DatingGod

Essentials: Stevia & the Sweet Fang

By now, everybody's heard about stevia.  Genuinely natural sweetener made from a South American herb. Super low glycemic index. Actually helps with pancreas function. The total opposite of those weird chemical sweetners sure to cause cancer in American lab rats like you and me. You can even buy stevia now in most grocery stores. But as with all once truly healthy foods/supplements/herbs that have gone mainstream, you now have to read the fine print to make sure you're not buying something "natural" instead of healthy.

Allow me and my attractive model, Emmaline, to walk you through the world of current marketplace stevia, and how to navigate it, how to recognize the faux, the pretenders, much like you did when Lay*s potato chips came out with "organic" chips and you knew something very, very unhealthy and bullsh*itty was awry . . .

I'm a big fan of the "SweetLeaf" brand. In part because it's the brand I've been using for ~fifteen years, but mostly because their stevia is pure, clean, no weird stuff added. And seriously, although I'm sure other brands are out there that are clean, I haven't found them yet, and let me tell you: a lot of very weird stuff is being added to stevia these days.

One of the common issues folks have with stevia is that it can taste bitter. The reason for this is that stevia's "sweet" is so concentrated that you only need a very tiny amount, and unless you have one of those itty bitty 1/8 teaspoon scoops, at least in the beginning, you're going to use too much and it'll taste bitter. To help combat this, stevia manufacturers added various "fillers" to both smooth out the taste, and bulk the product up to make it harder to overuse. The more clueless and/or unscrupulous ones added things like maltodextrin (sugar) or maltitol (chemical sugar substitute that will cause your colon to do the hula, and yeah, not really what you're looking for with your iced tea). But SweetLeaf makes their powder using inulin soluble fiber made from chicory and various veg/fruits, which is the best of both worlds.

The powder is good for cooking with, and for adding to hot drinks. It doesn't mix that well with cold drinks, unless you add it very slowly and stir as you go. The plain liquid stevia works well with hot or cold, though again you're back to dealing with the super concentrated issue.

But my very favorite part about SweetLeaf are the flavors. Above, Emmaline gets all up in the Chocolate flavored liquid, which is ridiculously yummy with coffee, tea, added to plain whole milk yogurt and berries and bananas and melon. Yum. Oh yeah yum.

And here Baby Emmaline gets all licky with the vanilla flavored. I use the fruit flavored ones, like Orange, Grape, and Lemon in the summer, to turn plain water or soda water into a "soda". And okay, I'll tell you my secret: it's what I use to make my Tequila Weasels.

My main issue is that my system is so hair-trigger that sugar/high fructose corn syrup/cane syrup causes my blood sugar to raise, my heart to pound, with a rather unphun energy crash on the other side. It's not such a big deal at night, but during the day it's like a 3pm slump for hours on end. And the artifical sweeteners like splenda and aspertame are of course pure poison. So for me, I cart stevia packets around, smuggle a club soda mixed with grape stevia into the movies, etc.

And dude, I am so going to order the Hazelnut, and the Cinnamon. And they have toffee and peppermint and root beer but really, I'm too tired to add one more dang link. This whole info thing is so more work than just plain old kvetching . . . But chocolate and vanilla stevia? Seriously worth passing on the yum . . .

Essential Stuffs: Sleep Inducers

I'm often puzzled by issues that folks suffer from that are easily solved with herbs or supplements. Sleeplessness is one of them.

As a single chick with no kids, my amount of sleep isn't impacted by much (except for kitties using my belly as a trampoline, and you kitty wranglers know zackly what I'm talkin bout.) But other than this, only two things really interfere with my sleep: caffeine and thinky thoughts. I'm working on the latter, as you kind readers have been privy to in Great Detail, and depending on the day's festivities, my go-to-bed mindstate can be either a wind turbine, an oasis of balmy breezes, or a sewer. The former is just because I love coffee, really love it, not as much as I love Baby Wallace, but almost as much. I know I'm an addict, and that I should quit, but I don't want to, and you can't make me.

Which means that because of these two things I'd be losing a lot of sleep if I weren't such an Herbal Genius, which is kind of like being an Evil Genius, but more Green. But since I am, a full night's sleep is never even a skotch of an issue, not even a tiny deal. Which is awesome.

