartoon characters. Thick cream can be filled in these moulds to get different kinds of items for beautification. Apart from cream other edible articles such as chocolates(grated, solidified into figures or in the liquid form), candies, butter cream, fruit pieces like cherries, strawberries and pineapples can be used according to imagination and occasion.

Thematic decoration of the cakes not only adds flavor to the occasion but also proves the importance of the occasion. Such as a cake meant for a wedding or an anniversary can be given a glossy or a snowy look by sprinkling fine sugar loosely over the top layer and its sides can be decked out with floral designs made of soft cream. Likewise a kid's party or a birthday can be made more colorful by positioning Disney characters using moulds on the top layer.

Cake decorations can also be designed with similar colors or symbols to remind important days like a cake with the color of national flag or symbol add stars to the celebration of the Independence Day. Similar arrangements can be done matching to the taste of the season.

There are a number of frostings or icings used for cake decorations. Victorian style, Royal icing, Fondant, Ganache, Marzipan are a few of them.

While cake decoration is a form of fine art, there are a number a number of culinary schools that teach this wonderful art. This art form can be learned from home too with the help of various books and CDs that provide step by step, simple procedures to master this skill. Cake decorating can become a good source of income once you become proficient in this art. Greater numbers of companies are looking for new and creative ideas for the decoration and ornamentation of the sugary coated sweet desserts. It can also be developed as a hobby that provides immense satisfaction and applauds once you are through with it. Hence cake decoration is a magnificent art.

http://decoratingwithtaste.com/ Cake Decorating Ideas - A blog dedicated to cake decorating. Learn decorating techniques, view pictures of beautifully decorated cakes, read about what tools you can use to decorate cakes, and more by visiting this blog.

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Purified Water Improves the Taste of Tea and Coffee

If you are a coffee lover or a tea devotee, then you know the feeling whenever you get a cup of your favorite that tastes absolutely delicious. You're the kind of person who will go and purchase a brand new tea or coffee maker just to make sure that you can make an incredible brew any time the mood hits you.

You get the machine home and make your first cup, anxious to make sure that this new "toy" will make a brew that matches the taste you are looking for. Much to your delight, it does! Your cup of tea is excellent, and you settle back with satisfaction, looking forward to many days and weeks of unbeatable tea and coffee.

The first few times you use your new machine, you get the same wonderful taste, and you are so pleased. You pat yourself on the back and think that you have never made a better purchase! But then, things change. Your tea doesn't taste as good as it did when the machine was new, and you can't understand why. After all, the machine isn't that old. True enough, you have made quite a bit of tea in it, perhaps as much as six to eight cups a day, but that shouldn't have done anything to the taste! You considered that use as more or less breaking the machine in.

Your tea continues to taste rather "off", and you are getting desperate. You're out shopping one afternoon, and a sudden craving for hot tea nearly overwhelms you, so you stop in at the hugely popular coffee shop on the next block, which you know also serves a pretty good cup of tea. You order, prepare your tea with milk and sugar as usual, and take a tentative sip. There it is! That flavor that you've been looking for, the one you were able to create at home when your tea maker was new. You go up to the counter to ask a question.

"Why does your tea taste so much better than the tea I make at home?" The lady behind the counter smiles knowingly at you. "Are you using purified water, or at the very least, filtered water to make your tea with?" she asks. "Why, no," you admit, surprised. "I've been using tap water like I always have, and making my tea in a new electric coffee and tea maker that I got a couple of weeks ago. The first few days, the tea tasted superb - just like it does when I get it here. But now, it tastes totally different, and I don't understand it at all!"

"It's your machine," says the barista. "How can that be?" you want to know, perplexed. "It's practically brand new!" "That's the thing," explains the barista. "When your machine was brand new, of course it made good tea. The impurities in your tap water had not had the chance to build up on the inside of the machine. That's why the tea tasted good at first. But now, after you have used the machine for a while, the impurities are there. And, they definitely will affect the quality of the finished product - your tea, and coffee, too."

"So, what do I do?" you ask. "Do I have to keep buying a new machine every few weeks in order to have a decent tasting cup of tea?" The barista laughed. "Hardly! That would end up being very expensive! No, all you need to do is clean your machine thoroughly when you get home. You probably got instructions along with it that tell you the best way to do it, and I'm pretty sure it involves white vinegar. Once you have it nice and clean, never use tap water in it again! Always use purified water, because it's the best and purest water that you can buy. Once you've done this, your tea or coffee will taste exactly the same at home as it does here - provided you are using the same type of tea, of course!"

Figuring you have nothing to lose, you go home and dig out your instruction manual to learn how to clean your tea maker. Once it's as clean as new, you set about brewing a cup of tea using purified water. Amazingly, the barista was right! Your tea tastes just like it did at the coffee shop!

And, it makes perfect sense, too. Any tea or coffee guru will tell you that the secret to brewing a perfect cup of either, besides the type of coffee or tea you are using, is the quality of the water you are brewing with! If you think about it, tea or coffee is mostly water anyway. When that water has an unpleasant taste or odor, like some tap waters do, how can you expect your tea to taste good?

So, the consensus is that purified water most definitely improves the taste of your tea and coffee! It makes such a big difference when you use purified water that it's astounding! If you like your coffee... if you love your tea... use purified water! You'll be glad you did!

Jon Stout is Chairman of the Golden Moon Tea Company. For more information about green tea, oolong tea go to the Golden Moon Tea website.

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All You Need to Know About Caffeine

A lot of people will take too much caffeine each day. A lot of people will drink a lot of coffee though out the day. In fact, the case will be worse if you drink a lot of coke. Besides caffeine, you are also taking too much sugar. You should try to understand how caffeine can be good for you and what happens if you are taking too much of it.

