5 Holiday Drinks That Can Pack on the Pounds by Stephanie Sy, Everyday Health Staff Writer

Nutritionists say the popular warm coffee drinks of the season can pack on pounds.

Eggnog lattes have become as synonymous with the holiday season as Santa Claus. The problem is, if you drink enough of them, you may start resembling jolly ol' Saint Nick.
Nutritionist Laura Jeffers at Cleveland Clinic says it's easy to lose track of the number of calories in cozy holiday drinks like eggnog lattes, but they add up fast. "The more flavors and names that you have with that drink, the more calories you're going to have," Jeffers says.

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For example, an innocent 100-calorie apple cider can balloon into a 400-calorie drink if you add whipped cream and caramel to sweeten it up. And drinking just an extra 200 calories a day can add up to 40 pounds of weight gain over the course of a year.
When it comes to some holiday drinks, modifications can help cut down on calories. Jeffers recommends replacing whole milk with skim milk and trying sugar-free syrups in caffe lattes for a taste of the season without the calories.

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Insight for Today 11/20/2014

Go Gluten-Free With Elisabeth Hasselbeck

'The View' co-host Elisabeth Hasselbeck shares tips for boosting your energy levels and choosing deliciously healthy foods in her book, 'The G-Free Diet: A Gluten-Free Survival Guide'. Related Lose Weight by Lowering Carbs 30-Minute Dishes for Every Weeknight More in Diet & Nutrition Gluten-free diets are all the rage these days as way to lose weight, but the trend has its roots in a very serious and debilitating health condition: celiac disease. Putting a name and face to this often misunderstood disease is Elisabeth Hasselbeck, co-host of the ABC morning talk show The View, New York Times bestselling author, clothing designer (for Dialogue by Elisabeth Hasselbeck), wife of NFL commentator Tim Hasselbeck, and mother of three. When Hasselbeck wrote The G-Free Diet: A Gluten-Free Survival Guide, she shared her journey from mysterious symptoms and embarrassment to an accurate diagnosis and lifestyle changes that have left her looking and feeling better than ever. Hasselbeck recently talked to Everyday Health about the differences going gluten-free has made on her body, mind, and spirit. Click here to read further

Your Insight of the Day

How To Improve Your Realistic Portraits Using Light And Dark Contrasts Lesson

It is often necessary to build up large black areas in pencil drawings, either for backgrounds or clothing.

If you try to make blacks by using soft graphite pencil and "scrubbing" the paper ...

... the result will be uneven and shiny rather than a flat black.

Using a charcoal pencil is an improvement, but it will still be an extremely painstaking, laborious process.

The best solution is to branch out and use a combination of willow charcoal, charcoal pencil, and sometimes graphite pencil last of all. Begin by flattening the edge of a stick of willow charcoal against the sandpaper block to give yourself the largest surface area you can.

Cross-hatch strokes of willow charcoal until the entire dark area is covered. Because willow charcoal is so soft, it will be helpful to protect any edges you wish to remain white before you begin.

Blend the willow charcoal smooth with a chamois or stomp,and go back into the area with a stick of harder charcoal that has once again been flattened on one side with sandpaper.

If the area is small enough, you can use a charcoal pencil instead, laying down tone in smooth strokes or small circles. Blend this layer as well.

For the smoothest finish, blend first with a tortillon and then with felt.

Depending on the texture you're trying to achieve, you may want to go over the charcoal layer a third time with graphite, which will fill in the tooth of the paper even more. It will also give the area a silvery sheen which may or may not be desireable.

Want To Learn More...

Learn how to draw portraits like a master with our latest portrait mastery drawing course.

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Warm Regards

Chris Elmore
Drawing Made Easy

Insight for the Day 11/17/14

Using Templates In Your Portrait Drawings To Increase Realism

Templates are available in a huge range of shapes and sizes ...

... and if you want realism in your
drawings, you'll need to invest in some.

