What Motivates Me

My camera's batteries are dead so I could not transfer some recent oatmeal pics from mycamera to this blog. In the meantime, this picture from www.everybodylikessandwiches.blogspot.com shows almost exactly what I have been staring at every morning and then eating with delight: Oats in all its forms!
I have purchase all the forms of oats available at WinCo from their bins: The whole oat groats, the steel cut oats, the Scottish oatmeal (which is like coarse ground oat flour...cooks up into a lovely porridge), old fashioned oats, and quick oats.I usually add nuts and raisins and soy milk to my bowl of hot steaming oat porridge.

What motivates me to have oats daily now is the wonderful taste and the feeling of well being I get from them. I have discovered that they are much healthier than I ever imagined...read on...

"Oats are a very healthy grain. Unlike wheat, barley and other grains, processed oats retain the bran and germ layers, which is where most nutrients reside. In addition, oats contain a variety of compounds that have been shown reduce heart disease, fight cancer, lower blood sugar, improve insulin sensitivity, and help with dieting.

For awhile now we’ve been hearing that oatmeal and oat bran can help lower cholesterol and subsequently reduce the risk of heart disease. Studies after studies show that getting more oats in the diet not only lowers total cholesterol, but more importantly, lowers the low-density lipoprotein (LDL) while leaving the beneficial high-density lipoprotein cholesterol alone.

Oats contain a type of soluble fiber called beta-glucan, which traps dietary cholesterol within a sticky gel in the intestine, taking unwanted cholesterol with it. Oats also contain compounds called saponins, which bind to cholesterol and takes it out of the body.

Like many plant foods, oats contain a variety of compounds that provide different kind of protection. Three of these compounds – tocotrienols (related to vitamin E), ferulic acid, and caffeic acid – are antioxidants. That is, they help control cell-damaging particles called free radicals, which, when left unchecked, can contribute to heart disease, cancer, and certain eye diseases. Its just being discovered that tocotrienols are 50% more powerful than vitamin E and they act on the liver, which turns down the body’s own production of cholesterol.

Other compounds in oats protect against cancer in much the same way that they help prevent heart disease – by neutralizing call-damaging free radicals before they cause harm.

Finally, oats contain generous amounts of compound called phythic acid, and although researchers haven’t identified the exact mechanism, there’s some evidence that phythic acid binds up certain reactive minerals, which may be important in preventing colon cancer.

Another benefit of oats is that they help keep body’s blood sugar levels in balance. Many people have impaired glucose tolerance condition – similar to diabetes and can increase the risks of heart disease. In people with this condition, blood sugar levels are higher than they should be, but not so high that the people are actually diabetic. Yet even slightly elevated blood sugar levels may be cause for concern because they cause the body to pump out larger amounts of insulin to bring them down.

The soluble fiber in oats gives protective gummy layer in the intestine. This slows the rate at which carbohydrates are absorbed by the body, which in turn helps keep blood sugar levels stable. In addition, oats soluble fiber appears to reduce the output of hormones in the digestive tract, which indirectly lowers the body’s production of insulin.

Although the evidence is still preliminary, compounds found in oats – saponins- may be effective in disabling HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

Dr. A. Rao, Ph.D, professor of nutrition at the University of Toronto working on the puzzling fact that while some people infected with HIV develop AIDS relatively quickly, others don’t become sick for years – current research is in its very early stages indicates that saponins in oats may play an important role in controlling HIV virus.

Unlike many foods, in which the processed versions are often the least nutritious, oats retain their goodness in different forms. So when time is an issue, you can enjoy quick oats. They provide just as many vitamins and minerals as the traditional, slower-cooking kind."from...http://foodsthatheal.blogspot.com/2007/09/oats.html