Heart Healthy Cooking

Cardiac cooking or heart healthy cooking is important, but lets talk about cardio exercise for a moment. Lets get this straight right form the start. There is nothing in my body that likes exercise. Nothing, but bypass surgery changed my thinking on this issue. Nearly 40% percent of Americans are overweight. So that means the prescribed exercise of an hour of day is being ignored. Usually the first thing a person thinks about finding an hour of time is it is impossible. Work, family and responsibilities and our days are gone. Nice try but that is only an excuse to get out of exercise. I have used that one myself.

There is more to exercise than burning calories. Although that is a nice benefit, taking care of your heart is more important. Exercise makes your heart strong so that it doesn’t have to work as hard to pump blood. It increases your lung capacity It helps reduce risk of heart attack, high cholesterol, high blood pressure and diabetes It makes you feel good It helps you sleep better It helps reduce stress I could go on all day, but that shoudlbe enough to at least make you think about it.

Everyone should be exercising but for the heart patient it is critical. So how do you get started? The easiest way is to start by walking. A word of warning, if you are not walking presently, this will not be an easy decision . It wont matter how long you start with, just start walking. Start with a 15-20 minute walk for a few days and add 5 minutes incrementally over the next few days and weeks. Before you know it you will be up to the hour a day.
If you like to go outdoors, running, cycling, hiking or walking are all good choices. If you like the gym, you’ll have access to stationary bikes, elliptical trainers, treadmills, rowing machines, stair masters and more. There is no ‘best’ cardio exercise. Anything that gets your heart rate up fits the bill.

Let’s get this out of the way right now. I don’t like diets and I never will. I tried them all.
I remember trying the Atkins diet and lost 30 lbs. Great right, except that my breakfast consisted of ½ dozen eggs and a lb of bacon, Sound healthy? Of course not..

Heart surgery can change the way you look at all kinds of food. Frankly , since my bypass surgery, I weigh the cost of everything I put in my mouth. The thought process usually goes like this, McDonald’s = clogged arteries = more surgery =pain. I never want to be in that kind of pain again.

So rather than diets I have changed my lifestyle and not just what I eat or cook. Exercise, nicotine, caffeine, all the things that they tell you are bad for you. Guess what? They are.

My cholesterol is in the 120’s and falling. Not bad since it approached 300 at times in my life. Folks, take a minute to think about the most important muscle in your body. Are you taking care of it?

On a Sunday afternoon in November of 2006 I drove myself to a hospital emergency room, suffering from chest pain. Some 3 days later surgeons performed coronary bypass surgery on 5 of my most important arteries. I was 49 at the time. 49! I slowly began recovering and 4 or 5 days after the surgery, I began to get an appetite again. Having an appetite is not something that was ever missing from my daily routine. I always had one.
Now let’s get this straight form the beginning. Hospital food is well, hospital food, it not good, agreed? Try hospital food for a cardiac patient. Oh my goodness. Think bland.

I have always loved cooking, have always loved eating and not necessarily in that order.
I had a choice to make, continue to slam down quarter pound hamburgers, meals that were rich in fat content or choose another way. I decided living is better. Like Andy Dufresne says get busy living or get busy dying. I chose the former.

Heart healthy living, heart healthy cooking and heart healthy eating became a passion. There is nothing quite like lying in a hospital bed counting your own heart beat just to make sure its doing what it is supposed to do to change your life.

Heart Healthy Cooking will provide you with information on all 3. Heart Healthy Cooking doesn’t mean bland. Heart healthy cooking is about cooking for a taste that sets your free.