Health Tips to Boost Your Morning Coffee

Boost your morning coffee

Although I recommend avoiding caffeine where possible, I understand that sometimes, even for myself, it is just impossible. So let’s focus on boosting your morning cup of joe to ensure you are filling your body with the right nutrients to stay focused and elevated throughout your morning!

Medicinal Mushrooms and Adaptogens

We love FourSigmatic, a medicinal mushroom company that specializes in caffeinated goodness to keep your body and mind balanced but also awake. You can learn more about the benefits of medical mushrooms here and even try out a more local brand, Pilz-Kaffee. We also love to add adaptogens to our coffee. Adaptogens are herbs that aid our adrenals and support our overall health, they can lessen the unwelcome side effects of caffeine (think: insomnia and anxiety). You can learn more about their benefits and uses here. Scoop your adaptogens in style and enjoy brain supportive adaptogen powders such as this one

Milk? Mylk? Alt-Milk?

Choosing the right milk for you can feel intimidating nowadays since there are so many options out there. If you can handle it, we recommend finding a good organic whole milk to use in your cappuccinos. If not, a dairy-free milk with no additives or unnecessary oils (always check the ingredient list) or simply adding a collagen boosting creamer to blend right in with your coffee. We love to blend with this milk frother.

Local Roasters and the Right Tools

We love supporting our local roasters where we can, you can easily type ‘local coffee roaster’ into GoogleMaps to find one in your neighbourhood! In Amsterdam we are lucky to have a plethora of local coffee roasters with a great selection of beans for sale. A lot of roasters pride themselves on fair trade practices and sourcing organic coffee beans, better for you and the planet! 

When it comes to making your morning coffee, we love to have a special coffee corner where we can embrace this morning ritual. We use a Solis espresso machine, you can use an electric bean grinder or try out our favorite morning arm workout, the manual Porlex grinder. Enjoy your enhanced morning cup of coffee at home or on the go!

Flu Season is back: Easy Health Tips to boost your Immunity

Supplement with Vitamin D3

As the days grow shorter, our body absorbs less Vitamin D3, which is a crucial vitamin for our immune system. During the winter months, it is recommended to supplement with Vitamin D3 to improve our immune response when faced with all the colds and flus of this season, it can also aid in bettering your sleep.  

We recommend a liquid Vitamin D3 taken daily before bed. You can also drink an immune boosting tea during the day instead of reaching for another cup of caffeine. We like the organic selection offered at Ekoplaza in The Netherlands. 

Eat your Vitamins

Add whole foods high in Vitamin C and antibacterial foods to your diet. We recommend: garlic, citrus fruits, bell peppers, strawberries, cruciferous vegetables, cinnamon, turmeric, cranberries, currants. Avoid any processed sugar as it significantly raises blood sugar and causes inflammation in the body and brain, which can lower the strength of your immune response. 

At the onset of cold and flu symptoms, we recommend taking a Protect Plus supplement and oil of oregano to kill any bad bacteria brewing in your body. Make sure to take both with food to avoid any potential nausea.

As the temperature cools down, we love looking at different cookbooks to explore warming recipes to soothe the body and mind during the autumn/winter season. This is the holy grail of soup recipes. In our household, Pho is a family favorite, this book is a great start to learn different ways to make this Vietnamese dish. 

Move your body!

The best way to adjust to the changing seasons is to get outside and embrace fresh air. Going for 2 short walks a day can boost your mood and get in those steps! It is tempting to curl up and Netflix and chill but taking a half an hour every day to stretch out and strengthen your body keeps your lymphatic system moving and your immune response strong. Amsterdam has plenty of parks to enjoy and lots of cute doggies to motivate you to get out there and enjoy the fresh air. 

If the overcast skies are too daunting, here is a quick Posture Reset workout you can try in the comfort of your own living room after a long day of working in front of the computer:  

3 Easy Tips to Help You Achieve Your Health and Fitness Goals

 

With our busy schedules, it is always hard to find time for self care and motivation to work out. Follow these three easy tips that you can integrate into your daily schedule  to help guide you in your wellness journey.

Wake up and breathe deep

Our first inclination nowadays is to reach for our phones and catch up on anything we might have missed while asleep. Instead, try to take three deep breaths first, then allow yourself to check your phone. You can even slowly build up the amount of time you breathe, start with those first three breaths, then the next day try four or five. Eventually over a few weeks of practice, you might wake up craving these few moments of relaxation before jumpstarting your day and raising your cortisol by checking your phone or computer immediately upon waking. As you build up your morning breathwork routine, you can include items such as a meditation pillow and meditation room spray that create a sense of routine as you start your day. 

Don’t set unrealistic goals

You are more willing to give up without even trying if you set unrealistic fitness or nutrition goals. Like with the morning breathwork practice, build up your weekly workouts over time. If you normally work out once a week – don’t overload your adrenals by suddenly jumping into daily workouts, this can cause injury and unnecessary stressors. Instead, start taking one or two extra classes a week. You can apply this method to any goals you have on your wellness journey. Don’t set an unhealthy weight loss goal that can cause you to spiral and engage in unhealthy habits, work together with your trainer, nutritionist or medical expert to set a healthy tiered weight loss plan that can get you to where you want to be without causing any damage to yourself mentally or physically. Multiple smaller goals will help you get to where you want to be without overwhelming yourself and giving up because where you aim to be seems so unattainable. Try using a journal to track your efforts, we like this journal, or this meal plan journal.

Clean out your kitchen

As we hear a lot nowadays, overall health comes from the gut. A lot of food in supermarkets these days contains unnecessary additives that disrupt our hormones causing weight gain, mood swings and long term health problems. Start by tossing or donating everything in your kitchen with ingredients that are not whole foods (think soy lecithin, and E-additives). Shop as local as you can, find nearby organic farmer’s markets – here in Amsterdam we have many throughout the city on different days of the week – and shop as organic as you can afford to. Fill your fridge with seasonal vegetables and fruit, and integrate probiotics (whether through water kefir, ferments, or a daily probiotic) to keep your gut working optimally. Make your life easier by keeping a Fridge grocery list, and get inspired by flipping through one of our favorites: Pegan Diet: Cookbook, Clean Plate Cookbook, and don’t forget to stock up on probiotics.