The Star Online: Lifestyle: Health
The Star Online: Lifestyle: Health |
- Keeping a healthy smile
- Three recipes from the award-winning book, Food For Your Eyes
- A fantastic win
| Posted: 30 Mar 2013 08:25 PM PDT Colgate, in partnership with the Malaysian Dental Association (MDA), is determined to rev up their efforts in promoting good oral health with the upcoming Let's Aim For Superior Oral Health campaign all throughout April. A HEALTHY smile is an added bonus at any age. Too often, people neglect the health of their mouth, teeth and gums, dismissing a twin row of beautiful pearly whites as nothing more than an aesthetic ideal. Many remain unaware that poor oral health resulting from inadequate care and poor hygiene may affect their overall health. If left unchecked, harmful bacteria in the mouth can sometimes grow out of control and cause oral infections such as tooth decay and gum disease. More alarmingly, some experts claim there could be a correlation between oral health and heart health. While the link between oral health and heart health is not completely clear, some studies suggest that both diseases may be intertwined, due to the presence of inflammation in both cases. Unfortunately, the importance of maintaining good oral health still eludes many Malaysians. According to the 2010 National Oral Health Survey of Adults conducted by the Oral Health Division in the Health Ministry, while some 52.4% of Malaysians thought they had good oral health, in actuality, a staggering 98.3% of Malaysians were in need of some form of oral healthcare. An estimated 88.9% have dental caries; 94.0% have gum problems; and 7.3% have lost all their natural teeth The survey also found that 24.7% have dental prostheses, while 45.9% need them. Meanwhile, 32.9% thought of a dental visit as a "fearful experience" and only 27.4% consulted a dentist in the past year. In response to the nation's state of oral health, Colgate, an oral hygiene product company, in partnership with the Malaysian Dental Association (MDA), are determined to rev up their efforts in promoting good oral health with the upcoming Let's Aim For Superior Oral Health campaign. The annual campaign, which enters its 10th instalment this year, is part of the Oral Health Month (OHM) in April. It aims to educate Malaysians on the importance of good oral care habits. Their efforts in promoting the cause are supported by the Malaysian Health Ministry. This year's campaign launch was officiated by Dr Khairiyah Abdul Muttalib, principal director of the Oral Health Division in the Health Ministry, and witnessed by John Hazlin, managing director of Colgate-Palmolive Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, and Indonesia, as well as Dr Haja Badrudeen Sirajudeen, president of the Malaysian Dental Health Association, at a shopping centre in Petaling Jaya last Wednesday. Poor oral health can have detrimental effects on one's psyche, Dr Haja points out. "Decades ago, tooth decay was the leading cause of tooth loss among the adult population, but now gum disease has overtaken it," he says. Gum disease, also known as periodontal disease, begins with bacterial growth in the mouth. Over time, if left untreated, periodontal disease could result in tooth loss due to destruction of the tissue that surrounds your teeth. "The loss of natural teeth can be a traumatic experience and may affect a person's speech, self-esteem and overall quality of life. Imagine what this means for someone who has lost all their teeth," Dr Haja explains. He adds: "It is important to adopt preventive oral care through regular brushing, glossing, rinsing and most importantly, regular dental visits of at least twice a year." Dr Khairiyah agrees that regular dental check ups are key to preventing cavities and gum diseases. "Early detection or early intervention can shift the odds towards more favourable outcomes. It's not just about just getting teeth scaled and cavities filled, it is about having good oral health, which is part and parcel of good overall health," she says. Throughout the month of April, Malaysians of all ages are invited to go for free dental check-ups at participating dental clinics throughout the nation. Since the campaign's inception, an esimated 500,000 Malaysians have benefited from the services provided during the OHM. The number of participating clinics that will