Heart Friendly Bacon and Egg Breakfast Sandwich
Welcome to the heart friendly egg and bacon academy !
Bacon’s popularity with the British people is never ending. Now that the British Heart Foundation have given eggs the go ahead too, we have given the great English Breakfast sandwich a new makeover, and it is now much more heart friendly.
Why is this gourmet bacon and egg breakfast butty now better for your heart health ?
- We grill the bacon – rather than frying it
- We use a table top grill with a drip tray to drain even more harmful saturated fat from the bacon
- We trim the all the remaining fat off of the bacon after cooking it
- We microve the egg rather than frying it
- We use Benecol cholesterol-reducing margarine on the bread
Ingredients (per person)
- 3 bacon strips or rashers
- 1 or 2 eggs
- 1 English Muffin
- Benecol cholesterol reducing margarine
- fresh ground black pepper
Here is the bacon in the grill – note the drip tray in front that catches all the fat that comes out of the bacon during grilling – you would otherwise be eating all this ! If you grill the bacon with the lid closed for about 3 – 4 minutes it will be cooked both sides and be succulent and fresh
Below is the special microwave egg container. You can cook individual eggs inside this gadget without them exploding. For an 800 Watt Microwave oven you need to cook the egg at 40% power for 40 seconds, then leave it for a minute, and then cook it on 40% power for another minute. Once cooked the egg should be removed and chopped.
Next, take the bacon strips out of the grill, and place them on kitchen paper to absorb any remaining fat. Now cut off the rind and the fat from round the edge of each slice using a paring knife.
You can see from the photo how much fat we were able to remove. Unbelievably, this fat weighs in at 20 grams !! Considering the recommended daily amount is 70 grams for an adult woman and 95 grams for a man, this is quite a large amount of fat savings for one meal.
To serve, spread the margarine onto both halves of the muffin, put the bacon and egg into the muffin, and season with some ground black pepper.
And there you have it – a delicious wholesome favorite breakfast sandwich that you can enjoy any time of day with a fresh cup of steaming hot tea. Enjoy.
We were just wondering why you can’t get this type of low fat bacon sandwich in cafe’s and restaurants, or bacon of the month clubs ? Despite all the hype about healthy eating it’s still remarkably difficult to find this kind of food when you’re out and about round town, and feeling hungry. If there are any restaurant or cafe owners out there – we’d love to hear from you.
An oven glove to save you from a heart attack!
A mitten which resembles an oven glove could save lives by speeding up the diagnosis of heart attacks. The glove – called PhysioGlove and developed by an American company called Commwell Inc. is placed on the patient’s left hand and held against their chest. It contains tiny sensors in the material which pick up electrical activity in the heart and relay the information back to a portable heart monitor.
The PhysioGlove allows paramedics to quickly establish whether a patient has suffered a heart attack and the readings are far quicker than the results of an electrocardiogram (ECG). The manufacturers claim that it can perform a complete ECG in less than 60 seconds which is approximately a tenth of the duration of a conventional test!
Unlike the new PhysioGlove – an ECG requires specialised training – i.e. medical staff would need to ensure that 10 electrodes are precisely placed on the patient’s body in the correct position as an electrode would only have to be one millimetre out of place and the vital signs of a heart attack could go undetected. Also an ECG requires a patient’s chest to be shaved prior to attaching electrodes which could steal vital seconds off the process.
Beetroot Lowers Blood Pressure
High blood pressure is on the increase, worldwide, and now affects more than a quarter of the world’s mature population. This has been projected to rise to almost one third in fifteen years time. It is responsible for over one hundred thousand deaths in the United Kingdom each year from coronary heart disease and stroke.
Beetroot Juice has key ingredient to lower blood pressure
Now scientists have identified a key natural ally in the battle against hypertension and coronary heart disease causes – beetroot juice.
Drinking 500ml of Beetroot juice each day appears to greatly lower blood pressure, and help to maintain a healthy circulatory system, according to research carried out in the United kingdom by the London School of medicine, by Professor Amrita Ahluwalia. This is due to it’s high concentration of an important beneficial ingredient – Nitrate.
