Hello there,
Welcome to my first blog for a while. I wanted to find a way to share some of my thinking around nutrition and health, along with some recipes and ideas when they are relevant.

This first post is all about protein. Twelve years ago, when I first qualified as a nutritional therapist, I realised that when people make an effort to include enough protein in their diet, many things improved for them.

One of these is that we feel more satisfied with our food, and tend to snack less, and overeat less. This in turn has a positive effect on weight management, and often, people who wanted to lose a bit of weight started to do so without any great effort on their part.

This is a pretty magical way of losing weight - instead of constantly thinking 'eat less', the message is 'eat more' (protein).

To be clear, we aren't talking 'high' protein here, we are talking about the amount which our bodies need to function. I think that we've overlooked protein as an essential nutrient, and have assumed that we all eat enough. We also tend to assume that growing children, men and athletes need protein, and that women need less! This is a bit of an old-fashioned view, but I think it has a long hangover.

We need protein for so many things in the body. Some of them are:

• Manufacturing the structure of the body - an obvious one this - the muscles, bones, skin and other cells.
• As building blocks for enzymes - for digestion and for making chemical transformations in the body.
• To make neurotransmitters for our mood, mental and cognitive health.
• To repair and replace damaged tissues.
• To help our livers detoxify by-products of digestion and bodily processes, as well as toxins we encounter in our food and environment.

I've always looked at the amount of protein people are eating, and feel most people could do with increasing it. Once I started teaching this on my courses, I realised how powerful this simple step could be. It has always been the first thing I've encouraged people to do, and this means including protein at breakfast, lunch and dinner, not just one meal a day.

Once people take this on board, they come back to me and say that they are snacking less, they have less desire to eat sweet things, their energy is better, they no longer have afternoon slumps, and even their sleep and digestion improves. And many start to lose weight, even after the first week, if that's what they want. It's quite a list of success stories.

There have been times when I've wondered if I am giving the right advice, but time and again, hearing these stories confirms that it has a positive effect.

In more recent years, there has been a lot of research highlighting the importance of maintaining muscle mass as we age, and that, as well as exercise, it's vital to eat enough protein. The tendency with older people, in my opinion, is that they feel they don't need as much food generally, and protein particularly.

This can lead to a downward spiral - less protein means muscle loss and wasting, which means less energy, less strength, poorer balance, higher risk of falls, and greater damage when they do fall. Not to mention the importance of the amino acids in protein for mental health and cognitive function.

There are many views on the amount of protein we need. I settled on an easy to calculate 1g per kg of body weight per day, which was a little bit more than the WHO recommendation of 0.8g. I'll explain just what this looks like, further on.

The muscle-conservation-in-old-age camp recommends upward of 1.2g per kg per day, and some recommend 1.5g or more, so you can see my suggestion is still quite conservative.

The numbers 
Supposing somebody weighed 60kg, which is approximately 9 1/2 stone. At 1g/kg they would need 60 grams of protein a day. Now, this isn't 60 grams of meat, fish, eggs or whatever. Animal foods generally are around 25% protein, so 100g of meat or fish contain somewhere around 25g of protein.

Beans and pulses (cooked) contain around 10g of protein, give or take a couple of grams. This means a rough guide would be that 10% of pulses and beans is protein.

How to get 60g of protein
During a day, you could eat:

• 2 eggs (16g)
• 1 tin sardines (22-25g)
• Half a tin of chick peas (10g)
• 30g of almonds (6g)
• 100g of natural yogurt (5g)

This totals 59-62g of protein.

The main message here is that protein needs to be included in every meal - so the breakfast we've got used to of cereals and toast is definitely not the best way to start the day!

Protein theory
I came across a recent article about the 'Protein Leverage Theory' proposed by Professors David Raubenheimer and Stephen Simpson (in 2005!). I had heard about this theory a couple of years ago, and at the time felt pleased that there was some science to back up what I'd been saying. There has now been a more recent study which supports the theory.

