Vivienne here from Soupure! My team and I are dedicated to your health and wellbeing and we want to make mealtime tasty, nutritious and easy even when your circumstances in life may not necessarily allow for it. Souping is a wonderful strategy to use.
Our home cooked soups are nutrient dense and jam-packed with more whole foods than you can imagine. Souping (reminiscent of ‘juicing”) is an easy way to get a variety of luscious vegetables and healing herbs into your diet in an easy and efficient way. During cancer treatment there may be barriers to healthy eating, such as taste changes, swallowing difficulty or even nausea and diarrhea. The soups can be healthy strategies to get the nutrients and calories in that you need, both during treatment and beyond. Antioxidant and phytonutrient foods can pack a powerful health punch, and ‘souping’ may just be the easiest way to get all you need.
Souping
Check out these 4 reasons why soup can be so downright nutritious!
- Soups make it EASY! Chewing is an essential part of the digestion process because by breaking down larger bits of food into smaller ones, you’re helping your stomach metabolize what you eat. Blending the food into a soup helps to aid in the chewing and swallowing process, so that when it’s time to eat, it’s easier to do! If chewing and swallowing are problematic for you, the soups are an easier way to ensure that the calories, protein and nutrients are being consumed to allow for proper healing, and a more energetic and vivacious YOU!
- Soups provide fiber! Your body loves fiber. It feeds the good bacteria in your gut, helps balance your blood sugar, keeps cholesterol in check, aids good digestion, and helps you poop. Plus, it helps you feel full and satisfied. Sadly, the average American consumes below the minimum daily recommendations of 25-38 grams which is associated with a higher risk of heart disease, diabetes, diverticulitis, obesity, constipation, and certain cancers like colon cancer. Eating soup can help! By blending foods in their whole form, you’re getting a healthy dose of fiber with every serving of soup you eat!
- Processing DOES count! Raw veggies are wonderful additions to a healthy meal. But cooking can sometimes be even better! Raw food provides B vitamins, vitamin C and minerals essential for sustained energy and healthy body tissue, that when cooked can sometimes be lost with the heat. The raw also provide healthy insoluble fibers (think the bulk in uncooked broccoli) that work to feed the healthy gut bacteria. But other foods, although healthy when raw, can be even healthier when cooked. These foods provide phytonutrients and antioxidants, that when gently cooked are more available to your body. Tomatoes are a great example. Tomato paste and soup contain substantially more lycopene than do raw tomatoes, as a result of the gentle cooking process. These phytonutrients can actually be seen with the naked eye. They create vibrant and colorful fruits and vegetables that give our soups their glamorous, mouthwatering complexion. These colors are essential for fighting disease, fending off environmental toxins, and establishing balance within your body. Just goes to show that the body requires food in all forms for optimal growth and sustained fuel.
- Soups are Beautiful (in more ways than just one)! Vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. What do they all have in common? To start, they allow our bodies to age more gracefully and look more beautiful, inside and out. Within a balanced diet, these nutrients help to promote healthy skin hair and nails, keep arterial plaque at bay, and help our brains to function properly.
Whatever is on the menu make sure it’s comprised of whole foods, from mostly plants. The foods should contain healthy plant and animal based proteins, unsaturated fats and complex carbohydrates, disease-fighting and colorful phytonutrients and fiber!
We have really enjoyed spreading the word with our friends at Savor Health. The compassion and evidence based care that they show for their patients is what drew us to them. We hope you enjoy the ideas that we shared, and they help you to live your best life!