Before flu-season kicks into full swing, now it the time to be arming your body’s natural line of defense. Whether you get the flu shot or not, keeping your immune system strong and healthy is essential to ward off the range of viruses, allergies, and all the other nasties lurking around us. Here are our top ten tips for how you can naturally arm your immune system to stay fighting fit:
1. Eat a balanced diet with wholefoods
Our immune system requires many nutrients to stay healthy, including vitamins A, C, D and E, as well as minerals selenium and zinc, and Omega 3s. In fact, a recent study in older adults showed that boosting fruit and vegetable intake improved antibody response to the Pneumovax vaccine, which protects against Streptococcus pneumonia. Focus on keeping your diet packed with healthy wholefoods, such as quality animal or plant protein, legumes, whole grains, nuts and seeds like chia, and plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables.
2. Get plenty of vitamin C
Nothing new here, vitamin C has been known for centuries as a natural immune booster. Make sure you’re including plenty of berries, citrus, kiwi, bell peppers, and dark green vegetables in your diet.
3. Keep it clean
Every day the environments we inhabit put us in direct contact with millions of bugs, germs and bacterias — some are good for us, and some not so much! As sniffle-season sets in, and our morning commutes have us crammed in confined spaces with people coughing and sneezing, sticking the basics of good hygiene is even more important. Think of the things that make you vulnerable to germs and disease and do your best to avoid them, for example:
- Wash your hands a few times a day, especially after the bathroom or being on public transport
- Don’t share drinks directly with others often
- Maintain food hygiene and prepare food safely
4. Avoid antibiotics (if possible)
Antibiotics can be a very necessary and important treatment for infection. However, you should try to avoid taking them in unless you really need them. Not only do antibiotics attack the bad bacterias, they can also attack the beneficial bacteria in the digestive system and suppress immune functions.
5. Make friends with good bacteria
Gut health and general health are inextricably linked. In fact, about 80% of our immune system is located in our digestive system, so keeping a healthy gut is very important to supporting a strong immune system. If you have been taking antibiotics, make sure you’re replenishing your digestive flora by taking quality probiotics — either as a supplement, or in the natural source found in fermented foods like raw sauerkraut, miso, yogurt, kefir and kimchi.
6. Drink plenty of clean water
Drinking plenty of water and staying hydrated is one of the simplest, best things you can do for your overall health. When it comes to your immune system, water plays an important role in helping to carry the white blood cells and other immune system cells. For an extra boost, add a slice of lemon to your water bottle for some extra vitamin C.
7. Get enough sleep
A tired body is more more at risk of illness. Our bodies strengthen, replenish and rejuvenate during rest times, and sleep deprivation can have surprisingly devastating results on the production of antibodies. To give your body it’s best chance to stay healthy and fight off illness this winter, make sleep a priority and aim for at least seven to eight hours per night.
8. Be a sun seeker
Vitamin D is very important for a healthy immune system, but with shorter days and less daylight hours our vitamin D intake often takes a sharp dive this time of year. Make a conscious effort to make the most of any opportunity you have to be outdoors during the day, like taking your lunch to the park, or walking an extra station or two in the morning. You can also get small doses of vitamin D from fatty fish.
9. Work it out
It can be all too tempting to fall into winter hibernation and let the cozy couch take place of your regular work-out regime. But exercise isn’t only a great way to keep the winter padding at bay — it also increases our immune function, improves sleep quality, and makes our bodies stronger. So keep it up!
10. Stress less
Stress and anxiety can wreak havoc on our immune system and make us more vulnerable to illness. Keep those winter blues at bay and focus on doing things that keep your mind healthy, as well as your body! Keeping a regular exercise regime can help with this. Also, find ways to make the cooler days fun with friends and family. Autumn is a great time to get outdoors and enjoy some activities before it gets too cold – try apple picking, or taking a stroll through a nearby park to enjoy the red and gold leaves.
Have you been watching SBS’ Born to Cook, Jack Stein Downunder? If you caught last weekend’s episode you would know that Jack Stein paid a visit to our chia farm in Kununurra, Western Australia!
We were super excited to host Jack on a visit to our farm, and to introduce him to the home of our Australian Grown chia. He spent the day with John Foss, our CEO and Founder, along with Farmer Fritz to learn all about plant-based nutrition and how our chia is sustainably farmed in the ideal environment to achieve the highest nutrition.
We put Jack through his paces on the farm, and introduced him to the challenges of water syphoning – our sustainable farming alternative to pumping water. Lets just say that it’s a good thing that Jack can cook better than pumping water! The episode finishes with Jack’s recipe for chia pizza with szechuan pineapple and tomato.
This insightful post is by our guest contributor, Sara Jackson. Sara is a Registered Nutritional Therapist and Naturopath who embraces a balanced Functional Medicine approach to support her clients’ health. Learn more about Sara and her approach to meaningful nutrition and healthier living.
We’ve all heard the mantras: you are what you eat, eat to nourish you, mindful eating, intuitive eating, clean food, dirty food, let food be thy medicine…you get the drift. And while I agree with a lot of the headlines that have helped get debates about positive nutrition back on the table, I believe that nutrition is nuanced, complex and very individual. Educating people about proper, balanced nutrition is now my life’s passion and work.
I want you to stop and actually think about how food affects you. How it affects your mind, body and soul and what part it plays into how you feel as a human being in your life at this very moment — both the good, and the bad bits. Forget about all the rules, fads and fiction and just think about your body for a moment.