The theory is that humans (and animals) need a certain amount of protein to function, and that if we don't get enough from our food, our bodies will 'make' us keep eating until we've taken in enough for that day.

This has major implications for people struggling to lose weight. Carbohydrates usually contain very little protein compared to animal foods, and even non-animal protein sources, so if we are eating lots of carbs (think the typical breakfast), with very little protein, we are going to be short of our requirements. We then need to keep eating, and if what we are eating is a lower protein food, this inevitably means we are taking in more energy (calories) than we need. This has to be stored as fat if we aren't using it all up.

I have felt for some time that too much carbohydrate makes us store more fat, and although I still think this is true, I can see that it may not simply be about the carbs making us fat, but the fact that a diet is low in protein may lead to us eating more carbohydrate, in turn making us fat.

So to come full circle, my recommendation to eat protein with every meal could help people satisfy their bodies' needs for protein, resulting in satisfaction (satiation) with their meals and ultimately leading to a lower intake of energy and then weight loss and improved body composition.

Although one could calculate a number of grams of protein to eat every day, this should be personalised depending on the level of activity, stress, state of health and more, so as a general guide, I would suggest including some protein with every meal and see how it works for you.

There are some fears around high protein diets, but I would remind you that I am not talking about high protein, merely adequate protein. If you have any health conditions, I would suggest having a chat with your healthcare provider before making any major dietary changes.


​

After what will be nearly five years running Tina's Kitchen in Lewes (hence the silence on the newsletter/blog front), I will be closing the shop and stopping the food side of the business at the end of June 2019.

The last lunch will be served on Thursday 20th June, with a sale of kitchen equipment and bits and pieces in the last week of the month.

It's been great running the shop and serving lunches, and hugely satisfying and rewarding giving people food which prompts such positive responses, both in terms of taste and how the food makes them feel.

My focus has always been on nutrient dense food with relatively low carbohydrate, and that carb has been in the ultra-complex forms of vegetables, pulses, nuts, seeds and fruit, rather than the more standard starches.

Alongside the shop I have been running Nutrition in a Nutshell courses,  spoken to groups and run workshops with schools. I would like to do a lot more of that now, and realise that, even being open only three days a week, the job was still full time and more.

Given that I love the teaching side of what I do, and ultimately my aim is to help people find ways of feeding themselves well at home, rather than buying food out, I feel I can be more effective if I do more writing, teaching and talking alongside one-to-one consultations.

I'll be giving up the shop completely so will no longer have premises; the upside of that is that I can run courses and workshops in people's homes - if you have a suitable space and are willing to host, you don't have to pay. So if this interests you, please get in touch.

I've got lots of plans for the autumn, including a weight loss group. At the moment one is scheduled for Tuesdays from 4-6pm, start date to be confirmed but around the middle of September. Another will run in Brighton. Again the dates are to be confirmed. 

In the meantime, remember I have a cookbook of all the Tina's Kitchen Recipes, which is getting great feedback; it's one way you can continue to enjoy the food at home, and develop your own variations of the recipes. To buy, come to the shop (before the end of June!), Lewes Tourist Information Centre or Soulfit Yoga in Lewes, or buy through this website here.

I'm hoping to post more regularly and include snippets of information I learn as well as occasional recipes and updates. I hope you'll start to follow me.
all the best,
​Tina

Balance your Health Naturally Newsletter

October 2012

Tina Deubert

In this issue:

• Light and Sleep
• Statins
• Cooking Methods
• Vitamin D Awareness Week
• Courses update
• Retreat – a holiday with a difference
• Salad stall

Light and sleep

A study came out a few weeks ago not only confirming that working and playing on screens at night disturb sleep, but explaining why.

Our bodies naturally produce melatonin in the evening, which is a hormone that prepares us for sleep, and works while we're asleep to repair the body.  It is triggered by fading light in the evening.

Daylight tends to have a bluish tinge which changes as the day closes, and it's this change of light quality which signals the body to start producing melatonin.

