Paleo

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Why should health & fitness professionals be recommending bone broth?

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Why should health & fitness professionals be recommending bone broth?

As health and fitness professionals we can sometimes be quick to recommend supplements to our clients. Supplements should be an addition to a healthy sustainable diet and only used when needed. If the nutrients we need can be obtained from food sources, we should be promoting these first. Mother Nature designed out food to contain an abundance of vitamins, minerals, enzymes and co-factors that are essential to our survival. Processed foods are often void, or very low, on these nutrients and this is why so many people are deficient in key nutrients. As health and fitness professionals we should be helping our clients make smart dietary choices and adding foods such as bone broth to their diet.

DAY 27 - PLANTAIN CHIPS

DAY 27 - PLANTAIN CHIPS

This month the team at TSTM are publishing health Paleo recipes. Our professional chef Helena is leading the way with the Paleo challenge we’ve set, but she has asked me to add a couple of recipes in the final week. How can I compete with a professional chef?

Paleo snacks are often a struggle for most people, so I was thinking my first recipe should be a snack. Plantain chips can be eaten hot or cold. You can make up a large batch and save them for snacks. Green plantains are a resistance starch, which makes them suitable for diabetics as resistance starch does not raise insulin levels. Resistance starch is also very healthy for the gut microbiome, you can read more about it here.

Give your clients a licence to eat carbohydrates

Give your clients a licence to eat carbohydrates

Is there a nutrition secret to going harder, faster, stronger, and longer? There is a whole mythology built up around “eating to perform": protein powders, carbohydrate back-loading, intermittent fasting, post-workout macronutrient ratios, etc. We've been told that carbohydrates are bad for us? But don’t we need carbohydrates to fuel our high-intensity training sessions? One of my teachers used to say, “most people don’t deserve carbohydrates, you can have carbohydrates in your diet, but they have to be clean carbohydrates.” The best way to determine if it’s a clean carbohydrate is to ask the questions, “did a caveman have access to it?”

DAY 9- BUTTERNUT SQUASH AND COCONUT CURRY

DAY 9- BUTTERNUT SQUASH AND COCONUT CURRY

I often use sweet potato instead of butternut, cavolo nero or chard instead of spinach. Also, the recipe was originally vegetarian. I like to add diced veil/beef/pork depending on what I have at hand so I don’t have to worry about preparing proteins on the side. I often use bone broth instead of vegetable stock, again depending on what I have.

DAY 7- BONE BROTH

DAY 7- BONE BROTH

Bone broth is one of the richest sources of proteins (collagen and gelatin that can’t be found in muscle meat), amino acids (such as glycine, proline, glutamine) and minerals (calcium, magnesium, copper, iron, manganese, phosphorus, potassium, sodium, zinc). It can improve gut and cardiovascular system functions, skin health, bones joints and muscles, liver and kidney function, brain and eye health, immune system function and sleep quality.

DAY 6- SWEET POTATO GNOCCHI WITH ROCKET, BASIL & ALMOND PESTO

DAY 6- SWEET POTATO GNOCCHI WITH ROCKET, BASIL & ALMOND PESTO

This recipe was created by our friend Alessia Beltrame. She has been working as a chef for years, has a background in pastry and is extremely passionate about food. Most of her recipes feature potatoes in a way or another, an ingredient that’s very popular in her home region in the North-East of Italy.

DAY 4- PEPPER CHICKEN

DAY 4- PEPPER CHICKEN

Another dish that’s traditional in my hometown. It’s mostly cooked in Summer (July and August) when peppers are (used to be?) at their best. Don’t be tempted to use chicken breasts instead of thighs because the fatty meat makes all the difference. What I like the most about this dish is the pepper-favoured juice that I would normally mop up with plenty of sourdough… Not this month!

DAY 3- CAPONATA AND A RIBEYE STEAK

DAY 3- CAPONATA AND A RIBEYE STEAK

When I think of the best food in the world, I think of Sicily. Every region in Italy has its own peculiar cuisine depending on what is locally available but Sicily really just has it all. When I visited Catania the first time I ordered a caponata as part of my evening meal. It was ridiculously cheap and ugly to look at. I still remember the first forkful I had.