1In a bowl, combine cream cheese, coconut oil and fresh lemon juice and blend till smooth.
2 Spoon them into the silicon trays
3Decorate with lemon zest
4Refrigerate for one hour
5 Enjoy!
More quick tips:
❤️ Leave the cream cheese and coconut oil out in room temperature for half an hour or more before mixing.
❤️ Use a teaspoon to scoop the mixture into the silicon mould.
❤️ Use a butter knife to level it, to make it look neater.
❤️ Alternatively, you could also use small fancy cupcake liners or baking cups to hold the mixture. If you love snacking as much as I do and have other recipes for easy keto snacks, do share in the comments below! Also, if you do try out this simple keto recipe, let me know how you go. I'd love to hear from you! Meanwhile, you have an amazing day ahead! Love, Lynette Tan
Do you remember flipping through magazines and wishing you had curls like the girls in there?
I do.
I was so fascinated with how big and bouncy those curls were. So natural looking, so full of life! Then, I remember marching into several potential hair salons, clinging on to that miserable magazine cut out, determined to get those same exact curls.
"Those are not permanent, you know.", was the usual response. "They won't last.", was the other standard response.
Then, almost all of them would promptly follow up with a suggestion that I get a more permanent perm.
After several rounds of this, I started thinking maybe that's it! That's how I'm gonna get me some long lasting natural curls and silly me, I succumbed.
I got my first permanent perm when I was 14 and I hated it and so did everyone around me. Yup, I could tell. It was in their eyes.
After the colourful rollers came off, and the perming solutions were washed away, I couldn't hide the massive disappointment that was written all over my face.
It wasn't like anything I had imagined.
The curls were way too small and tight, think instant noodles, and they made me look so much older than I really was.
I deeply regretted it.
To make me feel better though, the good people at the hair salon styled my hair so that it vaguely resembled those big, juicy curls I first fell in love with in the magazine.
The magic only lasted for a while. Right after I washed my hair, they were gone.
As you can imagine, I was desperate to get my straight hair back. I would wet my hair ever so often and fine comb through those teeny, tweeny curls but they were so... long lasting!
I just had to live with it for six arduous months. During which I would hide them in a bun, wear a cap, a hat, whenever I could.
Perhaps that'll help you understand why I have in my possession around 19 (and counting...) curling tongs, straighteners, crimps - barrels of different sizes to create the kinda curls I desire. Yes, those big, bouncy curls.
That's why in this new series "How To Curl Long Hair Fast and Easy" I hope to share with you the best tips and tricks that I've picked up over the years. After experimenting with so many different kinds of hair tools, I hope to be able to show you how you can readily re-create the looks you want, yourself!
S-curl, C-curl, soft curl, lazy curl, natural curls, sexy waves, you name it! I have just the tool for it. So to make sure you don't miss a thing, do consider subscribing to my channel - click here!
"Health is not valued till sickness comes" - Thomas Fuller
It's been 75 days since I embarked on this keto journey and I must admit, I quite like it!
I like how I look but more importantly, I love how I feel - a million bucks!
Prior to attending Keto On lessons, I was stuck at 47kg for the longest time. I had done all I knew how to do to try and shed those extra two kilos so I could achieve my ideal weight of 45kg, but nothing worked. Until keto, that is.
Some of the improvements I noticed about my body include heightened mental alertness and clarity. I also experienced increased energy levels. And because we're encouraged to have 70 per cent fat per day, I feel full almost all the time. Hence, I stopped snacking and very soon I was down to 45kg, almost effortlessly.
Now if you're thinking of making that switch to keto, let's go through some basics.
Just as a general guideline, aim to have, everyday:
25 per cent protein and (eggs, cheese, meat and seafood)
5 per cent carb (green leafy veggies)
Here's how to calculate your macros:-
70 per cent fat is calculated as three times your ideal body weight in grams. So for example, you currently weigh 55kg and you'd like to go down to 50kg (ideal weight), then:-
50 X 3 = 150g (daily fat intake)
25 per cent protein is simply your ideal weight in grams. Again, if your ideal weight is 50kg, then your daily protein intake should not exceed 50g (weight of raw food)
5 per cent carbs refer to green leafy vegetables not exceeding 20g (daily carb intake)
The key here is really to cut out all processed carbs like rice, noodles, breads, pasta, flour products including cakes and biscuits from your diet. Unless you're an Olympic athlete or training for a marathon, the excess carbs will not only spike your insulin levels but also turn to sugar in your body and store as fat.
Over-consumption of proteins can also have the same effect and promote fat storage in our bodies.
Follow this guideline as best you can and you should be in ketosis in five to ten days.
Whilst waiting for your body to adapt from running on glucose to running on ketones, it's a great idea to clean house, literally.
And a good place to start is actually your kitchen.
Throw out all the unhealthy food. Foods, laced with sugar or hidden sugars, that usually come in pretty packages that you can keep for months on end. Another way to identify unhealthy food is by reading the label. Usually the first three ingredients listed come in larger quantities. Then, there's usually a salt marker and then after that, all the other listed ingredients come in negligible amounts usually less than one per cent.
