Enhance Your Health
Health Tip of the Week: Is Meatless Meat Good For You?
As one walks through the supermarket, it is very difficult not to notice all of the new meatless meat options. “Meatless” beef, chicken, pork and even fish are available in a wide variety of flavors and recipes. If you are a vegetarian, this opens up a whole new world for you. Plants that taste like meat.
Meatless meat is made out of grains, legumes and a variety of vegetables with added spices and flavors to make the vegetarian option taste like meat. The big question one has to ask is meatless meat good for you? Unfortunately, it cannot be considered a healthy food. Meatless meat is a processed food that can contain high amounts of salt, sugar, artificial flavors and colors. Like all processed foods, meatless meat products requires detective work (reading labels) to find which ones are best for you.
It is important to know that for people on a gluten free diet, a lot of meatless meat products contain gluten such as wheat flour. But there are a few gluten free meat products available. I have tried a variety of meatless meat products including pork, fish and chicken. I stopped buying most.
The one that I do use and find to be a very good option when making vegetarian dishes is the plain ground meatless meat. Just like a 1lb package of ground beef, it can be used in a variety of casseroles and one pot dishes.
The other product that is not bad and is way healthier than the real thing is breakfast sausage patties. No cancer causing nitrates and preservatives and while not 100% breakfast sausage taste, it’s pretty close.
Next up is a something called lab grown meat. This is actually real meat that is grown in a lab from actual animal muscle tissue. The muscle cells are cultured in a petri dish and grown into muscle fibers, which in turn, overtime becomes a slab of meat.
This does not sound particular appetizing to me, but the point is to create meat that is real and does not slaughter animals which is very appealing to animal rights activists. Sadly, a study performed in the UK found that Generation Z (age 18-25) who are very interested in the environment and animal rights viewed the process with disgust, even though they thought it good be a good nutrition source and a transition to more sustainable food options.
In doing further research on the topic, I did find an environmental concern. One of the biggest reasons environmentalists argue against eating meat is the amount of methane cows produce. Methane gas is a known contributor to ozone depletion and climate change. That being said, I found a source that says current methods of lab grown meat requires a large amount of energy and produces carbon dioxide emissions which could be worse than the methane producing cows.
Pregnancy and Chiropractic News
A new study from King’s College in London, England found that improving pregnancy lifestyle through prenatal exercise programs and improving the pregnant women’s diet resulted in increased cardiovascular health in their children. The study also found that the women who improved their diet during pregnancy retained those healthy habits 3 years after giving birth. The study gave evidence that changing pregnant women’s lifestyle during pregnancy had positive lasting outcomes for the mother and child.
Children and Chiropractic News
Researchers continue to stress the importance of a good night’s sleep for children. Current research from the journal of “Molecular Psychiatry” backs up many other studies that prove too little sleep leads to depression, anxiety, impulsive behavior and poor cognitive performance in children. 11,000 children aged 9-11 were studied.
The recommended amount of sleep for ages 6-12 years old is 9-12 hours of sleep a night. 60% of children in the USA receive less than 8 hours of sleep on a school night. The study found that children who had 7 hours or less sleep a night were scored 53% higher than average for behavioral issues, anxiety, depression and poor school performance.