Stores sold more than 1.000.000.000 pounds of unprepared kernels and exported more than 245.000.000 pounds in the year 2000, making it no surprise that this confectionery is up there with the nation’s preferred delicacies. So if you want some, buy from the biggest in the market — sending a million or more pounds each year to fans of gourmet popcorn. And if you were wondering, they have also taken care to guarantee that it’s kosher certified. Given their three decades of experience, you can give them your order in good faith, no matter what flavor you’re craving. To guarantee perfection they first choose the finest, most flavorful kernels from America. Following that, corn oil is used to pop the corn to permit flavorings to infuse right into the core of the popcorn. Love that fresh taste? To maintain it, right after popping, the popcorn is swiftly sealed up and shipped. Why not pick up a 6 gallon tin, full of popcorn? They are ready for you. So if you have a company event that wants snacks providing — or just want to stock up enough to cater for movie night for a few weeks — you know what you’re looking for. Plain, of course, and buttered — but you can also find them offered flavored with white chocolate raspberry or banana cream pie.

Perhaps these are beyond your budget? Don’t dismay — smaller tins are also on sale. Designed to celebrate birthdays, any special occasion, or to send a message, they make excellent presents. Not enough? Well, you can raise the stakes, having an amusing picture, a special note, or the recipient’s name added. Some customers are sure of a preferred flavor and choose to merely buy a sizable tin of it. You can instead choose a sampler or perhaps an assortment. Alternatively, if you need a bigger variety, there’s a solution — the tower. And while they offer predesigned towers, you can also choose what each box will hold in a custom tower. So there it is; so many flavors, such a variety of selections. Owing to their presentation, too, they make wonderful presents. You’ll find no more effective way to spread a little cheer across the US.

Let me tell you about 1800Baskets — an innovative website which can cater to all your requirements from the well known Internet store 1800Flowers. An international vendor of gourmet gift baskets, this Internet company helps you to get your gift of choice right where it needs to go.

Whatever you want them for — a holiday, a special event — these baskets will actually overflow with knockout gifts. Customers will delight in the foodstuffs included in the baskets. The typical basket draws on elements such as meat, fruit, crackers and cheeses to produce delicious platters bound to delight. But it isn’t only the food; as we’re sure you know, meals will only be enriched by the drinks that accompany them — and as a result they will accompany their baskets with one or more bottles of premium wine for good measure. And what, you may inquite, about recipients with a sweet tooth? Happily, there are other baskets loaded with just that in mind. You might choose to select a basket full of sweetmeats, or instead they might be part of an assortment. And what are these treats, you ask? Just as pleasing to that sweet tooth are cakes and you can be sure that the selections will make the recipient smile.

They also offer gift selections intended for those who like sweet tastes but refrain from refined sugar. The tropical gift selections packed with pineapples, citrus fruits, and pears, boxes of one variety of fruit, or baskets filled with cheese and fruit provide a splendid prospect. There are non-edible variations, like the spa set which offers soaps.

A number of the gifts have been designed specifically for the holidays. An assortment of cookies, trinkets, wine, treats, chocolates, and sundry more unusual tasty goodies are put together in beautiful baskets and boxes. They might possess a more formal air, perfect for work colleagues, or you could buy them decorated as Santa Claus or a Christmas tree for loved ones. There are unique containers to celebrate funerals, anniversaries, closing a business deal, signing a contract, weddings, and a variety of other special events.

What this means is there are practically unlimited methods of buying your colleagues baskets now, no matter where on the planet they are. Without having to leave your laptop you may place an order in the certainty it will arrive at the end of its journey still pristine and in superior quality.