Another thing to note while reading food labels is this. Look out for super long ingredients lists with hard to pronounce names or words starting with the letter E or E-numbers. These are usually artificial food chemicals, additives or preservatives that help increase their shelf life.
So as a standard, buy foods that'll expire within a week and only buy foods that have no more than three or four ingredients listed.
If you have children at home, and they love cheese. Make sure you're getting them the real deal and not some "cheese product". Natural cheese is usually made from not more than four ingredients namely: milk, salt, cheese culture and non-animal rennet.
Closely related to cheese is butter. Again, it's always good to check that you're getting real butter made from 80 per cent milk fat from grass-fed cows, pasteurised cream, water and salt.
With all that in mind, what can you eat? Lots of great tasting, natural, whole foods!
Here's a quick keto shopping list to get you started:
cauliflower, finely chopped, to replace rice
zucchini or omelet, julienned to replace noodles
lettuce to replace tortilla wraps
coconut/almond flour to replace normal flour
Olive oil, coconut oil, lard or other animal fat, butter to replace all vegetable oils, which are inflammatory and toxic in excess
Natural spices to enhance the flavours in your food
Pink Sea Salt/Celtic Salt to replace normal table salt
Tamari to replace soya sauce
Sprouted nuts (not more than a handful a day)
Seeds (not more than one tablespoon a day)
Eggs
Fish
Haloumi cheese
Chicken, duck, turkey
Lamb
Beef
Seafood
Bone broth
Notice sugar is not in the above list? That's because our bodies cannot tell the difference between natural and synthetic sugar. Both cause our pancreas to overwork and spike insulin so it's best to cut it out, especially "diet sodas". But, if you must include a little in your cooking or baking, then plant-based xylitol would be the best option.
Hope that helps but what if you don't have the luxury of cooking at home? Or it's just the two of you and you'd much prefer to eat out?
Of course there are options.
Generally, you'd wanna avoid fast foods or deeply fried foods simply because the "vegetable oils" or more accurately inflammatory seed oils used are toxic in excess. It can also significantly increase your risk of heart disease. Further, although it's mandatory to refresh and change out these "vegetable oils" weekly, some don't.
So that leaves us with still many other food choices like stir-fries, grilled or barbequed meats and seafood, soups and steamboat.
Stir-fried foods are broadly ok but, it's the sauces they come in that contain hidden sugars and "vegetable oils". So one way to remove them is to do the food spa - cleanse and wash away the harmful sugars and "vegetable oils" in soup and eat the food as is.
Speaking of hidden sugars, when eating salads, ask for extra virgin olive oil (EVOO) instead of the commercial salad dressings that contain tons of chemicals and sugars. Or you can always bring your own EVOO.
But say you don't have the means to wash away the unhealthy sauces and "vegetable oils" and you can't convince the chef/food vendor to replace or leave out processed carbs. Then, order your food as it is on the menu, eat the proteins and leafy greens and just leave the processed carbs behind.
More tips coming up on how to keto adapt, whether you’re switching to the keto diet for weight loss, or contemplating a complete change to keto lifestyle long term to stay healthy.
Remember you still get to enjoy your favourite foods, keto style!
I have become so well acquainted with all these hard-to-pronounce
prescription drugs to treat the common cough and cold!
Laryngitis was my constant companion during my stint on
national radio and all throughout my teaching career, before that.
What I found immensely frustrating was, how that common cold
almost always degenerates into this cruel cough that never, ever goes away! The
pain that starts at the back of the nose will often very quickly make its way
down the airway, leaving you with this agonizingly raw and gnawing sore throat.
Some of my ex-colleagues have referred to it as the 100-day
cough. For me, one day is one too many! Talk about a hundred times of that!
I’m not counting, that’s for sure! I hated every minute of
it!
And that’s why I’m so glad I came across this book by Dr
Norman Walker Fresh Vegetable and Fruit
Juices: What’s missing in your body?
He explained how massive amounts of mucous are formed in
our bodies from consuming excessive dairy products and/or concentrated
starches and carbohydrates. And as a reaction to this build up of toxins in the
respiratory system, a cough develops.
It’s just the body’s way of getting rid of surplus phlegm.
What really amused me was his conviction that, “cough medicines are mostly an excellent
means to store up future supply of coughs, and are intended for the gullible.”
So, what did he propose as a better alternative?
His solution was simple – gargle the throat with either
straight or diluted fresh lemon juice, that’s it!
Can it be any simpler?
Like you, I laughed and scoffed at first. I mean, was this
guy for real?
So, I decided to try what seemed like a medically-unorthodox
remedy on myself. After all, the proof of a pudding is in its eating.
And after doing this for at least two years, I find that it
really works! I’m now a believer!
So here’s what I do when I feel a cough coming:-
Make a lemon aid
concoction by:
Filling a glass half full
with distilled water
Adding ¼ glass of
boiled distilled water to make it slightly warm
Adding the juice of
half a lemon
How often and how
should I consume this?
