Plastic /Stainless Steel Drinking Bottle?? Which would you choose? Which is the better option?

This article will discuss about the difference between a plastic and stainless steel drinking water bottle. It will unfold the criterias that you need to carefully consider before purchasing your water bottle!!

According to recent researches around the world, it is ALWAYS safer to purchase a stainless steel drinking bottle compared to a plastic bottle.

If you're unable to find a stainless steel bottle of your choice, there are a few things which you need to consider and be precaution of before and after purchasing plastic drinking water bottles:-

1. "BPA-Free"
Ensure that the plastic water bottles are labelled as "BPA-Free". Now..what does BPA stand for? Bisphenol A...it is basically a chemical which is released when plastic is heated, washed or re-used. This chemical is extremely detrimental to humans as it is said to be able to cause cancer!!!

Therefore...please ensure all your plastic made utensils, drinking bottles and etc are BPA-Free.

2. Type of Plastic
There are two different types of plastic material which should be avoided. One is known as Polycarbonate, and the other is PVC (Polyvinyl Chloride).

How do we determine the type of plastic material which has been used? Pretty simple...all you have to do is to look at the bottom of the plastic water bottles or any kind of plastic container....there will be a recycle symbol (a pyramid like sign), and in this recycle symbol you'll find a number.

These numbers are called Plastic Codes, and they come from the range of 1 to 7. Anything with the code 7 is extremely dangerous. Better alternatives of plastic materials are those with codes of 1, 2 or 5.

I've attached a schedule below, describing the various Plastic Codes and its usage (courtesy of The Plastic Web):

Plastic Codes

3. Usage

Do not use Polycarbonate (Plastic code 7) plastic containers in the dishwasher with strong detergents. Besides that, it is best if you do not reuse this type of plastic material the second time and avoid heating them up or using them to store hot liquids or hot foods.

What's the conclusion?? Well...i guess it would be much more safer if you could use stainless steel products to store food and liquid!!

Eat Healthy-Nutritional Label Part 3-Ingredients to Avoid

This is the final part of my 3 series of articles on Eating Healthy-How to Read, Analyse and Understand Nutrition Label. Learn about High Fructose Corn Syrup, Hydrogenated Oils, Refined Flour and etc here!!

In the past 2 articles, we have thoroughly learned the most efficient way of reading and understanding nutritional labels of food products, with making reference to various nutritional labels from Nutritiondata.com and the US FDA official site.

Learning to read and understand a nutritional label is a very important step when it comes to selecting and purchasing food products for your consumption. Besides being able to do the above, it is essential for you to look at the content or ingredients of the food products that you intent to purchase!!

If the food product contains ANY of these 4 ingredients.....do not consume them:-

1. High Fructose Corn Syrup

Often when we come across this ingredient....we believe that it is some kind of sugar syrup. High fructose corn syrup basically refers to processed glucose which is later mixed with 100% pure corn syrup. It is normally used in soft drinks and baked products. Highly processed sugar!!

2. Hydrogenated Palm or any kind of Vegetable Oil

Hydrogenated Vegetable Oil ( it can be peanut, soy bean, palm or other form of vegetable oil ) refers to Trans Fat!! Trans Fat is the worst form of bad fat...which must be avoided. When vegetable oils (for eg peanut, soy bean and palm oil) are processed, they turn into a white, solid substance which nutritionists refer to as hydrogenated oil ( or commonly known as trans fat ). Hydrogenated Oil can cause heart diseases, cholesterol and blood pressure when consumed in abundance. It is commonly found in peanut butters, biscuits, cookies and all fried foods.

This is the main reason why we should avoid any kind of fried foods. Always try cooking your raw poultry, seafood and vegetables by steaming or stewing them. Did you know that healthy nuts such as walnuts, pecan, hazelnuts and etc turn into hydrogenated products once you fry or bake them? This is even true for healthy oils like olive and canola....Pretty suprising rite!!

3. Refined.....

The third ingredient which you have to look out for is anything which starts with the word Refined for example Refined Wheat Flour, Refined Brown Sugar or Refined Lime Juice.

Refined food refers to processed food, of which the good substances of the raw food material are omitted when processed. Let's take Refined Flour for instance...it is basically wheat flour going through processes to remove the coarse wheat substances in the wheat flour.

Thus...by refining raw food products, the natural healthy substances gets refined too!!

4. Enriched....
Another ingredient that you must be caution about is anything which starts with the word Enriched...Enriched Soy Milk and Enriched Flour. Why??? Well it is processed food materials...Avoid them as far as possible...