Wellness PICKS: Angelina Jolie's Favorite Lotion

Trust our favorite Angelina Jolie to always think of helping other and changing the world – even when she is in the shower.  Brad Pitt’s ladylove uses bath products Shea Terra Nubian Honey Shower Crème and Shea Butter Body Lotion of which fifty cents from each bottle sold goes to the Nubian Goat Project, which purchases goats for needy families in Ethiopia.

Talk about feeling real good after a shower, WELLNESS PICKS love Shea Terra Organics because its line of products is loaded with the highest quantities of shea butter than most shea butter products you find on the shelves today.  The natural ingredients include aloe ferox, bush mango, African potato, and honeybush – all known to promote skin repair and cell renewal.

Among their range of natural products - all free of parabens, sulfates, artificial fragrances or colors, our top pick is Miombo Mango Indigenous Silk & Shea Butter Lotion, a supple, rich moisturizer so named because it contains zesty mango extract from the African Miombo Rainforest.  The label reads: organic and wild harvested African herbs, 20% certified organic shea butter, moisturizing goat's milk and cruelty-free silk. 

Angie is right, shea’s got it all good.   

Wellness TIP: Non-Reactive Cookware

Dried foods or leftovers stored in plastic bags and plastic wares would taste like plastic.  It’s very noticeable - or haven’t you noticed? - unless you like them flavored ‘industrial’.  Same goes for sipping a hot tea in a Styrofoam cup, you are drinking more than tea.  We guess it is “T” for “toxic.”  This is attributed to the simple fact that food ions react with synthetic or metallic ions.   

Of course the makers of elegant cookware and cute lunchboxes are not telling you this.  So WELLNESS PICKS says that rather than wrapping a baked potato in aluminum foil, consider baking it directly on the oven rack or placing it in a covered casserole dish.

We can avoid adding toxins to our foods. You can use one of those inert, non-reactive cookware made from enamel, titanium, silicone or glass materials. Or go environmental with bamboo, earthenware or ceramic products.   

WELLNESS PICKS gives you award-winning author Rebecca Wood for more Guidelines for Choosing and Using Healthy Cookware.  She is quick to tell us that “foods vary in their reactivity” and that “It’s not necessary or expedient to ban all plastic from your kitchen.”  Check out this helpful site for more counsels on "Healing with Food."  Well then Miss Rebecca, gives us the wares.

Look, those cute "Microgreens" are creeping on my salad plate

There are many other salad greens out there and some really possess exquisite flavor such as the likes of arugula, mesclun, radicchio and lamb's lettuce. For chefs and passionate home cooks, the salad bowl is a culinary playground with tantalizing tumbles of bitter and tangy, of sweet, spicy and peppery.   Make it real fresh. 

How about “bulls blood beet greens?”

And now the “microgreens” (Sounds like you're in a lab).  Microgreens are filament-thin, delicate plants, the smallest possible incarnation of salad greens, leafy vegetables, herbs, and edible flowers.

The cute greens - those lovely little cluster of microgreens are flavorful Lilliputian members of the greens community which have been appearing with increasing frequency on today's restaurant menus.  We just had a halibut steak with Persian spices in saffron broth garnished with a rainbow mix of micros like upland cress, amaranth, and sorts of edible flower confetti.

WELLNESS PICKS is attracted to microgreens because of their punchy splashes of flavor - our favorite is the spicy, nutty and earthy microarugula - and their almost-evanescent beauty.     

At our choice restaurant French Laundry, at Yountville, California, the chef cuts what he needs from the living plants, so what we taste is a vibrant bouquet of just-harvested flavor.  A curious reading of trendy menus reveal, micro is extensive: Microfennel, microarugula, micro-spinach, microchrysanthemums, microcelery and others appear as toppings, as garnishes, or as explosive bursts of flavor.

The chefs at Martini House, in St. Helena, and Foreign Cinema and Campton Place, both in San Francisco, are now incorporating microgreens into a variety of dishes. 

We prod you to try a sampling of microgreens at these San Francisco restaurants:      

42 Degrees: Variety of microgreens tossed in a fennel salad with Meyer lemon and satsuma orange or on a warm arugula salad with salmon.

Alma: The popular bulls blood blend (beet greens) dressed with sherry vinaigrette

Andalu: Microgreens rainbow mix in Ahi tuna tacos or microarugula on rabbit potpie.

One Market: A mix of microbasil in a melted caprese salad or leek tart on salmon and a bed of micromustard greens

Kokkari: Lobster and shrimp cake topped with a mix of microgreens.

Lark Creek Inn in Larkspur: Arctic char is garnished with mixed bulls blood beet green and an English pea soup is topped with microcilantro. 

