Magnesium Supplements

Magnesium is needed by our body to carry out normal body functions. It is the fourth most abundant element found in the bones, teeth and in the red blood cells of the body. You can take magnesium from food sources or in the form of magnesium supplements.

The good sources of magnesium include green leafy vegetables, Brazil nut, almonds, peanuts, oatmeal, chocolate, fennel seeds, whole wheat bread, baked potatoes, soybean flour and more. But sometimes, magnesium needed by the body is not met by food sources and in this case, magnesium supplements should be taken for proper functioning of the body.

Magnesium supplements are available in many forms including magnesium chloride, magnesium oxide, magnesium hydroxide, magnesium arginate, magnesium gluconate and others. On an average adult, it is required to have 270-400 mg of magnesium intake in a day taken in small doses with water. You need supplements during certain medical conditions due to magnesium deficiency caused by excessive loss or due to improper magnesium absorption. You should always take magnesium supplements after your doctor's prescription as they know the benefits and side effects of these supplements to the body.

You can have several health benefits by taking magnesium supplements. If you are diabetic, then magnesium supplements can help in improving the insulin level and glucose intolerance by maintaining adequate level of magnesium in the body.

Magnesium deficiency in your body can result in various heart diseases. Magnesium supplements helps in treating high blood pressure, high cholesterol level, coronary artery disease, abnormal heart arrhythmias and heart attack by maintaining blood level of magnesium and relaxing heart muscles. Women need magnesium supplements to maintain their health. It helps in combating symptoms of premenstrual syndrome and at the time of menopause. If you are pregnant, then you can avoid complications during pregnancy and delivery such as premature labor, pre-eclampsia, eclampsia and placenta previa. They are also needed for building healthy bones and preventing osteoporosis by helping in enhancing bone mass.

Magnesium also helps in calcium, sodium and potassium absorption in the blood stream needed by body. If you are suffering from asthma attacks, then magnesium supplements can help you in achieving normal breathing by helping to relax the bronchial muscles.

Magnesium supplements should not be taken in over doses as they can cause certain side effects that harm your body. You can suffer from symptoms like tiredness, weakness, cramps in abdomen and legs, diarrhea, and nausea with vomiting and low blood pressure. They can be very harmful to your heart sometimes causing death. They can cause difficulty in breathing, loss of appetite, flashes of heat and fainting. Overdose of magnesium can disrupt the calcium level of the body resulting in muscle contractions and hindering normal functioning of hormone secretion and functioning of central nervous system.

jhergzb contributes to many free article directories and is a paid staff writer for FreeArticleDigest.com, where you can find articles on subjects ranging from wood file cabinets [http://www.freearticledigest.com/computers-and-office/woodfilecabinets.html] to industrial storage cabinets [http://www.freearticledigest.com/tools-auto-and-industrial/industrialstoragecabinets.html]. You may republish this article free of charge, anywhere online, as long as all keyword links are left intact.

Recommend : lodge logic pre seasoned 17 inch cast iron skillet anolon advanced cookware set

What is Strong Flour?

Home baking is now a normal activity in many households. The manual part of bread making (mixing flours, kneading) is fascinating, but the main reason is that it is very easy to do the math: bake bread yourself rather than buying it at the supermarket, and you will save a lot of money.

In this article I will talk about wheat flour, the most used for breads all over the world. Historically, wheat is one of the first and most important cereals to be used by ancient civilizations. It first appeared almost 10000 years BC in the area in the Near East watered by rivers Tigris and Euphrates, called the Fertile crescent. Over the centuries, wheat started to be grown in other areas such as Europe and China. Worldwide, wheat is now produced for the most part in the European Union, mostly in Italy and France.

The seed (or kernel) of wheat is composed of three parts. The bran is the outer shell, and contains fibers and vitamins (especially B). The endosperm is a source for starch (a polysaccharide carbohydrate). The germ is small, but full of vitamin E and B and antioxidants. These three parts can be combined to obtain different kinds of flour.

