Ok, I have weighed myself over and over for the last few weeks and I couldnt understand it. I was maintaining a straight 130 and ARGH it was frustrating. I couldn't understand why? I have been working out, strength training, i have given up ALL caffeine (which meansplainly I am not eating sweets nor am I drinking soda all day) so WHY WHY WHY??????
But then, as a miracle of God, I weighed myself this weekend and VIOLA- I have lost some pounds. I like to think partly becasue I have traded my soda and chocolate in for water and yogurt. I want to share some knowledge about yogurt that most people dont know...... It is sooo yummy but there are SOOOOO many reasons you should eat it too.
Yogurt is a fermented dairy product made by adding bacterial cultures to milk, which causes the transformation of the milk's sugar, lactose, into lactic acid. This process gives yogurt its refreshingly tart flavor and unique pudding-like texture, a quality that is reflected in its original Turkish name, Yoghurmak, which means "to thicken". The lactic acid bacteria that are traditionally used to make yogurt-Lactobacillus bulgaricus and Streptococcus thermophilus-also confer on yogurt many of its health benefits.
Health Benefits
Our food ranking system qualified yogurt as a very good source of calcium, phosphorus, riboflavin-vitamin B2 and iodine. Yogurt also emerged from our analysis as a good source of vitamin B12, pantothenic acid-vitamin B5, zinc, potassium, protein and molybdenum. These 10 nutrients alone would make yogurt a health-supportive food. But some of the most interesting health information about yogurt comes from a different context-its potential inclusion of live bacteria.
Yogurt for A Longer Life
The highest quality yogurt in your grocery store contains live bacteria that provides a host of health benefits. Yogurt that contains live bacterial cultures may help you to live longer, and may fortify your immune system. Research studies have shown that increased yogurt consumption, particularly in immunocompromised populations such as the elderly, may enhance the immune response, which would in turn increase resistance to immune-related diseases.
Eating yogurt may help to prevent vaginal yeast infections. In one study, women who had frequent yeast infections ate 8 ounces of yogurt daily for 6 months. Researchers reported that a threefold decrease in infections was seen in these women.
Yogurt Boosts Immune Response Lactobacillus casei, a strain of friendly bacteria found in cultured foods like yogurt and kefir, significantly improved the immune response and ability to fight off pneumonia in an animal study published in the Journal of Nutrition.
A human study has confirmed that a daily serving of probiotic-rich yogurt bolsters your body's ability to protect you from infection.
Daily consumption of yogurt- both conventional, commercially available yogurt and probiotic yogurt (yogurt containing health-promoting bacteria)-stimulated cellular immunity in a study involving 33 healthy women aged 22-29 years.
Cellular immunity-our immune system's first line of defense-involves special white cells which serve as our body's primary means of protection against infection by viruses, yeasts, and parasites. In addition, cellular immunity is also critical in preventing the development of cancer.
In addition, not only did the ability of immune cells to effectively kill pathogens increased following intake of the yogurt, but this effect persisted in the washout period after the women had stopped their daily yogurt consumption. These results suggest that enjoying a daily cup of yogurt-either conventional or probiotic-may boost immune function.
Yogurt Lowers LDL, Raises HDL CholesterolDaily consumption of 3 ounces of probiotic yogurt significantly improved the cholesterol profile, lowering LDL (bad) cholesterol while raising HDL (good) cholesterol, in women volunteers.
Yogurt, Specifically, Significantly Increases Fat Loss
In just 3 months, 16 obese men and women on a reduced calorie diet that included three daily portions of yogurt lost 61% more fat and 81% more abdominal fat than 18 obese subjects assigned to a diet with the same number of calories but little or no dairy products and low amounts of calcium.
Not only did those in the yogurt group lose more fat, especially around their waistlines, but they also retained more lean, muscle tissue than subjects on the yoghurt-free diet.
How yogurt promotes fat loss while preserving muscle is still a matter of debate. It may be due to the fact that calcium reduces fat cells' ability to store fat, so cells burn more, and less is produced in the liver. Or, it may be due to the branched chain amino acids present in dairy products. Regardless, this study, published in the International Journal of Obesity, indicates that adding one or two servings of yogurt to your daily diet can help you maximize loss of fat and minimize loss of muscle-the optimal outcome for any diet.
Calcium-rich Dairy Foods Boost the Body's Fat Burning After a Meal
Yet another study suggests those ads linking a daily cup of yogurt to a slimmer silhouette have a real basis in scientific fact. Research published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition not only confirms earlier studies showing a calcium-rich diet is associated with fat loss, but may help explain why.
Normal-weight women ranging in age from 18-30 years were randomly assigned to a low (less than 800 mg per day) or high (1000-1400 mg per day) calcium diet for 1 year, and the rate at which their bodies burned fat after a meal was assessed at the beginning and end of the study.