Screens give off a bluish light which mimics daylight and fools the body into thinking it's still daytime, so prevents melatonin being produced.

Unfortunately we don't just start producing melatonin the minute we turn off the screens, which is why we can have problems.

The obvious answer is to get off the screen at least an hour before bed, but we don't always do this, so there's a programme you can download which changes the light quality on your screen as the daylight fades.  Have a go - it's at http://stereopsis.com/flux.  Many people have found this useful and helpful – give it a try and see if your sleep improves!

Statins – Watch $tatin Nation!

Click on this link http://muvi.es/2011/65978 to watch a documentary about how we have been misled when it comes to cholesterol – a substance our body makes for many different purposes.  It tells us about how cholesterol is important in the body for repair, hormones and more, and how blocking its production with statins also blocks production of an important enzyme, CoQ10, important for energy and heart health!

Anybody who has attended one of my courses or seen me for nutritional therapy – or maybe even had a conversation with me! – will know that I try to explain the importance of fat in our diet, and that fat itself is not the problem, but a) what happens to fats in the body when they are damaged, and b) the quality and origin of the fats we eat.

My take on fat is that in its ‘whole’ form, ie contained in nuts, seeds, avocadoes, naturally reared animals and their products (eggs, dairy etc), game meat and wild fish, is ‘good’.

It becomes ‘bad’:

• When it is processed and therefore damaged, changing its structure and preventing its proper use by the body.
• When it originates from intensively reared animals given little or no exercise and fed on foods they would not eat naturally, thereby changing the balance of fat types (including omega 3) to one which is less beneficial.
• When we don’t eat enough vegetables!  Among the many reasons for emphasising vegetables and fruit in the diet is because of their antioxidant properties – oxidised fat is ‘bad’ and damaging, so in theory eating plenty of veg helps reduce oxidation of fats in the body.

There are some schools of thought – the healthier versions of Atkins – which advocate high fat, adequate protein and low or no carbohydrate diets for good health.  Personally I have found that fat intake as outlined above, with a relatively low carbohydrate diet high in vegetables is most beneficial, and feel this might be more accessible and manageable for most people.

Cooking Methods Affect ‘Healthiness’ of Food

Some research is now showing that moist, slow cooked food is better for us than quickly cooked foods at high temperatures.  This is because high temperature cooking produces AGEs (Advanced Glycation End products) which can be damaging to our health, increasing inflammation among other things.  Long, slow, moist cooking avoids this problem, keeps nutrients together and reduces the chance of damage by heat.

Just in time for winter – get that slow cooker out of the cupboard, and make delicious, warming, comforting stews and casseroles.  None of the vegetable goodness is lost, and if you eat meat you can make lovely bone stocks which draw on the nutrients in the bones and do you even more good!

This week is ‘Vitamin D Awareness Week’

29th October to 4th November is Vitamin D Awareness Week.  The government is becoming concerned about the decreasing levels of Vitamin D in the UK population, and has identified 4 key ‘at risk’ groups:

• The under 5s
• The elderly
• Pregnant or breastfeeding women
• People with darker skin pigmentation

It could be argued that the whole population is actually at risk.  There are many reasons for this:

• We are shy of eating oily fish, fish liver and fats generally (where vitamin D does exist in food, it is ‘fat soluble’ which means it’ll
• only be available in fatty foods).
• We are terrified of the sun!  We slip, slap, slop and cover up probably more than we need to.  While we don’t want to burn, we do NEED the sun, and all this covering up is preventing us from making vitamin D.
• Cholesterol is a precursor for vitamin D, which may mean low cholesterol = low vitamin D
• If we have darker skin we may have more difficulty making enough vitamin D in the northern hemisphere.
• We can’t make Vitamin D for 6 months of the year, and can only store it if we have decent levels to start with.