I do this every two hourly, or whenever my throat feels itchy
and if at first you get into a coughing fit, don’t worry. Fresh lemon juice
helps loosen the phlegm so it’s easier for you to expel it.
Rich in Vitamin C and organic citric acid, lemons actually
have an unusually alkaline effect on the body that is if you don’t add any sugar
to the mix. Fact is, sugar chemically alters the healthful enzymes contained
therein causing more harm than good.
So, if you find drinking it straight or diluted unpalatable,
then don’t! Instead, use it to gargle your throat until you feel better!
Honestly, I don’t get coughs as often as I do anymore. But
when I do get one, they don’t stay for long!
Now if you ask me, I’d rather have lemon aid than sugary
cough syrups and tablets any day!
Love, Lynette Tan *Quick tip: to yield more juice from the lemon, roll it on a flat surface before cutting it in half!
There’s this new makeup repair kit in town called Moon Mousse. Yup! I know it sounds
incredible but I’ve watched several videos that really show how our broken eye shadows,
highlighters, blushers, bronzers and pressed powders can be put back together
again, pretty much like Humpty Dumpty! Ha!
But back in the days before this magical mousse was created,
there was always the good ol’ Isopropyl Alcohol 70%!
I remember once when one of my favourite eye shadows broke
into a million pieces when I brought it along with me for one of my travels!
As exotic as the destination was, I was so uninterested as my
mind raced to find a way to put my eye makeup back together again. So I
carefully saved up all the broken pieces in a zip lock bag and flew home with
the heaviest of hearts.
Then I scoured the internet for a way to fix my makeup and
apparently the best way to do it was to pour just enough isopropyl alcohol 70%
to the broken pieces and mix it up with a spatula until it formed a moldable
thick paste – think thick, moist cookie dough.
Then, using that same spatula, you kinda pat and press and
slide the paste back into the container from which it came. And you keep at it
until all the paste is nicely packed into that makeup jar!
After that, you leave it to dry for at least four to five
hours. But for best results, I left it to dry overnight! And viola! You’ll get
good-as-new makeup!
So don’t fret! If you just broke your makeup, there are ways
to fix it and this new makeup repair kit that I just mentioned even comes with
all the necessary tools to help you put everything back together again.
Here’s the Moon Moussevideo, do check it out. You’ll probably have to
ship it through a third party or something. But if you’re skeptical about it’s
effectiveness, you could always try isopropyl alcohol 70% first, easily
available at any pharmacy or personal care store!
I found the video very relatable and entertaining! Enjoy!
As my 42nd birthday draws near, I can’t help but
feel a deep despondency and despair that I haven’t been able to make time
standstill once more. But then again, who can?
So as it rolls around again, I’m even more determined to
delay the ravages of time and reverse aging through eating natural, nutritious
foods. And I purpose to use only natural products that nourish the cells in our
body.
I mean, let’s face it!
Everyday we’re growing older; we see more lines on our faces.
Our hair is thinning out. In fact, in June this year, I was diagnosed with
alopecia areata.
I remember it was just after a photoshoot that I noticed a
tiny bald patch just after my regular hairline, above my forehead. Even though
my husband assured me that it was barely noticeable (I really think he was
being kind), I knew and I knew it was there! I mean how can a beauty queen be
without her crowning glory?
I was devastated.
My GP explained that alopecia areata is an auto-immune
disease. In layman terms, my immune system was attacking my healthy hair
follicles and destroying them, for reasons unknown! Even though she guaranteed
that it wasn’t a permanent condition and that my hair was gonna grow back in a
few months. I was a wreck!
Long story short, my hair did grow back in record time – one
and a half months instead of the projected four to six months (see picture at
top of page).
And here’s a list of things I did that I think really helped.
1. Nutrition
Everyday after a breakfast of soft boiled eggs, apart from my
usual probiotics, fish oil and multi-vitamins, I’d take CanPrev’s Curcumin-Pro
and Resvera-Pro to regenerate damaged hair follicles and stimulate healthy
hair growth.
On top of that, I also drank regular doses of blended alfafa
sprouts, carrots, and lettuce juice – a lethal concoction that promotes hair
growth, according to Dr Norman Walker author of Become Younger
2. Massage
I was prescribed a steroid cream and 5% minoxidil to apply to
the scalp day and night.
In addition to that, I also mixed my own organic hair growth
oil using refined emu oil, and therapeutic grade thyme, lavender, cedarwood
atlas, and rosemary essential oils. Then I would lie on my back with my head
hanging off the bed and massage my scalp for at least four minutes to promote
blood circulation to the scalp.
3. Hair Products
Sometimes I get this sinking suspicion that the hair products
I use contain a lot of chemicals and that’s what’s really causing my hair to
come off. So during those one and half months that I was hoping, wishing and
praying for my hair to grow back, I made my own shampoo using castile soap, distilled
water, jojoba oil, vitamin E and essential oils. I also stopped colouring and
styling my hair.
Plus, I also did regular hot oil treatments using black
castor oil and coconut oil to nourish the hair roots too.
I’m currently trying out other natural hair care products and
I hope to share them with you really soon.