White flour is produced from ground endosperm. Whole grain (also called wholemeal) flour is made grounding all three parts together. A particular type of wholemeal flour is called Graham flour, where the three parts are grounded separately (the endosperm more finely, and the bran and the germ more coarsely) then mixed back together. Germ flour is made from the endosperm plus the germ. Germ and bran can also be found alone as by-products of milling process. Germ is often used as supplement for athletes as an aid to gain muscle resistance, whereas bran is added to breads to enrich their fiber content.

The right flour for bread baking is "strong." The strength of a flour depends on the content of gluten, a proteic complex composed of glutenin and gliadin. Gluten absorbs water up to 150% of its weight, and when the dough is left to rise, it withholds the CO2 produced by the yeast, giving bread its typical bubbly and spongy texture. If you have ever kneaded strong flour you will have noticed that the more you work it, the harder the dough gets. This is the flour's strength. Gluten forms a kind of elastic coat, that can be stretched while kneading and holds its shape when baked.

The higher the protein content, the stronger the flour. Ideally, percentage of protein should be 15% but 12% is also fine. If the protein is below 10%, it means that the flour is "soft" and should be used to prepare cakes. Apart from bread, strong flour is also used to prepare Italian dishes like pizza, focaccia, and fresh pasta.

Maria is a mother of three from Malaga, and a "bread machine." She shares her mastery of bread making in a blog, where all bread recipes have the approval of a very severe committee composed of three hungry kids and a hungry husband. Try her Focaccia or the Traditional Irish Soda Bread

Recommend : lodge logic pre seasoned 9 quart dutch oven le creuset 9 piece cookware set

Whole Grain Vs Whole Wheat - What is Best For You? Part I

We have all seen it, 100% whole wheat bread that sits next to the white bread. It looks like white bread, but it says enriched. Enriched with what? Well, let me back up a little. When wheat is harvested the whole grain is taken to the refinery. REFINERY, did you see that! The wheat is heated to a point when the germ and the bran fall off. What is left is the starch, the white part, the not good for you part. The part that has a long shelf life and is bug resistant. Do you know why it is bug resistant? Bugs CANNOT sustain life in it. They will die if they only eat this refined grain. So why on earth, with the abundance of good life sustaining food do we eat white flour, which is the starch of the wheat grain ground up. Honestly do I need to answer that? Take a look around and you will see obesity on the rise, and now not only are adults overweight, but kids, little kids are getting more and more fat. Why? We are feeding ourselves all kinds of unhealthy food. Some do it because it is cheaper, some because of taste, and some just because they don't know any better.

So now that I explained what white bread is made of, let me continue to answer the question of "what exactly is enriched"? After the refinery takes the grains apart and makes white flour, which has no nutrition, they add some vitamins, some minerals, and some fiber, but not even a gram worth. The white bread is enriched with some of the very things they just worked so hard to take out. However, they do not add in as much of the grain they take away, otherwise it would be whole grain. Just enough to add some flavor and calories to it.

What is whole grain? It is the WHOLE grain used in the process of making bread, cereal and the building blocks of many other foods. For it to be truly healthy whole grain needs to be listed on your bread, cereal or other food in the number 1 or number 2 position on the ingredients list. No, whole wheat flour which is followed by (enriched white flour, niacin, and iron) is not healthy, it is a way of making people believe that they are getting a whole grain bread. They are not lying, it is whole wheat flour, but not whole grain. It did come from the wheat plant and it is all wheat, but not all grain. Whole is just another word like all. If you look a little farther down on the list you will see molasses, why molasses you ask? It colors the bread to make it look brown. Yup, white flour plus vitamins and minerals still does not bring the bran back into the bread. Bran is what helps to give the natural brown color to bread. So, they again, add something to it, to try and make it look like something it is not.

Linda Cramer is the co-owner of Planet Gift Baskets. Visit our website. http://www.planetgiftbaskets.com

Friends Link : calphalon unison nonstick 10 piece cookware set kitchenaid 10 piece cookware set