Tag: Human gastrointestinal tract

Chocolate covered coconut lime ice-cream – lactose free, dairy free

Ingredients

4 heaped dessert spoons of freshly grated or desiccated coconut

3 heaped teaspoons of golden caster sugar

Juice from 1 small lime

80g of dairy free chocolate – ideally made with coconut oil.

165 ml of coconut milk

Method

Melt chocolate in a bowl over a bain-marie.

Coat the inside of silicone moulds with chocolate and place on a tray in the freezer.

Add coconut milk, coconut, lime juice and sugar to a mixing bowl and mix well.

Remove chocolate moulds from the freezer and add a small amount of coconut mix to each one.

Return to the freezer until fully frozen.

Remove the moulds from the freezer and add some melted chocolate to cover the top of each mould.

Return to the freezer till frozen.

Remove from the silicone moulds and ENJOY – these are mouthfuls of heaven, resembling the popular chocolate bar promising a taste of tropical heaven – you know what I mean 😉

If using gluten free chocolate these mini ices are gluten free, lactose free & dairy free. A treat for a hot summers day, easy to make.

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Dairy free, lactose free, egg free strawberry ice-cream.

Ingredients

349g silken tofu (firm)

100 ml rice milk

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

350 g strawberries

2 dessert spoons of golden caster sugar

Method

Place tofu into a mixing bowl and add vanilla extract, golden caster sugar and rice milk.

Mix with a hand mixer – it will look grainy in texture – keep calm and carry on!!!

Wash and chop strawberries and add to mix, the using a hand blender blend in strawberries.

Using a hand blender blends mix to a smooth paste and adds some air to the mix.

Place the mix in an ice-cream maker or a plastic container, if using a plastic container place in freezer and freeze for 1 hour.

Take the container out of the freezer after 1 hour and blend again.

Place container back in the freezer till mix is frozen.

Can be made with sweetener if desired. This ice-cream is very solid if left overnight in the freezer – either eat it once lightly frozen or leave it out to defrost slightly before serving. Has the texture of a granita.

Serves 4 approximately 140 Kcal per serving, approximatley 3g of fat.

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Fast eating – speedy way to make your IBS worse, the benefits of slow eating.

Why is it suggested to help IBS you need to ensure you relax, take time over your meals and chew food slowly? How does this advice help with reducing symptoms?

If you don’t chew your food well you are more likely to swallow air with your food, this can pass into the intestines and increase bloating. After your mouth your digestive system does not have teeth, your gut moves and squeezes to mix and push food through it, but this not break down tougher foods – you need to chew these foods well, prior to swallowing.

If you are eating whilst working you may experience stress, particularly if you are answering a discourteous email that demands some diplomacy in its response, or dealing with a complaint on the telephone. It does not help your digestion (or your IBS) if your body is experiencing stress whilst you are eating a meal. Stress causes an increase in adrenaline, a hormone that gets the body ready for action, and this hormone slows the digestive tract, slowing down digestion. Adrenaline reduces the amount of digestive juices that are secreted to help digest your food, therefore it is perhaps not surprising that you feel so uncomfortable if consuming food when stressed. Sitting up straight can also help – use gravity to help your digestion and don’t slouch when eating.

Sometimes it is difficult to change what we do, particularly if you feel that you may be penalised in some way if you take a break at work, but it is worth considering. Under the current economic climate it is difficult to insist on taking breaks if your colleagues do not, so perhaps it is time we all support each other and take back our work breaks and lunchtime, to allow everyone time to sit down, relax and ‘rest & digest.’

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April is International Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) Awareness Month

April is the International Awareness Month for irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) – a whole month, I hear you say? Wow, does it need a WHOLE month for people to be aware? Well my humble opinion on this matter is it does. Their can be a misunderstanding of this condition as everyone can suffer from upsets to their bowels on occasion from stressful events and IBS is often viewed as trivial by society because, after all, if up to 10 – 20% of the population suffer then surely it can’t be that bad? Irritable bowel syndrome is often played down and yes it isn’t a life limiting disease, but for some people it can have a real detrimental effect on their ability to work and have a good quality of life. It’s often quality of life that matters to people’s mood and ability to enjoy life, so this is important to everyone.

Irritable Bowel Syndrome is a range of symptoms that affect the way the bowel functions, and common symptoms include diarrhoea and/or constipation, pain with or without bloating, but IBS can include symptoms that are not directly related to the digestive tract, such as exhaustion, headaches, dizziness and depression – in fact it perhaps isn’t surprising that people get depressed with having to tolerate a myriad of confusing symptoms that on occasion isn’t managed well. There is no cure, yes there are treatments, but what works is different for everyone. Everyone’s IBS is different, therefore it does need some understanding of ones own symptoms and triggers that is important. This is where the IBS Self Care Plan developed by the IBS Network can help, because it helps to identify people’s individual symptoms and provides explanations of the various treatments that may help.