Vitamin D is needed for many things, including:

• Bone and tooth health
• Cancer protection
• Protection from auto-immune diseases like Multiple Sclerosis and Rheumatoid Arthritis
• Mental and brain health, eg Seasonal Effective Disorder, PMS, depression etc
• Muscle strength (important for prevention of falls in later life, and for strengthening bones, as well as fitness and aesthetics)
• Heart health
• Diabetes prevention

So what can you do in the winter?  The advice is to get your levels tested, and if they come out below 40ng/ml (the minimum for storage) think about taking a vitamin D supplement.  Doctors will test the ‘at risk’ groups, and may test if you can present them with a good reason.

Alternatively you can get a skin prick test from Birmingham City Hospital for £25.  It’s very simple and a fairly good indicator.  Go to http://www.vitamindtest.org.uk/

Food-wise, we can get about 10% of our vitamin D from food, and this comes from eggs and oily fish.

Eating for Good Health Courses

These 5 week courses are designed to give you the basis of a healthy diet in an enjoyable, enlightening and practical format.  We look at the science behind why certain foods are important for health, some of which are surprising!

We cover:

• Blood sugar balancing and protein
• Fats – the good, the bad and the ugly!
• Nutrient Density
• Digestion and its importance for absorption and therefore health
• Putting it all together – having pulled everything apart, simple, easy to follow ‘rules’ showing you just how simple it really is

The course takes place with a kitchen to hand, which means you get tasters and demonstrations showing just how easy it can be to eat well.

The approach is a pragmatic, realistic one – real food, readily available, for real people!

All you need is an open mind, an interest in decent food and a willingness to prioritise food for health. (And £80!)

The next course starts on Wednesday 7th November at Christ Church in Prince Edwards Road, Lewes, from 7-9pm, for 5 weeks.

To sign up for the course, see www.foodworks4u.co.uk/courses and scroll about half way down for the Registration Forms.  Send a £10 deposit if more than 2 weeks before the start date, otherwise the full £80 please.

My aim is to start a course each half term, so if you miss one, another will soon come along.

Hove Course – I’ll be running the Eating for Good Health course in Hove in January as well.  This will start on Thursday 10th January at 10.30 until 12.30, for 5 weeks, cost again is £80.

Plans are also afoot to run a day time course in Lewes and a vegetarian course, once enough people are interested.

Fancy a holiday with a difference?

I am planning a 6 day ‘retreat’, where the whole course and more is presented alongside cookery workshops - we prepare all our food together so that you get hands on experience you can take straight home and continue at the end of the week.

I am convinced this is a really effective way to change habits and give people the confidence to make changes for good.

I’m looking for venues at the moment, so if anybody knows somewhere which will comfortably sleep 10-12 people with a decent sized kitchen and preferably lovely countryside, please let me know.

If you might be interested, please let me know.

More information next time I hope.

Salad Stall at the Friday Market

This coming Friday will be my fourth at the Friday market in Lewes, open from 9.30-1.30, though people do turn up before then.

I am selling seasonal salads with a baked omelette in biodegradable salad boxes, making a complete lunch and selling at £4.50. 

Here are some examples of the salads so far:

• Mixed green salad leaves
• Carrot with mustard seeds and lemon juice
• Raw beetroot with lemon juice and olive oil
• Coleslaw with Chinese leaf, carrot and apple
• Roasted root vegetables with balsamic vinegar
• Leek and Sorrel baked omelette/frittata

Served with toasted seeds and salad dressing made with olive oil, local honey, cider vinegar and mustard.

The salads will change according to what is locally available, so you can be sure you’re getting a true locally sourced, organic lunch box.

The advantage of a salad for lunch is that, apart from being surprisingly satisfying and filling, because it is low carbohydrate you don’t get a mid afternoon slump, which is common with sandwiches and other carb-based lunches.

That’s about it for this time.  If you’ve read this far, thank you!

