How Malnutrition Affects You

While we often associated with malnutrition with people in developing countries, where the Food Supply is inadequate, malnutrition occurs with people of developed countries as well. Knowing more about what the body needs for proper nourishMent and how we are challenged to receive adequate nutrition can help us prevent malnourishMent in ourselves and in those we know and love.

How Malnutrition Affects You

How Malnutrition Affects You

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How Malnutrition Affects You

How Malnutrition Affects You

Biologically, we are intended to eat from a wide variety of Foods, but the typical person consumes a very narrow selection of foods. These foods are often highly processed and stripped of many vital nutrients. In addition to this, medications, stress, environMental toxins and tissue injury can further increase the need for nourishment.

An extreme lack of a specific nutrient will result in disease. Forexample, scurvy is the disease which results from severe lack of Vitamin c. Such diseases are what most people associate with malnutrition. Less acute deficiencies can still affect proper functioning of the body such as the brain, eyesight, height, weight, the functioning of various organs, as well as the development and formation of body parts, especially in unborn babies, newborn babies, and young children.

How do we protect ourselves from the dangers of malnutrition? We can first turn to the Food Pyramid for a bit of guidance. For fruits and vegetables, the Food Pyramid suggests that we eat about nine servings of a variety of fresh, raw fruits and vegetables each day. Unfortunately most people aren't eating this minimum and a recent report from the economic research arm of theUSDA stated that we would need an additional six million acres of farmland to grow enough of this produces to support this minimal need for the American diet. This suggests that we are most certainly not getting sufficient nutrition from food alone.

A second option to improve nutrition is to add freshly made juices to your diet. Juice extractors are very affordable and work by grinding away the extra fiber and cellulose from a fruit or vegetable and channeling the juice into a container. The juices are naturally sweet. Even a juice made from celery and spinach has a sweet flavor. Making your own juice provides better nourishment than pre-packaged juices and isn't likely to contain added sugar, or preservatives, unless you're adding thoseyourself. The downside to juicing is that juice extractors tend to make a mess, and must be cleaned immediately after use.

The third option is to supplement the diet with food-based, standardized nutritional supplements. This means supplements which are made by concentrating nutrients from food sources and are then tested to ensure that the final product provides those nutrients in a consistent fashion. Unfortunately, most nutritional supplements do not meet these standards so it is important that if you are going to use dietary supplements, to fill in the holes of your diet, you must find ones that are effective instead of reaching for the cheapest, mega-sized bottle of chemically manufactured multivitamins you can find.

How Malnutrition Affects You

Eating Gluten-Free Is Mustard OK?

Is mustard gluten free? In its raw form seed, yes, but when it is mixed into prepared mustard pastes, flour, beer or malt vinegar is sometimes added. This is a "read the label every time" products but if the ingredient list doesn't include flour, beer or malt vinegar, go ahead an enjoy it.

Eating Gluten-Free Is Mustard OK?

Eating Gluten-Free Is Mustard OK?

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Eating Gluten-Free Is Mustard OK?

Eating Gluten-Free Is Mustard OK?

Commercial mustard comes in many forms from raw seeds to powdered mustard flour to rich creamy or oily spreads that go well with roasted meat and in sandwiches.

Mustard seeds are tiny round seeds-about 2 mm or less than one eighth of an inch in diaMeter. The seed color ranges from almost white to black. These seeds are naturally gluten free and are vastly different in size from any gluten-containing grain. When the seeds are separated from the pods and stems, a sieve with very smallholes will also separate out any gluten-containing seeds volunteer. Most commercially exported mustard seed comes from Canada, the Russian Federation and Ukraine.

Mustard seeds are mixed with water, vinegar, oils, and other spices and flavourings to make the spreadable prepared mustard pastes. Depending on the type of seed and the processing traditions, the final product ranges from white to bright yellow to black. The seeds may be crushed into a fine powder or left whole. Prepared mustards may be thick or quite thin.

Dry mustard, mustard flour or mustard powder is very finely ground mustard seeds. It has a flour-like texture but it does not contain wheat flour. Mustard powder is often added as an ingredient in other commercially prepared Foods as a flavoringagent.

Wheat flour is sometimes added to prepared mustards to adjust the texture, taste, and cost of the product. If wheat flour is added, it must be listed on the ingredient list. Beer is occasionally added to specialty mustard, making the product not gluten free it must also be included on the label. Malt vinegar does not seem to be used in commercial prepared mustards, but it often appears in recipes for home made mustards. If so, the mustard will not be gluten free.

Eating Gluten-Free Is Mustard OK?