As a matter of fact, caffeine can make you feel less sleepy. This is why most people would like to have a cup of coffee in the morning. If you feel tired after work in the evening, you may also try to drink a cup of coffee. Drinking only one cup of coffee a day will not really hurt. However, drinking six cups a day will probably have adverse effect on you.

One of the side effects of taking too much caffeine is that you may not be able to sleep. Since caffeine can help to wake you up, you will find it very difficult to fall asleep if you take too much caffeine. Though caffeine can help to keep you wake up. It can also be dangerous for people to think that they can take coffee instead of taking rest and going to sleep. This is especially true for vehicle drivers.

Drivers who think that they can just take a cup of coffee and do not need to sleep will pose real threat to all people on the road. In fact, you should try to take a rest when you feel tired or sleepy. A cup of coffee or a can of coke will never be the solution in this case.

Besides, caffeine can be something addictive. A lot of people nowadays are indeed addicted to caffeine. To be more exact, most people are addicted to coffee. Of course some people may also be addicted to coke. People who are addicted to caffeine will shake if they do not take caffeine. Although caffeine is not any kind of drug, it will not be a good idea if you are addicted to it.

Remember, when you feel tired, you should try to take a nap. Caffeine is never a substitute of taking rest or sleeping. As mention, if you are a driver and feel really tired, you should never think that you can just drink a cup of coffee continue driving. Yet taking a cup of coffee in the morning may do good to your. You should know how you can use caffeine instead of using it wrongly.

Antony Lee has a website on Health, Fitness and Wellness. Be sure to check Healthy Weight Loss Plans.

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A 5 Step Guide to Selecting the Best Coffee Beans

Most consumers would think that coffee is coffee and that it wouldn't matter if it's instant or brewed as long as it tastes okay and wakes them up. While that is all fine and dandy, it is worth noting that picking the best beans according to your preference can result in a coffee which will be most looked forward to every morning. And if you own a grinder or a grind and brew coffee maker, you will notice the difference once you start thinking about your options and you will be glad that you did.

• Do Coffee Species Matter?

There are different species of coffee plants like Coffea arabica, Coffea benghalensis, Coffea canephora, Coffea congensis, Coffea excelsa, Coffea gallienii, Coffea bonnieri, Coffea mogeneti, Coffea liberica, and Coffea stenophylla. Each species produce beans that have certain different characteristics and distinct flavor profiles.

Around 75% of the world's coffee trade is comprised of Coffee Arabica, the reason being its preferred flavor and ability to thrive in most areas. Arabica beans are coveted for the deep aroma and great flavor that can go with most coffee additives like cream, sugar, and so on. This is something that most coffee drinkers agree on with good reason. You can never go wrong with a high quality brand of 100% Arabica with a medium roast.

• Which Roast Is The Best?

There are different types of roast, depending on how long the beans are roasted. It can be determined by different degrees of darkness. There are four main types of roasts - Light (Cinnamon Roast, Half City, New England), Medium (Full city, American, Regular, Breakfast, Brown), Dark (High, Viennese, Italian Espresso, Continental), and Darkest (Italian, French, Spanish).

Describing the taste of different roasts is as subjective as that of wine. There is no substitute to judging them with your own palate as only you can decide what your personal taste is. Choosing a type of roast is mostly on personal preference, but most people do like medium roast for its balanced flavor and sweetness.

• How Important Is The Origin?

Coffee beans are distinct in their terrier, or capturing the place in where they were grown. While differences in flavor can be subtle, beans grown in Hawaii and Central America are more of snappy and vibrant variety, while those from East Africa and Yemen are deeper in bitterness, and those grown in Indonesia and Sumatra are even more complex in flavor.

• Storing Coffee Beans

When open to air and light, roasted coffee beans can lose their flavor and go stale quite quickly. The best way to store beans is with an opaque airtight canister at room temperature. Theoretically, refrigeration can help preserve the beans longer, but with frequent opening of containers for use creating condensation, the moisture can tamper with the beans' flavor.

When purchasing beans, make sure to get those stored in a sealed bag with a one-way valve laminated on it, which lets carbon dioxide out and keeping outside air from entering. Upon roasting, coffee beans produce prodigious amounts of carbon dioxide, so such valves are necessary for initial storage. Either that or frequent opening of jars for venting as done by most coffee shops. Do not go for beans stored in open beans as they would mostly be stale.

• Grinding It Right

The perfect grind size is crucial so that the right amount of the flavor is extracted from the beans without going to far, which will take excess bitterness along for the ride. The smaller the grind size, the more surface area there is and over extraction is a big possibility. Too big of a grind size will just keep the hot water from getting enough flavor. Most people would say that they don't like strong coffee, while the reality is that they don't like bitter coffee. With coffee, strong doesn't really have to mean bitter.

If your coffee maker comes with a grinder, then use it. Experiment with different grind sizes to find your preference. If there is no grinder along with your coffee maker, then a small coffee grinder with pulse action will do the job just fine. Grinding your own is best as it is better to draw out the flavors closer to brewing time than having them ground in the shop. Most find a 15-20 second grind best while espresso calls for a finer grind.

Selecting and storing the beans right can have a great impact on the flavor of your coffee, a difference of changing the mediocre coffee from your coffee machine to a restaurant quality one in the comforts of your own home. So next time you are grocery shopping for coffee give coffee beans choice some thought.

Having the best coffee maker helps, but buying the best beans and grinding them right can make a huge difference to the quality of your brew.

Yogi Shinde is the webmaster of Coffee Maker Ratings & Reviews website which provides unbiased information on different types and brands of coffee makers. This article is free for publishing provided the resource link is maintained.

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