Wishing you good health,



Tina Deubert

Nutritional Therapist and Bowen Therapist

mBANT, mFHT, CNHC registered for Bowen

To sign up for this email, contact me via the contact form or email me at [email protected] 

 

After a bit of a delay, I am ready to start serving Fresh, Local, Organic, Seasonal Salads (FLOSS!) at Lewes Food Market, Friday mornings 10-1pm.  Come and get a healthy, nutritious, la

Unfortunately, I've had to postpone starting the salad stall at the Friday Market, but hope to begin early October.

I'm very excited to be starting a salad stall at the Friday Market in Lewes, from 7th September.

Balance Your Health Naturally - Looking at Food and Health Holistically

By Tina Deubert

July 2012

Welcome to my first newsletter.  You are receiving it because at some point you signed up to receive emails from me or because you have expressed interest in my work.  Please do let me know if you aren’t interested, and accept my apologies if you have accidentally received the newsletter despite telling me you don’t want it.

BUT I hope you’ll find it interesting.  My aim is to give you food for thought about nutrition and health news.

I will also be telling you about any projects or offers I am running, and other therapies or therapists you may find interesting.

Without further ado, here goes:

Topical Tips – Safe Sun



You may have heard that the UK population is almost universally low or deficient in Vitamin D.  This vitamin is showing itself to be incredibly important to health, and as time goes on more and more conditions and bodily functions are being shown to benefit from adequate Vitamin D levels in the body. Some of these are:

• Bone health
• Depression
• Cancer prevention
• Immunity
• Insulin control
• Blood pressure regulation

Vitamin D is not easily available in the diet, and the best source for us is sunlight – the action of sun on the skin makes us produce vitamin D from cholesterol.

We have been given many messages in recent years about avoiding the sun, covering up, slapping on the sunscreen and so on, and one theory about our current Vitamin D deficiency is that we have gone too far with sun avoidance.

Compare these two current public health recommendations:

UK – spend time in the shade 11am-3pm; cover up; use factor 15+ sunscreen

US – 5-30 minutes of sun exposure to legs, arms, face or back, 2 times a week WITHOUT sunscreen

The UK recommendation, arguably, is out of date, and if followed can block up to 90% of vitamin D manufacture in the body.

Obviously, we still have to avoid burning, so all of us will have a different length of time we can safely stay in the sun without burning.

However, a few minutes, depending on your skin, each day, can produce lots of vitamin D, so it’s important we don’t avoid the sun completely.

So the message here is to enjoy the sun, soak it up but make sure you don’t burn.

Weight Loss Group and Courses

In the Spring I ran a weight loss group, called Lose Weight – Feel Great!  It consisted of 5 classes designed to provide sound nutritional advice to enable people to lose and manage their weight with a healthy diet which can be continued without feeling deprived. The idea is to learn how to feed yourself properly so that your weight finds a healthy level and stays there – once you are eating appropriately this is what should happen.

The group is still running, with slow but steady loss of weight and centimetres, as a support group.  We’ve covered other topics related to weight gain and loss, and we also had a session where we cooked and ate a meal together. 

Making food in a small group and eating it together showed everyone how easy it can be to put together a nutritious, well balanced meal in a very short time, with readily available ingredients and relative low cost.

 

As a result I now plan to run other nutrition based courses on a regular basis.

All courses and workshops include:

• Talk/presentation
• Practical sessions – cookery demos and/or workshops
• Tasters
• Printed material to take away
• ‘Shop’ with recommended foods and supplements where appropriate

foodworks4u Courses:

• Eating well to support good health – a 5 week course designed to give you the tools to eat well every day, supporting good health and enjoyment of food.  (Dates and times to be arranged)
• Lose Weight – Feel Great! – Tuesdays 6-8pm in Lewes.  A 5 week course to equip you to eat well, feel better, lose weight and keep it off, without feeling deprived.
• Off to Uni? – A one day workshop for young people leaving home.  Practical, informative workshop outlining what you need to stay healthy and keep your brain working on a budget.  Includes lunch and recipe ideas.  (Dates and times to be arranged)
• Learn to love your Gut – Mondays 2-4pm, October, Hove.  The importance of digestion and what you can do to support it. 
• Cooking for the family – making sure children are well nourished, encouraging healthy eating habits and distinguishing real food from ‘food’ with negligible or negative benefits.  (Dates and times to be arranged)
• Other food and health related topics, as requested

Why do a course?