Nitrate can also be found in other foods such as fresh green vegetables, so a smaller quantity of beetroot juice can be supplemented by other qualifying natural healthy foods if desired. The Nitrate is converted by the body into Nitric Acid, and it is the peaking of this compound that has been observed to coincide with the maximum reduction in blood pressure.
Potential for very fast blood pressure reduction
The reason that we’re excited about the potential heart health benfits of beetroot is that this amazing food has the unique ability to lower blood pressure very quickly. In tests conducted on volunteers, blood pressure reduction occurred within just one hour of consuming the beetroot juice, peaked within four hours, and continued to have an effect on blood pressure lowering for up to 24 hours.
So, if you want to help to keep your heart healthy, why not try some of this delicious home made juice? The onion and garlic will thin your blood and help to lower your cholesterol, whilst the watercress will oxygenate your blood. The beetroot will lower your blood pressure and also build up your red blood cell count. It’s a win – win formula!
Heart Beet Juice recipe
Whizz up the following ingredients in a juicer and chill before serving:
- 125 g (4oz) Beetroot
- 125 g (4oz) Watercress
- 125 g (4oz) Red Onion
- 250 g (8oz) Carrot
The above recipe will make 200ml (7fl oz), and contains 167 calories.
Nutritional benefits of beetroot juice recipe:
The key nutritional benefits of the beetroot juice recipe are summarised by the super food compounds listed below, that are found in the recipe:
- Viamin A
- Vitamin C
- Magnesium
- Niacin
- Vitamin B6
- Vitamin E
Enjoy, relax and soak up the heart health giving benefits!
Early warning of impending Heart Attack
What if it was possible to receive an early warning of an imminent heart attack?
Coronary Heart Disease kills more people in the United Kingdom and the United States than any other disease. In the United Kingdom it claims the lives of more than a quarter of a million people each year. The problem is that nearly half of people who suffer from the early symptoms of the onset of a heart attack actually choose to delay calling 911, and prefer to wait for a while to ‘see how it goes’, rather than risk the embarrassment of calling for the paramedics to what turns out to be a false alarm.
This worrying fact has been discovered by research conducted by the British Heart Foundation, who have studied the medical records of heart patients who experienced the classic symptoms of chest pain, or pain in the arms, shoulders or jaw, before experiencing a full blown heart attack. This results in approximately 30 percent of all heart attack victims dying before they can reach the life saving treatment available at a hospital or ER Center.
AngelMed Guardian can predict imminent heart problem
Well, the solution to this is now a reality, thanks to a tiny new medical device – the AngelMed Guardian – that can be surgically inserted beneath the skin, like a heart pacemaker, and can electronically sense the tell-tale signs that precede a heart attack. This is nothing short of a miracle in the quest for the ultimate key to preventing the massive death toll from this dread disease. It is currently being tested in the United States, and has shown promising results in it’s ability to successfully provide vital warning time that allows the patient to reach essential life-saving medical help.
24/7 heart monitoring system
The unit performs 24/7 monitoring of the heart’s vital electrical impulses, looking for any signs of irregularities or arrhythmia that could indicate the possibility of a serious problem. When the alarm is triggered, the patient can immediately check in to the nearest hospital and receive the necessary anti blood clotting medication that can prevent the development of the heart attack.
Different types of heart attack
There are two different types of heart attack. The most serious type occurs when a piece of arterial plaque, or blood clot breaks away from an artery wall, and prevents the normal blood flow through the ventricular chambers of the heart. This blockage can cause massive damage to the heart muscle, and death, but it also affects the heart’s electrical rhythms. This change in the electrical signals can be detected in it’s early stages, and a warning alarm can be triggered. A mild heart attack generally does not produce the same disruption to the heart’s electrically driven system, so the device is aimed at the former more serious condition.
This incredible new breakthrough in heart health technology is a small wireless enabled electronic device similar in size to a USB memory stick, that is capable of detecting the normal electrical signals produced by the heart, and hence any changes that may indicate the possibility of an imminent heart attack. It is claimed that the equipment can provide vital hours or even days of notice prior to the onset of serious heart illness, If it detects the trigger conditions. It alerts the patient by physically vibrating inside the body, and it can also provide an external alert to a pager carried by the patient.