Stores sold an amazing 1.000.000.000 pounds of unprepared kernels and shipped out more than two hundred and forty five million pounds internationally in 2000, making it hardly a surprise that popcorn is one of America’s favorite treats. As a result, more than a million pounds are sent out by the Popcorn Factory, pre-prepared as gourmet popcorn, popcorn balls, popcorn favors and tins of popcorn, yearly. In addition, it’s kosher certified, so anyone can enjoy it. With thirty years of experience, you can confidently depend upon them, whichever variety you happen to crave. To ensure quality they first pick out the finest grain from the U.S. Then, corn oil pops the kernels and the flavorings can infuse straight into the flesh. And to make sure of that fresh taste? To preserve it, straight after popping, the popcorn is rapidly sealed up to be dispatched. Their speciality tins make a great gift, in two and a half and six gallon sizes and packed full. So if you’ve a business function to provide snacks for - or just want to get you and your family enough to cater for the next few movie nights - you know who to talk to. You can buy them in plain and buttered not to mention several other flavors such as banana cream pie. But if that’s too much, they do offer different possibilities; among them the beautiful boxes. As with many presents, you can have these decorated to suit the occasion. Not enough? Well, you could raise the stakes, having an amusing picture, a personalized note, or the name of the recipient added.

If you’re already certain what you’re after, you can just place a significant order. Those with wider interests might prefer the assortments on offer. Alternatively, if you want a larger variety, you have a solution - the tower. Quickly constructed from a stack of containers securely attached, you can buy specific combinations or make your own choices.

The Popcorn Factory offers an amazing variety of popcorn in virtually any flavor you’re likely to want. Order them as gifts or as treats. Can you think of anyone who’d like a six gallon tin? We greatly recommend it.

I was in an auto accident four years ago and sustained a back injury. After being treated unsuccessfully by a chiropractor, he finally decided to get an MRI done on me, and we discovered the cause of my mid back pain. I have had a journey into health the last four years, exploring traditional Western treatments such as medications and procedures such as nerve injections and then after receiving no relief, began to take matters into my own hands. I began walking again, as well as eating healthier meals and was introduced to Qi Quong. Those modalities have helped me to become more active and have less pain.

I worked as a nurse for 35 years, many of them working with spinal cord injured patients, stroke patients as well as head injured patients. In the time of 13 years, I sustained 3 injuries, being out of work for less than a week each time. I was such a stoic, feeling that I was young and could heal quickly. The wear and tear of all those strains and pulls and abuses resulted in an occurrence of mid back pain when I reached my late 40, sometimes immobilizing me with inflamed discs. I have tried a variety of modalities.

Because of consumer demand, the food industry focus is on producing fruits and vegetables that ship well, not nutrient content. How food is stored and processed has an impact on nutrition. The best defense against nutritionally depleted foods is careful supplementation followed by purchasing fresh foods as close to the source and organically grown whenever feasible.

Getting the most nutrition for every dollar spent is of great concern for those interested in maintaining good health. Yet for the average consumer, the nutrition derived from fresh food dollars has substantially decreased over the past three decades. Why is this happening and what can be done about it?

Everyone wants good nutrition from the foods we eat and we are encouraged to eat five or more servings of fruits and vegetables every day. Yet in light of the methods used to bring food to our tables, getting even minimal levels of nutrients from the foods we eat can be a challenge. Why is it such a challenge to get good nutrition from our most basic foods?

The answer lies in many of the habits of our modern lifestyle. We no longer live on farms, so our foods often must travel great distances from field to table. Because consumers demand produce with an attractive (read ‘perfect’) appearance, the food industry focus is on producing fruits and vegetables that ship well, not nutrient content. Picked green in the field and shipped in cold storage, many types of produce that look great in the store fail to produce optimal nutrients that develop only in the ripe state, or lose much of their nutrients in cold dark conditions. Examples of this are tomatoes and lettuce. Vine ripened tomatoes are proven to contain higher levels of beta-carotene, lycopene and soluble fiber than green picked fruit. Lettuce loses up to 46% of certain nutrients within 7 days of cold, dark storage.

Another reason for nutrient poor produce is the very soils they are grown in. Soils throughout North America have been depleted since the ‘dust bowl’ years of the 1930’s. Soil depletion is a problem worldwide, because of poor farming methods that take from the soil without returning the minerals vital to good health. Modern methods replace only the minerals necessary for good plant growth, not trace minerals essential for human health. Although this trend is beginning to be reversed by today’s organic farmer’s careful cultivation of the soil, depletion continues to be a problem throughout the world with little attention paid to the contribution of trace minerals to good health.