I know firsthand the effects that positive and poor nutrition can have on our bodies. This time about seven years ago, I was facing a diagnosis of stage 2 cervical cancer that came totally out of the blue. In hindsight, I can see the link between developing cancer and my long hours in a stressful job, very haphazard diet, and generally just not really prioritising my health in any meaningful way. These factors compromised my immunity and made me more susceptible to the HPV virus, which most of us live with every day, but for me turned rogue and developed into cancer. With the help of both conventional and natural medicine, I have thankfully been clear of cancer ever since my treatment finished.
I have used this experience positively and changed almost everything that I felt was important in my life. I studied for four years retraining to become a fully accredited Registered Nutritional Therapist. My goal was and is to use my personal experience with how nutrition, along with some other powerful lifestyle changes, have transformed my health and kept me free from cancer. I am now privileged enough to help others dealing with cancer journeys, as well as a host of other illnesses and disorders that I specialize in such as chronic fatigue, digestive health and many more.
So I would like to share with you four meaningful and manageable ways you can really use nutrition to make a difference in your life:
1. Eat more health giving food, and less processed foods.
Recent studies show we should ultimately eat 8—10 daily servings of rainbow coloured vegetables and fruit.
Action point:
The next time you go shopping, pick one veggie that you usually walk straight past and find a delicious new recipe to cook with it. Start off by adding one extra green veg to your lunch and evening meal. Think about seasonal cruciferous vegetables (broccoli, kale, chard, salad greens, cabbage, brussell sprouts, cauliflower), and lots more garlic and onions which help increase sulfur in the body and help detoxification.
2. Ditch the unhelpful carbs
Not all carbohydrates are bad, however many of the “simple” carbohydrates found in processed and refined foodscan contribute to insulin disruption, bloating, fatigue, moodiness and poorer gut health.
Action point:
We need carbs no matter what you heard – but it’s time to embrace the good guys. Oats, quinoa, brown rice, buckwheat, beans and lentils can be your new best friends.
3. Use dietary fibre to prevent disease.
There seems to be less hype about fibre than many other dietary considerations such as sugar and fats. Fibre consumption in the Uk is well below national targets of 30g a day for adults (the average intake is 17.2/day for women and 20.1g/day for men). There are countless evidence based studies to show that diets rich in fibre can play a part in lowering the risks of many disease such as cardiovascular disease, coronary events, stroke, type 2 diabetes, colorectal cancer, gastrointestinal and digestive health disorders.
Action point:
Increase your daily intake of fibre‐containing foods such as fruit, vegetables, nuts and seeds and high‐fibre/wholegrain starchy foods. Adding two tablespoon of chia seeds daily adds a whopping 12g of dietary fibre to a well balanced diet.
4. Get good gut bugs.
Our gut micro biome are central to our immune systems, our mental and emotional health and the way we absorb and get the most out of the food we eat. Stress, processed food, antibiotics, alcohol, cigarettes, sugar, pollution may compromise good bacteria and feed the pathogenic bacteria. However we can improve this pattern with changes to lifestyle and diet and adding natural probiotic and prebiotic via supplements, fermented food and drink.
Action point:
Try out some probiotic rich food and drinks to help improve your gut health. Look in the refrigerated section of your supermarket or health food store for kombucha and kefir drinks, or try foods like sauerkraut, miso, kimchi, bio-live plain yoghurt and coconut yoghurt.
A California native, Claire Ptak worked as a pastry chef for Alice Waters at Chez Panisse before moving to London. Claire worked at The Anchor and Hope in Southwark and staged at St. John and Moro before starting her cake stall Violet on Broadway Market. In 2010 she opened Violet, the bakery and cafe in Hackney, East London. She was most recently appointed to create the royal wedding cake for the nuptials of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, which she chose to be a lemon elderflower creation. Alongside baking, Claire works extensively as a food stylist and writer. Her forth cookbook, ‘The Violet Bakery Cookbook’ was shortlisted for the Fortnum and Mason Best Cookery Book 2016. Claire regularly contributes to The Guardian and The Observer and her work has also been featured in Vogue, Bon Appetit, Observer Food Monthly, Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Tasting Table, Food52 and beyond. Claire is also the host of Violet Sessions, a podcast of inspiring interviews with creative female pioneers. Guests have included Penny Martin, editor of The Gentlewoman; Chef and restaurateur Thomasina Miers; Chef Ruth Rogers of The River Café; Home cook and cookery writer Nadine Redzepi; and star of podcast sensation My Dad Wrote Porno, Alice Levine.
Great for vegan and gluten-free baking, these fruity blondies are great energy boosters, and you could substitute any fruit that is in season.
“Blondies are one of my favourite things to bake for two reasons: you can make them from start to finish in an hour, and everybody loves them! I have been a fan of chia seeds since I was growing a chia pet back in the 1980’s. Eating them is way better! Who knew they were also so incredibly good for us? I’ve been using flax seeds to make vegan eggs for a long time but I actually prefer using ground chia.” — Claire Ptak
HOW TO:
Line a 20 x 30cm baking tray with parchment paper and set aside.
In the bowl of an electric stand mixer, whisk together the melted and cooled coconut oil, chia seeds and palm sugar until creamy and smooth.
Add the coconut or almond milk and vanilla and mix well.
Measure the flour mixture, baking powder and salt in a bowl and whisk together. Add this to the wet and cream together until smooth again. Scoop into your prepared tin and smooth the top.
Heat the oven to 170°C
Trim the tough stem from the figs but try to keep the shape of the figs intact. Slice the figs in half down the centre through the stem then slice into quarters. Arrange on top of the blondie mixture, skin side down. Sprinkle with the flaky sea salt and bake for 25-35 minutes or until set and golden. Allow to cool completely before slicing. Serve with your favourite tea or coffee or glass of alt milk.