After 1 year, fat oxidation (burning) was 20 times higher in women eating the high calcium diet compared to those in the low-calcium control group (0.10 vs. 0.06 gram per minute).
The women's blood levels of parathyroid hormone were also checked and were found to correlate with their rate of fat oxidation. (The primary function of parathyroid hormone is to maintain normal levels of calcium in the body. When calcium levels drop too low, parathyroid hormone is secreted to instruct bone cells to release calcium into the bloodstream.)
Higher blood levels of parathyroid hormone were associated with a lower rate of fat oxidation and lower dietary calcium intake, while lower blood levels of parathyroid hormone levels were seen in the women consuming a diet high in calcium, who were burning fat more rapidly after a meal. So, it appears that a high-calcium diet increases fat oxidation, at least in part, by lessening the need for parathyroid hormone secretion, thus keeping blood levels of the hormone low.
Boost the Body's Ability to Build Bone
It's not just its calcium that makes yogurt a bone-friendly food, cow's milk and fermented milk products such as yogurt and kefir also contain lactoferrin, an iron-binding protein that boosts the growth and activity of osteoblasts (the cells that build bone).
Not only does lactoferrin increase osteoblast differentiation, it also reduces the rate at which these cells die by up to 50-70%, and decreases the formation of osteoclasts (the cells responsible for breaking down bone) thus helping to prevent or reverse osteoporosis. In addition, lactoferrin also increases the proliferation of chondocytes, the cells that build cartilage. For building bone, enjoying both milk and yogurt seems a good idea since lactoferrin's effects were found to be dose-dependent, stimulating an up to a 5-fold increase in osteoblasts at higher doses.
Help Prevent and Heal ArthritisLactobacillus, a probiotic (friendly) bacteria found in yogurt offers "remarkable preventive and curative" effects on arthritis, say Israeli researchers in a study published in the Journal of Nutrition.
Because lactobacillus has already demonstrated beneficial effects in other inflammatory diseases such as inflammatory bowel disorders, researchers thought it might also lessen the inflammation of arthritis. To find out, they ran two groups of animal experiments.
In both sets of experiments, laboratory animals fed the yogurt with large amounts of lactobacilli had the least amount of arthritic inflammation, while those fed plain yogurt experienced only moderate inflammation. The animals that received just lactobacillus, even heat-killed lactobacillus, also showed significant benefit. Milk, however, had no effect. So impressed were the researchers with the study's results that they recommended trials using commercial yogurts containing lactobacilli in arthritic patients.
Protection against UlcersHelicobater pylori the bacterium responsible for most ulcers, can be shut down by yogurt, suggests a study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. In this study, for six weeks, 48 adult volunteers infected with H. pylori ate yogurt containing the probiotic bacteria Lactobaciullus acidophilus and Bifidobacterium lactis twice daily after a meal, while 11 others received a milk placebo. After eight weeks, subjects were given the C-urea breath test, which measures the amount of urease, an enzyme used by H.pylori to allow it to penetrate and infect the stomach lining. In those receiving the yogurt containing probiotics, H.pylori activity was effectively suppressed.
Reduce Your Risk of Colorectal Cancer
Although we've focused on the benefits of low-fat yogurt, a study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition indicates that enjoying full-fat yogurt and other full-fat dairy foods, such as whole milk, kefir, cheese, cream, sour cream and butter, may significantly reduce risk for colorectal cancer.
Although high in saturated fat, these dairy foods contain a number of potentially cancer-preventive factors, including a protective fat called conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), which has also been shown to be cardioprotective.
In this study, over 60,000 women aged 40-76 years were followed during an average of 14.8 years. Those women who ate at least 4 servings of high-fat dairy foods each day were found to have a 41% lower risk of colorectal cancer compared to women eating less than a serving of high-fat dairy foods daily.
For each increment of 2 servings of high-fat dairy foods a woman consumed each day, her risk of colorectal cancer dropped 13%. So, while research continues to indicate that it is wise to limit your intake of saturated fat by cutting back on servings of high-fat meats, enjoying full-fat versions of yogurt and other dairy products may actually be protective.
For Fresh Breath and a Healthy Mouth, Eat Yogurt
Consuming just 3.2 ounces (90 grams) of yogurt twice a day not only lowers levels of hydrogen sulfide and other volatile sulfide compounds responsible for bad breath, but may also eliminate tongue-coating bacteria and reduce dental plaque formation, cavities, and risk for gingivitis. The sugar-free yogurt eaten by 24 volunteers in this 6-week study was fermented with two strains of probiotic (friendly) bacteria: streptococci and lactobacilli.
Be careful when selecting yogurt and choose yogurts that contain live cultures-highest quality prodcts will often indicate exactly how many live bacteria are contained in the product. Lactobacillus bulgaricus and Streptococcus thermopholis are the lactic acid bacteria usually used to make yogurt in the United States.
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