How food is stored on the grocery shelf also has an impact on nutrition. Tomato juice retains vitamin C better in cans than in glass containers, whereas orange juice retains its vitamin C better in glass than plastic or glass containers. Vitamin K as well as some B vitamins is depleted by exposure to light, including fluorescent light present in grocery stores. For example, enriched pastas can lose up to 80% riboflavin content if stored in lighted conditions for just 12 weeks.

Other factors that influence nutritional quality of fresh fruits and vegetables include washing, preparation (chopping, slicing, etc.), and cooking and storage methods in the home. There are too many known variables in preserving food nutritional quality to list in this brief article. Yet, very little research has been done to fully determine nutrient losses in our modern food system.

There is a very good source available which summarizes much of what is known. Written by Jane Ramberg, MS and Bill McAnalley, PhD and titled, “From Farm to the Kitchen Table: A Review of the Nutrient Losses in Foods”, published in the Glycoscience & Nutrition journal, September 1, 2002 issue, volume 3, number 5, this informative summary is the basis for information provided in this article. Anyone who desires a free copy of the entire summary may obtain one by contacting the author at the source listed in the author’s bio.

The best defense against nutritionally depleted foods is careful supplementation followed by purchasing fresh foods as close to the source and organically grown whenever feasible. Maximizing your nutrition dollar by getting optimal nutrition from all sources is your best offensive move for maintaining good health.

Karen Walker is a home business consultant specializing in the health and wellness industry.

http://www.newamericanfamily.com

eMail to: karen@newamericanfamily.com

I, a crazy, self-professed health and fitness nut, have a confession.

I love the foods my mother used to fix for me and my five brothers and sisters. I love chicken, mashed potatoes, and gravy and the warm, fuzzy feeling I get when I remember all of us kids sitting at the dinner table.

I love hamburgers with all the trimmings and the fun we used to have at our neighborhood summertime barbeques.

I love sandwiches my mom made me for lunchpeanut butter and jelly, egg salad, tuna fish, cream cheese and olives, BLTs, and roast beef on brown-colored white bread.

I love eggs, bacon, and toast, thickly smeared with butter and jam, which I gulped down before the school bus came.

I love cheese, and I love pizza. My college boyfriend, Jack, and I used to eat pizza (and drink beershhhhhhhh!) every weekend at the Hollywood.

I love deep-fried onion rings. I love mint chocolate chip ice cream. I love popcorn with lots of butter. Movie without popcornwhat’s the point of going? And popcorn without butter, what’s the point of eating it?

Most of all, I love cookies. Probably because I started making cookies for my family of eight when I was nine-years-old.

I made them just like my mother told me. You knowsugar, salt, white flour, baking soda, eggs, chocolate chips sometimes, and the queen of artery-clogging, heart-stopping, cancer-causing hydrogenated fatsCrisco! How I loved that Crisco mixed with sugar!

And the best parteating the cookie dough BEFORE it was cooked. Yummmmmmm! I figured that was my reward for making cookies for my family.

But, what I didn’t love were those stomach aches that made me double over in pain every day of my high school lifestomach aches that wouldn’t go away until I laid down on my stomach to make them go awayfor another 24 hours.

I know my mother thought I was just trying to get out of doing dishesso she saved them for meor I just toughed it out until they were done!

The other thing I didn’t love was being stuffed up every day of my life. I had no idea what it was like to feel clear-headed. In fact, I had no idea I was stuffed up until, well, I wasn’t.

So when I started the process (and it is a process and a slow one at that) of taking the animal and dairy products out of my life, something magical, and unexpected, happened.

My stomach aches disappearedcompletely. And, I could breathe through my nose for the first time ever! How was I to know that a nose is meant to be breathed through when mine was always stuffed up?

I also lost 10 pounds in 6 weeks. Funny thing wasI didn’t even know that I needed to lose weight. That was over 20 years ago, and my weight has stayed right there for all these years.

Do I still love all those foods that my mother, along with other mothers, doctors, teachers, and the government, thought were best for me? Absolutely!

But what I love more is the fact that I don’t have to think about which clothes in my closet fit and which ones don’tthey are all the same size, and they all fit just right.

I love feeling good. I love being able to breathe our clean air through my nose while I walk 7 miles to Pt. Williams and back.

