Tonight we moved Fitbook to a new datacenter.

This will increase the speed of the website significantly.

It can take up to 24 hours for these changes to get through to everyone, but in a day or so, everyone will be connecting to our new servers and Fitbook will operate at lightning speed.

Right from childhood, you've been inculcated with the idea of milk and cheese in your diet.  You've grown up thinking that both are excellent sources of calcium and protein.  Both keep your bones and teeth strong, and they maintain your skin and hair in good health.  As nutritious snacks, they also have that added advantage of improving your mood as well as your sleep.

Now that you're all grown up, does the idea of milk and cheese snacks still fit into your diet?  Will giving in to your hunger for cheese still be part of healthy snacking?

With the following tidbits of info to share, here's how snacking on cheese can be good for you and what types of cheese are best to nibble on.

1.     Among the many types of cheese in the world, your healthiest options would be those which are low in fat and sodium.

2.     It is the milk in cheese which determines much of its fat content.  Thus, it makes a big difference whether you go for cheese made from high-fat and full-cream milk or those designed to be low-fat and fat-free.  These include reduced-fat or fat-free cottage cheese, goat cheese, cheddar cheese, cream cheese, and Swiss cheese.

3.     On the other hand, it's the salt added to milk prior to turning into cheese which affects its sodium content.&nb...

Is beef better on the other side of the fence where they're naturally raised and grass-fed?  The wonder of grass-fed cattle is that they're allowed to roam in their natural surroundings and graze on their age-old diet.  They're said to receive less treatments with antibiotics and hormones, unlike grain-fed ones which fatten up on a lot of corn, soy, and starch.  These products, in turn, may fatten you up to the point of obesity.

Closer to home, here's what cuts of grass fed beef offers you on the dining table.  As organic food options, these beef cuts provide you with healthier proteins as well as more of healthy fats and fatty acids.  Their heart-healthy fatty acids include Omega-3 and CLA or conjugated linoleic acid.

Every cut's just as mean on protein but lean in cholesterol.  It's prime beef which contains less fat, less carbon, and more natural vitamins like C and E.  All in all, it supplies you with lower levels of saturated fat such that your total fat intake and calorie consumption stay within limits.

Better than grain-fed red meat, it's actually red meat for less!  Every six-ounce steak of it means 100 less calories than usual.  This translates to a calorie cutdown of 177,733 per year.  Thus, you now might steer more towards a sirloin steak from beef that's grass-fed rather than a similar cut from one...

What is kale and how does it benefit your health?  Does it fit not only the needs of your diet but also the way you store and prepare food?

First of all, here's what you need to understand about kale.  It's one among many cruciferous vegetables.  Excruciatingly complicated as it sounds, this is simply a family of green, leafy veggies to which the more familiar cabbage, cauliflower, and broccoli belong.

The cabbage family is best known for its standout nutrition.  As part of a detox diet, it helps cleanse your digestive tract.  Aside from lowering your cholesterol levels, it also minimizes your risk for cancer.  Right now, its health benefits extend to five types to cancer, and these include those of the colon, bladder, breast, ovary, and prostate.    

Thus, it comes highly-recommended to include these veggies in your diet at least 2-3 times a week, even 4-5 times at most.  Each serving equates to about 1-1/2 cups.

Going back to the term 'cruciferous', we refer to cabbage-like, leafy greens whose stalks branch outward in a cross-like manner.  The word 'kale' itself has a Scottish origin, and it dates back to the time when cabbage-like plants were called "caulis" or "coles".

What sets kale apart is that it has long, ruffled leaves much like large sprigs of parsley.  Its color ranges from shades of green hued with purple to violet.  Bluish as kale is, it can grow ...

These days, it's more than the novelty of Oriental cuisine which makes anyone want to eat rice.  You're also tempted into a rice diet by the desire to add more whole grain and dietary fiber into your meals.

As whole grains, both white rice and brown rice are good sources of carbs.  They fuel your body with the energy it immediately needs.  When you eat rice meals in just the right quantities, meaning a cup at a time, then you feed your system with calories which are burned and not stored.

Speaking of storage, all varieties of whole grain rice have to be kept in bins or bags which are airtight and dry.   Incidentally, even with proper storage, brown rice spoils faster than white rice does.  White rice, after all, has been processed further.  Aside from running through the mill and having its husk removed, it's also polished with glucose or talc.  Nutrients lost in the process are reinstated by fortifying the grains with B vitamins and iron.     

On the other hand, brown rice which has been husked and hulled is healthier than white rice which has been processed and fortified.  In terms of nutritional value, the former has far more thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, iron, selenium, potassium, magnesium, manganese, phosphorus, and a host of other nutrients.  It's also three times richer in dietary fiber.

As a food choice, brown rice is also considered to be environmentally-friendlier...