Start with a set of circles, ovals, and squares, but it's a good idea to look over the options to keep in mind for future projects.

Templates are necessary because even when drawing portraits, you are often required to depict man-made objects-- buttons, patterns on clothing, buckles, and zippers are a few of the most common.

Keep in mind when you're using templates that shapes are only perfect from head-on angles. The shapes need to be adjusted for side views, bird's eye and worm's eye vantage points.

Because of that, in addition to having shapes, you also need templates of curves that you can use to render perfect lines that are angled. French curves are a good option for small areas, and a flexible curve is good for large ones.

When using a template on your drawing, check to be sure that it's clean before putting it on the down (sounds obvious, but that has been a lesson hard learned in my case).

Draw the shape in place lightly, remove the template and double check that it's the right size and in the right place before re-tracing over it darker. Vary the pressure of the line as you trace; unless it's a pattern on cloth, it will have a dark side and a highlight side.

Emphasize the difference even if it's not visible in the picture; the exaggeration will heighten realism in your work. If there are lines within lines, don't get lazy and try to freehand them ... they'll appear sloppy so close to the precise lines.

If the shape has tone (versus being an outline), fill it in and blend over the top with the template still in place. It's faster, and it looks better because it hides your pencil strokes.

Want To Learn More...

Learn how to draw portraits like a master with our latest portrait mastery drawing course.

It's just like having your own drawing teacher guide you step-by-step along the way without the expensive price tag.

No more smudgy mess with black and white that looks like a first grader whipped up in art class.

"Portrait Mastery" is generously illustrated showing you step-by-step just how to create a real life portrait.

Click here to learn more

Warm Regards

Chris Elmore
Drawing Made Easy

5-Spice Chicken in a Bowl - Healthy Food Tip and Recipe

healthy food tip and recipe

Today's Recipe If you don't know what to serve for dinner tonight ...
The unique use of spices in the broth combined with the chicken gives you a great combination of flavors in this easy-to-prepare addition to your Healthiest Way of Eating. Not only does it taste great you will also receive 155% of the daily value (DV) for health-promoting vitamin K, 68% DV for protein, and 67% DV for niacin. Enjoy!
5-Spice Chicken in a Bowl
Prep and Cook Time: 30 minutes
Ingredients:

• 2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (6 oz each), cut in 2-inch pieces
• 4 cups chicken broth
• 1/2 inch sliced fresh ginger, sliced (or 1/2 tsp dried ginger)
• 6 whole cloves
• 2 cinnamon sticks
• 5 star anise
• 1/2 tsp dried fennel seeds
• 1 medium-sized onion, chopped in big pieces
• 3 cloves garlic, chopped in big pieces
• 6 whole medium dried shiitake mushrooms
• 1 lb green beans, ends cut off
• 1/2 cup minced scallions

Directions:

1. Chop onion and garlic and let sit for 5 minutes to bring out their hidden health-promoting benefits.
2. Healthy Sauté onion in a medium saucepan over medium-low heat for about 5 minutes, stirring frequently. Add garlic and continue to saut� for another minute. Add chicken broth, ginger, cloves, cinnamon stick, star anise, fennel seeds, and shiitake mushrooms. Turn heat to medium-high and simmer for 15 minutes.
3. While broth is simmering, cut ends off beans and cut into 1-inch pieces.
4. Strain broth mixture (saving shiitake mushrooms) and put liquid back into pan. Bring to a boil and simmer on high heat with chicken pieces and green beans. You may need to skim the surface a little while chicken pieces are cooking. Slice shiitake mushrooms and add to chicken and broth. Add scallion as well as salt and pepper to taste.

Serves 4 Serve with brown rice. For optimum flavor and nutrition serve with:

• Napa Cabbage Salad

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In-Depth Nutritional Profile for 5-Spice Chicken in a Bowl
Healthy Food Tip

What is the difference between different types of peppers?