A course can be a good way of putting the foundation of healthy eating into place, and may help reduce a variety of difficult to resolve symptoms like:

• Low energy
• Mood swings
• Blood sugar imbalances
• Skin problems
• Brain fog
• Digestive difficulties

It can also help clear up some of the mixed messages we get about food and health, and give you the confidence to know you are feeding yourself and your loved ones as well as you can.

Additional Benefits

Participants are eligible for a discounted individual Nutritional Therapy consultation once they have completed a course, allowing an individual, targeted nutrition programme for more chronic, deep seated problems.

Costs

5 week courses cost £80

3 week gut course £50

1 day workshop £60 to include lunch

EARLY BIRD DISCOUNT – Any bookings before 10th August SAVE £10

Branching Out – I am now a registered as a food business with Lewes District Council, which means I can pursue a related passion, cooking for people.  This is an embryonic branch of foodworks4u and I’m happy to let it grow according to demand.  At the moment I am offering:

• Wide Awake Lunches! – Instead of sandwiches making everyone sleepy and ineffective in the afternoon, I provide appetising and tasty salads with good quality protein.
• Dishes for Dinners – it might be a special dish for a vegetarian or gluten-free guest at a dinner party you are preparing or a starter, main course and/or pudding.
• Gluten free cakes – special occasion or day to day (cafes and restaurants also supplied)

For more information see the website: www.foodworks4u.co.uk

Thank you for reading this far.  Please feel free to forward this to anyone you think may be interested, and do contact me if you have any questions or would like to make a booking.

Here’s hoping for a sunny August!

Tina Deubert, Nutritional Therapist, Bowen Therapist, Teacher

01273-483501

[email protected]

Definition of Nutritional Therapy from the British Association of Applied Nutrition and Nutritional Therapy (BANT): “The application of nutrition science in the promotion of health and peak performance. Nutritional Therapy can identify potential nutritional imbalances and how these contribute to symptoms. This approach allows the nutritional therapist to work with people on many levels by addressing nutritional imbalances and supporting the body towards maintaining health.”

A new one day workshop designed to help young people eat well on a budget when they fly the nest.

These will run in August and September, from 10am-4pm, dates to be confirmed, and will cost £50-£60 depending on numbers. 

The day will include a healthy lunch, demonstrations, easy meal ideas and money saving tips.

Just to let you know some of the lovely feedback we've had from the first course.  I will also be running a healthy eating - food for good health (name not settled on yet!) in September.

“I feel really positive about the changes I’ve made to the way I eat and the benefits and feel like this is a change for life, not a diet!” 

“I really like Tina’s enthusiasm and positive energy.  I also appreciated the written information.  A well thought out course.” 

“Lost a couple of pounds and 1.5cm from hips, so I am happy!”   (after 2 weeks)

“The establishment of a new routine has been an absolute revelation and I am really excited.  I don’t feel hard done by at all.” 

“Thanks for the great advice I’ve really enjoyed it and feel really positive about the long term changes.”

Average cm loss over 4 weeks:  9cm

Average weight loss over 4 weeks:  6lbs/2.7kg

On top of this, everyone in the group experienced some improvement in general symptoms, like constipation, poor sleep, mood, bloating, low energy and cravings among others!

It's been a very enjoyable and rewarding course to run, and I'm looking forward to doing more.

Next Course starts Tuesday 12th June, 2012 from 6-8pm

We had the second meeting last night, and the members are enjoying learning about eating healthily - and being able to enjoy food while beginning to lose weight.


A second course will run in June, starting the week beginning 11th June, so contact me for more details.

I'm also going to start a healthy eating course, so please let me know if you'd like to know more about this.