Wellness LIST: America's Best Healthy Foods

Klondike Slim-A-Bear Ice Cream Sandwich

How's a "Best Dessert for Your Blood Sugar?"

WELLNESS PICKS spotted them - we mean, we spotted Men'sHealth listing "The Best Healthy Foods of America."  Thanks for doing the walk. It is during these times of the year that we get extra super nosy about lists and listings: bests and worsts, ins and outs, hot and not.  You have a month-ful of time to actually try each at the rate daily. If some of the items are not available in your area, you might want to whip up some of your own. And, be reminded that you are not to over-indulge. Serving suggestions included. Have some: 

Best Restaurant Sundae: 
     Uno Chicago Grill's Mini Hot Chocolate Brownie Sundae
Best Restaurant Dessert: 
     Chili’s Sweet Shot Key Lime Pie
Best Frozen Treat:
     Fudgsicle Original Fudge Bar
Best Dessert for Your Blood Sugar:
     Klondike Slim-A-Bear Ice Cream Sandwich
Best Restaurant Sirloin:
     Ruby Tuesday Peppercorn Mushroom Sirloin
Best Restaurant Tilapia:
     Chili's Cedar Plank Tilapia
Best Restaurant Meal for Your Blood Pressure:
     Red Lobster Wood Grilled Sole with Fresh Asparagus
Best Frozen Dinner:
     Stouffer's Meatloaf
Best Mall Chinese Meal:
     Panda Express Mushroom Chicken with Mixed Vegetables
Best Frozen Entrée:
     Marie Callender's Oven Baked Chicken
Best Fast Food Kids Meal: 
     McDonald’s Chicken McNuggets with Apple Dippers, Caramel Dip, and 1% Low-Fat Milk
Best Drive-Thru Meal: 
     Wendy’s ¼-Pound Single with Small Chili and Medium Iced tea
Best Fast Food Burger: 
     McDonald's Big N' Tasty
Best Hawaiian Pizza: 
     Domino’s Thin Crust Ham and Pineapple Pizza (2 slices)
Best Frozen Pizza: 
     Kashi Mexicali Black Bean Pizza (1/3 pizza)
Best Fast Food Pizza: 
     Pizza Hut 12" Fit and Delicious, with Diced Red Tomato, Mushrooms, and Jalapeno (2 slices)
Best Drive-Thru Tacos: 
     Taco Bell Grilled Steak Soft Tacos, Fresco Style (2)
Best Sit-Down Mexican: 
     Baja Fresh Grilled Mahi Mahi Fish Tacos (2)
Best Restaurant Appetizer: 
     Outback Seared Ahi Tuna (small)
Best Supermarket Yogurt: 
     Fage 2% (7 oz)

Best Bottled Tea: 
     Honest Tea Community Green Tea (16 ounces)
Best Mall Snack: 
     Auntie Anne’s Cinnamon Sugar Pretzel, no butter
Best Nuts: 
     Emerald Cocoa Roast Almonds, Dark Chocolate (1/4 cup)
Best Snack Dip: 
     Muir Glen Organic Garlic Cilantro Salsa (2 Tbsp)
Best Cracker: 
      Nabisco Triscuit Original (6 crackers)
Best Sandwich for Your Blood Pressure: 
     Cosi Tuscan Pesto Chicken Sandwich
Best Pita Sandwich: 
     Chili's Fajita Pita Chicken
Best Sub Sandwich: 
     Subway 6" Double Roast Beef
Best Vegetable Sandwich: 
     Cosí's Fire-Roasted Veggie Sandwich
Best Asian Salad: 
     Panera Bread Asian Sesame Chicken Salad (Half Portion with Reduced-Sugar Asian Sesame Vinaigrette)
Best Classic Salad: 
     T.G.I. Friday's Cobb Salad
Best Sweet Coffee Shop Drink: 
     Starbuck’s Vivanno Banana Chocolate with nonfat milk
Best Coffee Drink: 
     Tall Starbucks Skinny Latte + Protein (12 oz)
Best Fast Food Breakfast: 
     Platter Bob Evans 3 Scrambled Egg Lites with 2 Slices of Bacon & Fresh Fruit
Best Fast Food Breakfast Sandwich: 
     McDonald's Egg McMuffin
Best Fast Food Oatmeal: 
     Starbucks Perfect Oatmeal with Nut Medley
Best Supermarket Breakfast Sandwich: 
     Jimmy Dean D-Lights Canadian Bacon, Egg White & Cheese Muffin Sandwich
Best All-Fruit Smoothie: 
     Jamba Juice Peach Perfection (16 Ounces)
Best Instant Oatmeal: 
     Quaker Cinnamon Swirl High Fiber Instant Oatmeal (1 packet)