be offering free dental check-ups throughout the OHM has also increased from 300 to 805 since 2004. This year, Malaysians can pre-register for their free dental check-ups at Colgate Malaysia's Facebook page: www.facebook.com/ColgateMY. The new initiative was introduced to allow the public to pre-book a time slot at any participating dental clinics. On top of that, Colgate is also organising the OHM dental check-up photo contest, which gives the public a chance to win exciting prizes by visiting participating dental clinics from now till April 28. Visit their Facebook page for a full list of other OHM activities, which will include a slew of nationwide roadshows. |
| Three recipes from the award-winning book, Food For Your Eyes Posted: 30 Mar 2013 08:24 PM PDT Oat porridge with banana and passionfruit OATS are a great breakfast option that can be prepared sweet or savoury. Oats have a moderate glycaemic index, and keeps you full for longer. Adding fruit into the oat porridge is an easy way to increase your antioxidant intake. Here, I have included bananas and passionfruit. Feel free to substitute with your favourite fruits. Serves three Preparation & cooking time: 10 minutes Ingredients: 375ml (1 ½ cups) skimmed or lowfat milk ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon 95gm (1 cup) wholegrain oats 130gm (½ cup) mashed ripe bananas (about 1 large) 130gm (1) banana, sliced 18gm (1) passionfruit 1 tablespoon coarsely chopped toasted walnuts To cook the oats: In a medium saucepan, bring milk and spice to a gentle boil. Stir in oats. Return to a boil, then reduce heat to medium. Cook one minute for instant oats, five minutes for uncooked oats, or until most of the liquid is absorbed. To serve: Remove oatmeal from heat. Stir in mashed bananas. Spoon oatmeal into three cereal bowls and top with some sliced bananas. Cut the passionfruit into half and scoop out the pulp, seeds and juice. Divide this over the three bowls of porridge. Sprinkle with chopped walnuts and serve warm. THIS is my version of Vietnamese spring roll. I have substituted brown rice vermicelli for the normal rice vermicelli to take advantage of its lower glycaemic index. These spring rolls are packed with fresh salads and herbs to give it a lovely fresh taste and to retain most of its antioxidants. You can substitute the vegetables with your favourite ones. Try shredded guava, blanched choy sum or shredded courgettes! Prawns are a source of omega-3 fatty acid and zinc. Alternatively, you could use smoked salmon or canned tuna in place of prawns. Vietnamese spring rolls Serves four Preparation & cooking time: 35 minutes Ingredients: 300 g prawns 100 g (1 cup) brown rice vermicelli, soaked in water for 20 minutes 40 g (8 sheets) rice paper 80 g (8) fresh lettuce leaves, washed and drained dry 100 g (1 cup) bean sprouts, blanched in boiling water 110 g (1) carrot, shredded 20 g (½ cup) mint leaves 20 g (½ cup) coriander leaves 20 g (2) spring onion, cut into slivers Nuoc Cham sauce: 4 tablespoons (tbsp) fresh lime juice 4 tbsp fish sauce 4 tbsp water 2 teaspoons sugar 10 g (2 cloves) garlic, minced 10 g (2) birds eye chilli, minced Method: First, devein the prawns. With the shell intact, hold the prawn backside up. Run your knife down the length of the prawn to expose the vein. Use your finger or the tip of your knife to remove the vein. Repeat until all the prawns are deveined. Bring a pot of water to boil. Cook the deveined prawns for one to two minutes, or until it floats to the top. Drain the prawns from the pot and leave to cool. Peel off the shell and slice the cooked prawns in half. Peeling the prawn shells is left until after the prawns are cooked to prevent them from shrinking too much. Bring the water to boil. Boil the rice vermicelli for three to five minutes, or until al dente, and drain. Dip the rice paper in a large bowl of warm water. It will become soft and pliable. Place the rice paper on a flat area and line with a lettuce leaf. Scoop a tablespoon each of rice vermicelli, sprouts, carrots, coriander, mint leaves, spring onion and prawn halves onto it. Roll the rice paper and fold over the ends to seal in the filling. Cover with a damp cloth and continue to make the rest of the rice paper rolls. Nuoc Cham sauce: In a small bowl, mix all the ingredients together. Green peas, tuna and wolfberry rice PEAS are a good source