Importance of Vitamins, Why Vitamins?

Vitamins help the body turn food into energy and tissues, creating a regular and normal healthy system function giving us health. The importance of vitamins is a key factor to have a prosper, happy and health life, so you shouldn't neglect this issue. Because our body doesn't store most vitamins, we must consume them regularly to avoid deficiency.

With few exceptions, the body is not able to synthesize or manufacture vitamins so basically we need to consume them externally, from food or beverages in order to have a healthy life.

Vitamins are important and vital to a normal body function as they are absolutely necessary for our growth, general-well being and vitality both physical and mentally.

There are 13 vitamins total: vitamin A; the vitamin B complex, which includes thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, vitamin B6, folic acid, vitamin B12 pantothenic acid, and biotin; and vitamins C, D, E, and K.

Fat-Soluble Vitamins are: Vitamin A, Vitamin D, Vitamin E, Vitamin K and Beta carotene.

Water-Soluble Vitamins are: Vitamin C, Thiamin (vitamin B1), Riboflavin (vitamin B2), Niacin (vitamin B3), Vitamin B6, Vitamin B12 an Folic acid (folate).

For the most part, vitamins are obtained with food, but a few are obtained by other means. For example, microorganisms in the intestine—commonly known as "gut flora", produce vitamin K and biotin, while one form of vitamin D is synthesized in the skin with the help of the natural ultraviolet wavelength of sunlight.

Humans can produce some vitamins from precursors they consume. Examples include vitamin A, produced from beta carotene, and niacin, from the amino acid tryptophan.

Quick Strawberry & Banana Vegan Milk Shake

Finding solutions to have tasty things to eat and drink is always on my mind. This morning I prepared a vegan milk shake using water and a bit of oat flakes. This created some sort of milk.

Oat flakes mixed with water are a good alternative to normal milk, and gives this nice smooth beverage that can be used in many recipes, or just being used as regular normal milk alternative.

Quick Strawberry & Banana Vegan Milk Shake

So I added 2 bananas, 10 strawberries, water, oat flakes and blended for 1 minute. That was it. Perfect, fresh and tasty. Enjoy.

Vegan Video by Dan Piraro

Very cool video with a cartoon explanation to vegetarianism. Dan Piraro masterfully made this nice video. It's a talking pig that explains why eating meat is bad for you.

Daniel Charles Piraro is a surrealist painter, illustrator and cartoonist best-known for his award-winning syndicated cartoon panel Bizarro.



In 2002, Piraro became a vegan. His activism is visible in Bizarro, often incorporating vegan and animal cruelty themes into his cartoons. Piraro has also incorporated an entire section devoted to veganism on his website, detailing his reasons for becoming a vegan and other vegan-related information.

http://www.bizarro.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Piraro

Vegan Video by Dan Piraro

Selected Tasty Vegan Recipes

Surfing across the internet we can find hundreds of high quality blogs with thousands of tasty vegan recipes. I made a small selection of the best recipes and food ideas I found interesting and tasty last week.

Oyster Mushroom and Yves Pepperoni Pizza
Recipe from Comfort Food Vegan blog, Ontario - Canada by Anardana.

http://comfortfoodvegan.blogspot.com/2010/03/oyster-mushroom-and-yves-pepperoni.html



Spicy Tofu Noodle Salad
Recipe from American Vegan Kitchen, Virginia - United States, by Robin Robertson.

http://veganplanet.blogspot.com/2010/03/american-vegan-kitchen-spicy-tofu.html



Avocado Wasabi Salad
Recipe from VeganYumYum, Boston - United States, by Lolo.

http://veganyumyum.com/2010/01/avocado-wasabi-salad/

Food not Bombs - Cook for Peace

(...)Food Not Bombs shares free vegan and vegetarian meals with the hungry in over 1,000 cities around the world every week to protest war, poverty and the destruction of the environment.

With over a billion people going hungry each day how can we spend another dollar on war?(...)



(...)Food Not Bombs is one of the fastest growing revolutionary movements and is gaining momentum throughout the world. There are hundreds of autonomous chapters sharing free vegetarian food with hungry people and protesting war and poverty. Food Not Bombs is not a charity.

This energetic grassroots movement is active throughout the Americas, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Australia. Food Not Bombs is organizing for peace and an end to the occupations of Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine. For nearly 30 years the movement has worked to end hunger and has supported actions to stop the globalization of the economy, restrictions to the movements of people, end exploitation and the destruction of the earth. (...)



Food Not Bombs
P.O. Box 424, Arroyo Seco, NM 87514 USA
575-776-3880, 1-800-884-1136

Email: menu@foodnotbombs.net
Website: www.foodnotbombs.net

Vegan POWER - A Start up

Going vegan is a deep internal change. Your mind and your body turn one. Your spirit purifies and flies. Your breath purity, no harm, no guilt, no crime.

http://www.goveg.com/

Animals on today's factory farms have no legal protection from cruelty that would be illegal if it were inflicted on dogs or cats: neglect, mutilation, genetic manipulation, and drug regimens that cause chronic pain and crippling, transport through all weather extremes, and gruesome and violent slaughter. Yet farmed animals are no less intelligent or capable of feeling pain than are the dogs and cats we cherish as companions.

Eating well, the importance of food

Eating well is important. You have to find balance within yourself and what you eat. You have to find what better suits your needs, proteins, vitamins and minerals, also depending on what you spend and what are your daily energy loss.

Being vegan means being able to improve, discover and find out new solutions to eat better, but still eat whatever you feel like. My friend João has a great start up website with videos to teach how to cook stuff. Homemade non commercial videos.

http://www.joaoleitao.com/receitas/

GO VEGAN



Vegan no leather shoes for skaters

Being a skater and being a vegan, it means that I have to find shoes that suits my philosophy, several brand offer great choice, emerica has annual skate shoes collections for vegans. nice!



http://emericaskate.com/news/2008/06/25/vegans-rejoice-fall-2008/