All peppers, including green chili peppers, belong to the Capsicum genus of foods, and this food group has been extensively studied with respect to health. We include three of the most widely available and commonly consumed Capsicum peppers on our website and The World's Healthiest Foods book: bell peppers, cayenne peppers, and chili peppers. But there are many other peppers with similar properties, including tabasco peppers, jalapeno peppers, and hot cherry peppers, as well as other sweet peppers in addition to bell peppers.
Although it might seem like the biggest differences in peppers would be related to their size or shape, peppers can be nutritionally different for a wide variety of reasons. For example, if the growing season for a pepper has been cool and rainy, the pepper can accumulate more beta-carotene but less red-colored xanthophyll pigments. This trade-off isn't bad or good; it just gives you a different combination of healthy nutrients. Most peppers will also appear green when they are not fully ripened because their high chlorophyll content (making them look green to the eye) will overshadow their carotenoid content (which will make them look orange or yellow). If allowed to ripen more fully, these same green peppers will change in color to show more of their yellow-red carotenoid pigments. You'll get wonderful benefits from all of the peppers mentioned above, just different nutrient combinations.
If you are looking for particular nutrient benefits, you can use the following color-nutrient combinations as a general rule of thumb. Yellow peppers typically contain more of the lutein and zeaxanthin carotenoids. Red peppers usually have more lycopene and astaxanthin, two other important carotenoids. Orange peppers tend to offer more alpha-, beta-, and gamma-carotene, while purple peppers will usually provide you with more anthocyanin flavonoids. Since all of these nutrients can make important contributions to your health, I recommend a variety of peppers for the widest possible health support.
There is one group of individuals who may want to decide about peppers a little differently. The family of foods to which all Capsicum peppers belong is the nightshade family (Solanaceae). Nightshades also include tomatoes, eggplant, and potatoes. Nightshades contain substances called alkaloids that can be problematic in the diets of some individuals. In general, those with health problems involving their joints, including osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis, and gout may be more sensitive to the effects of nightshade alkaloids and may need to reduce or eliminate these foods in their diet. All peppers would be included in this list of nightshade foods.

Mental Cleanse Call Recordings - Chapter 9

The recorded audio for the 3 PM ET call:
http://mffaudios.com/audios/2014-11-12-3PM.htm

The recorded audio for the 8 PM ET call:
http://mffaudios.com/audios/2014-11-12-8PM.htm

Now we move onto Chapter 10.

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Using 'White Line' Detail To Improve Your Realistic Portraits Lesson

Often times in drawings, there are white lines that are very fine sitting against a dark background.

Some examples are flyaway hairs, stiches in cloth, lettering, highlights in the eye, or texture in fabrics.

These lines pose a difficult problem because they're too small to be effectively picked out with an eraser after laying in tone, avoided with pencil as you work in the rest of the picture, or masked with frisket.

The best bet in such cases is to use the indentation technique. The area that you're indenting should be white, so clean it up before you start.

Also, this technique works best when the drawing surface is firm but padded, so stack loose paper or foam core board beneath your drawing.

Lay a piece of tracing paper over your drawing so you can see what you're doing, and then, using a hard, sharp graphite pencil (5H or harder), draw the lines that you want to keep white. This will take firm pressure, so be careful not to tear the paper.

Remove the tracing paper and shade over the indented lines. The charcoal or graphite should skip right over the lines, leaving them white. If you made a mistake and need to fill in the line, however, you can do so with a sharp pencil and a blending stomp or tortillon.

Want To Learn More...

Learn how to draw portraits like a master with our latest portrait mastery drawing course.

It's just like having your own drawing teacher guide you step-by-step along the way without the expensive price tag.

No more smudgy mess with black and white that looks like a first grader whipped up in art class.

"Portrait Mastery" is generously illustrated showing you step-by-step just how to create a real life portrait.

Click here to learn more

Warm Regards

Chris Elmore
Drawing Made Easy

Insight of the Day 11/13/14