The savior? Melatonin. (Clicking on the link will take you to the wikipedia page for lots of eggheady details, so maybe wait til after you've read this post to click over)

Melatonin is a hormone secreted by the pineal gland in response to the body's circadian rhythms. Essentially, it's presence tells the brain: we're asleep now. And when you take it in supplement form, in about an hour or so, you get very, very, very sleepy, and as you walk to the bathroom to brush your teeth and then to the bedroom it occurs to you that you might not make to your bed, but will instead curl up right here on the kitchen floor, beside the kitty food, the stuff that smells like the great atlantic ocean, but slightly older. At least this is what happens to me.

And this isn't something like am*bien or val*ium or even ben*dryll which puts you to sleep but leaves you feeling groggy, hungover the next day. This stuff burns off during the night, what's not needed gets flushed out of the system, and come alarm time, you're good to go. (actually, i don't even use an alarm anymore - just wake up naturally after a full night's sleep)

Melatonin supplements can also boost the immune system, acts as an anti-oxidant, and may give you spicy dreams. And supposedly, only take it after the sun goes down, or it'll make things a bit wacky with your circadian rhythms due to the pineal gland's interaction with light.

Of course, there can be lots of different physical issues at play for why we don't fall asleep, something is awry with your melatonin receptors, etc. You may need to play around with different melatonin "cocktails" which are melatonin plus herbs or other supplements. I started out with samples of different mixtures, then tried different ones, and now only take 1mg. of melatonin, straight up, no chaser. And some semblence of that is what I'd recommend.

You can try one of the combos below and take the full dose recommended on the bottle, or just try melatonin by itself, starting with 3mg about an hour before you want to be asleep.

Melatonin - chewable tablets, plain melatonin, with some added B-6 to help with absorption. ($6 for 180 doses)

Natural Factors Stress-Relax - chewable, also contains 5-HTP & Suntheanine, tastes delicious like a tropical sweettart, though of course that means it contains fructose. I tried this one first and it was MAGIC like candy and a blankie for naptime. But ultimately, I only need the melatonin, so I buy what's less expensive. ($23 for 30 doses)

Source Naturals - sublingual (which helps with absorption) with GABA and other supportive stuffs ($13 for 100 doses)

Nature's Plus - minty spray with all sort of Metabolic Factor Whatnot (i may buy this just to try it because it's a spray) ($12 for 30 doses)

General List of sleep formulas. This list contains lots of different formulas - some have tryptophan, or valerian/camomile/hops, or other different combos. Some things work better for folks, some give crazy dreams, but you won't know til you try. Like I said above, start out with melatonin, or things that contain melatonin with other things as this will be the least intrusive on your system.

(PS - I use iherb for all these links because I'm familiar with their setup, often order from them because they are inexpensive and shipping is free for orders over $40 plus they offer free samples of stuff (click on their "free" button). But I mostly use my coop so by all means support your local coops and health food stores! :)

And feel free to ask questions in the comments, and in support of other folks, I'll answer them in the comments.

Happy snoozing :)

And go here for more entries for Essential Stuffs I've posted in the past few months. More to come!)

Essential Stuffs: Tongue Scraper

This is the first post in what will be an ongoing series, a series of things that really are freakin essentials, things you'll hands down benefit from, stuffs that will make things a little (or a lot) gentler, healthier, simpler. Some you'll know about, some you won't, some you'll already be using, some your eyes will bug out a little at as you go: really? But they'll all be useful, if of course, you use the dang things. . .

The first one is going to seem a bit wacky at first to those of you not familiar with them: tongue scrapers, also known as tongue brushes or cleaners. Their function? Literally scrape the funk off your tongue. Yep. De-furring.

If your diet is less than optimal, your tongue most likely has shag carpeting. If you're coming down with an illness, you've probably got a lawn growing in there. This is bacteria, and it needs to not be there. Of course, it shouldn't be there in the first place, but yeah, hello western diet, and all that.

The bacteria build up can wreak all sorts of havoc in your mouth, including making you sick, or making it harder to get well, or just giving you sulfurous breath that even your weasels know is demonic. So mowing your tongue is not just good for you, but for the planet! 

They've been around for a long time. While scooting around the net looking for images, I even found a silver one from the 1800s. And I wonder why they went out of fashion. Our diets have certainly gotten worse. . .

They come in all sorts of configurations:

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I use the one that looks like half of a golden arch (ironic, no?) because personally I'd rather use metal than plastic. And some folks just brush their tongue with their toothbrush, but it doesn't do a near good enough job. I use it once a day after I brush my teeth. If I'm sick, though, like with a cold or cough, I'll use it several times a day, and it really helps.

Here's a link to the wikipedia page in case you want more details and data and history.