I love the gift of energy and the feeling that my life is on track.

I love taking care of my patients (yes, you!), and I love cheering you on in your own journey to the best you.

My mother had no idea that the foods she gave me were the very foods that were making me sick and overweight.

At one time, she suggested that I get exploratory surgery to find out what was wrong with my stomach. I refused.

My mother did the best she could with the knowledge she had. I applaud her for all she did for me and my siblings.

Much of who I am today is the direct result of my mother’s love, guidance, and sacrifice.

Now it is up to me to do the best I can do for my own body, health, and fitness with the knowledge, self-motivation, and self-love that I have.

And what about you, my friend? How do you feel about how you look and how you feel right now?

Are you happy where your health and life are headed in the next year, or five or ten years, down the road?

If not, perhaps you are open and ready to learn how to make small, baby-step changes (no, you don’t have to give up all the food you love) in your daily food choices that could make a huge difference in your weight and how you look and feel, especially about yourself.

As you sort fact from fiction and build up a foundation of principles that are critical for you to reach and maintain your ideal weight, health, and level of fitness, you will be amazed at what our mothers just didn’t know.

They simply didn’t know that the meat, milk, cheese, refined sugar, flour, and cereals, desserts, salt, processed foods, and added fats and oils are some of the very foods that make us overweight, sick, and tired.

It is up to each of us to decide what we love moreour childhood foods or our adulthood health.

The choice is yours.

Dr. Leslie Van Romer is a health motivational speaker, writer, and lifestyle coach. Visit http://www.DrLeslieVanRomer.com for more inspiration.

For many years it was assumed that what you ate each day had little or nothing to do with helping in the prevention of many of our deadliest cancers. However, recent research has proven that nutrition does indeed play a major role in the prevention and treatment of many types of cancer.

There are certain vitamins and minerals that are believed to enhance and spread malignancies through the bodies system, and this is needed to help prevent cancer. There are also vitamins and minerals that help to prevent the growth of tumors.

The National Cancer Institute has reported that one third of all cancer is diet related. They have also gone on to say that making changes in the diet can help to prevent most of the cancer that is related to nutrition.

Research has shown that diets that include fruits and vegetables eaten on a daily bases, according to the recommended daily allowance, give a reduced risk of the majority of the deadliest cancers. For a diet to provide a reduced risk, certain vitamins and minerals must be included. This means that foods that are rich in bioflavonoids, fiber, and vitamins A, C, and E must be consumed regularly. These all seem to help to slow, stop, and even reverse the process that leads to cancer.

Now, everyone knows that cigarette smoking is one of the leading causes of cancer, particularly cancer of the lungs. But many of the cancers caused by smoking are related to a severe lack of vitamin C. Cigarette smoking depletes vitamin C in the body very quickly. It is highly recommended that smokers follow a diet with more fruits and vegetables that contain high amounts of vitamin C to replenish the bodies depleted supply.

Most cancer patients are referred to a registered dietitian to help promote a diet that will help aid in the bodies healing and recovery process. In the final stages of cancer, most patients do not feel like eating. In the past, many of these patients were force fed. However, recent research has shown that when a patient does not feel like eating, it is the body’s way of trying to starve the cancer.

During the time that the body is trying to starve the cancer, doctors will go into action and bombard the cancer with treatments. When the cancer is destroyed, the patient’s appetite will return back to normal and the body’s recovery can take place.

While we have learned how certain nutrients included in the diet can help prevent, slow down and even reverse many forms of cancer, there are numerous forms of cancer most of which are very deadly and many people do not survive the ordeal.

If you are ever one of the unfortunate ones that acquire one of these deadly cancers, or someone you know does, always remember that proper nutrition will help through the process. Aside from your doctor and specialist, it will pay you ten fold to seek out the aid of a qualified registered dietitian who can put together a nutrition plan for you that will help you fight the cancer every step of the way. Your doctor may even refer you to a dietitian as part of your treatment.

Jim O’Neill gives you tons of valuable information on the subjects of weight loss, fitness, and nutrition to make it easy for you to live a healthy lifestyle. Sign up now for his free 7 part mini e-course at: http://www.mrgymfitness.com/minicourse.php