But we also must increase the profile of this syndrome in society and the devastating symptoms it can produce, a month of promotion to increase people’s awareness of the actuality of living with IBS will help. It would be really cool for you to share your IBS story this month to increase people’s knowledge and improve the image of this syndrome with the general public!  So comments to this blog would be useful and should you wish to share your story with a wider audience then contact The IBS Network and spread the awareness!!

Join the IBS Network – the UK national charity for IBS – who provide a helpline, email responses by health professional, quarterly magazine, monthly newsletter, can’t wait card and coming later this month for members only, The IBS Self Care Plan and symptom tracker, your own personal resource for understanding and managing your IBS. Check out the link on this blog site for further information

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Probiotics – what are they and can they help my gut?

There is a plethora of information about probiotics and we are constantly bombarded with advertisements promoting their use, for gut health, so what should we believe? Probiotics are products or food that contain bacteria, in large enough amounts to alter the number and/or type of bacteria that live in the large intestine (see diagram at the bottom of the page.) Everyone has populations of bacteria in their gut and we know that changes to these natural populations can occur in food poisoning or with any illness that occurs within the digestive tract. This could be irritable bowel syndrome, crohns or ulcerative colitits for example, but other disorders can affect the populations of bacteria. We are only just beginning to understand how these bacteria affect our health; they produce substances called short chain fatty acids from starchy foods, which help feed the digestive tract, keeping it healthy, a real benefit. They also help to produce vitamin K, a vital nutrient that helps our blood to clot and our bones keep healthy. So the relationship with our bacteria is beneficial for both the bacteria and us. These ‘good bacteria‘ also help to prevent some of the more harmful bacteria from developing and causing illness. Our bowels contain huge numbers of bacteria; our bodies contain about ten times more bacteria cells than the cells that make up our body, a good proportion of these are in our gut, an astounding fact.

What are often called ‘good bacteria’ are various types of bacteria commonly found in our bowel, and it is felt that if this natural ecosystem is damaged by illness, then replacing those bacteria helps to reduce symptoms such as diarrhoea, bloating and pain, which often accompany some digestive diseases. The theory is that taking these bacteria in food or drink will replace the bacteria that are missing; however in reality the effects are variable.

These bacteria are produced from dairy foods, such as Lactobacillus, Bifidobacterium and Lactobacillus acidophilus – long names for such cool microorganisms. We have good evidence that taking bacteria at the start of a course of antibiotics can prevent the diarrhoea that can accompany these medicines – antibiotics can reduce the natural populations of good bacteria in our bowel, which slightly alters digestion of starchy foods, resulting in diarrhoea. The case for probiotic effectiveness in reducing episodes of ulcerative colitis is controversial, but probiotics can be effective in reducing occurrence of infections that occur in people who have had reconstructive small bowel surgery (called pouches,) and can prevent diarrhoea that occurs when travelling abroad. For illnesses such as food poisoning, they may reduce the amount of days you are ill and reduce the number of times you need to visit the loo -which is always a benefit!

The products that are available also have varying effects in people with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS,) and the evidence for their usefulness for preventing further attacks of crohns disease is still uncertain. As these products are generally not harmful in most individuals, if you have irritable bowel syndrome UK health professionals advise that you could try them and see if they work for you. If you have crohns disease or colitis, it is probably better to discuss this with your gastroenterologist before you try them out.  Try them for at least a month if you wish and follow the manufacturers instructions, you may need to continue taking them if you find them beneficial, as their effect can be temporary. It is also advisable to store these products as the manufacturer recommends and use them within the date advised, to ensure that the products are effective as they can be.

Some people may be better to avoid taking these bacteria, for example if you have a severe intolerance to lactose (a natural sugar found in dairy foods,) most of the manufacturers products are based on milk, therefore they may give symptoms, as they may contain varying amounts of lactose, depending on the product. However the bacteria will have reduced the amount of lactose naturally found in these foods, so caution is advisable if you wish to try them.  Also if your doctor has told you that you have a weak immune system then you should not take these products.

Again we do not have evidence that probiotics can be helpful in preventing allergies or stopping infections of the bladder in adults, so don’t waste your money! Although I was informed by blogger yesnobananas that there is some evidence for a strain of lactobacillus Ramnosus in protection from developing atopic eczema, which is hard to find, but see her blog for further information

http://yesnobananas.wordpress.com/2013/01/10/can-probiotics-prevent-food-allergy/

But where we know they are effective, or the products are recommended by your registered health professional, they are certainly worth considering. If you wish to try them and are not too sure about your situation, you could always discuss their use with your healthcare provider.

Health professionals can check the links below for evidence base references:

http://www.patient.co.uk/doctor/Probiotics-and-Prebiotics.htm

http://www.cochrane.org/search/site/probiotics

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