of vitamin C, fibre, beta-carotene and contain some amount of omega-3. This is an excellent one-pot meal which is complete on its own and easy to prepare. Serves five Preparation and cooking time: 35 minutes Ingredients: 180 g (1 cup) uncooked white rice 180 g (1 cup) uncooked brown rice 1 tbsp cooking oil 20g (2 cloves) garlic, chopped 50g dried shrimp, soaked in 200ml water, pounded, retain soaking liquid 10g (6) dried Chinese mushroom, soaked in 200 ml water, sliced, retain soaking liquid 1 tin (185g) canned tuna in water, drained and flaked 3 tbsp dried wolfberries 325ml (1½ cup) water 320g (2 cups) frozen green peas, thaw in a bowl of water, drained Garnish: 2 tbsp chopped spring onions 40g (4) shallots, sliced and fried Method: Rinse the rice in a large bowl and drain. Heat the oil in the rice cooker. Add in the garlic, dried shrimp and fry till aromatic. Stir in the sliced mushroom, tuna flakes and dried wolfberries. Finally, stir in the washed rice. Add all the soaking liquid and water into the rice cooker. Cook the rice until all the liquid is absorbed or vaporised. This will take about 25 minutes. Switch off the rice cooker and stir in the green peas until it is well mixed. Leave the rice to sit for at least two minutes. Garnish with spring onions and fried shallots. |
| Posted: 30 Mar 2013 08:21 PM PDT A personal passion project claims first prize at the Oscars of the culinary publishing and broadcast world. IT all started with what dietitian and author Goo Chui Hoong thought was a spam email. Having launched Food for Your Eyes – a health-cum-recipe book co-written with her husband, consultant ophthalmologist Dr Kenneth Fong – locally just a couple of months prior, she was not expecting it to be noticed by the international culinary community. "It was very random. We had had the book launch at the At 19 Culinary Studio (in Kuala Lumpur). The Gourmand Awards Committee emailed the school – I run cooking sessions there occasionally – and the owner, Hellen Fong, forwarded it to me," she recalls, adding that at first, she thought it was spam. Considered the Oscars of the food and wine publishing and broadcast industry, the World Gourmand Cookbook Awards is an international annual event recognising the best of culinary books and television shows. Founded by Edouard Cointreau – scion of the Cointreau liquor, and Frapin and Remy Martin cognac families – in 1995, the awards aim to reward and honour those who "cook with words", and to help readers find the best of the tens of thousands of culinary books that come out every year. Having had no previous experience with publishing, the Fongs had no idea what the Awards were all about. "For us, because we are not in the industry, we didn't realise how important the Awards are," says Goo. In fact, she checked with Julie Wong, editor of both their book and Flavours magazine, to determine if the Awards were indeed legitimate. Wong quickly enlightened her about the event and encouraged the both of them to submit the book for consideration, even putting them in touch with Chef Wan and Toh Puan Rosita Abdullah, the two previous Malaysian winners at the Awards. "After looking at Toh Puan Rosita's book (the hardcover coffee table-cum-cookbook Kulit Manis: A Taste of Terengganu's Heritage) and the high quality, we thought that we wouldn't even get shortlisted," says Dr Fong. "So, we just posted off the three copies of the book they requested for judging to Madrid, Spain, and didn't really think much of it after that." When, to their surprise, they were indeed shortlisted, the Fongs then debated whether or not to attend the Awards, which were being held in Paris, France. Says Dr Fong: "There were five other books shortlisted in our category from all over the world, and they were of such good quality." In the end, they decided to go out of curiosity, just for the experience, and for the opportunity to visit Paris. Culinary focal point It was only when they were actually at the three-day long Paris Cookbook Fair last month – of which the Awards ceremony is the grand finale – that they realised how important and prestigious the Awards were in the culinary world. "It's only when you go there that you realise how seriously the authors and publishers take it. Some (winners) were in tears on stage; they really put their heart and soul into winning an awards," says Dr Fong. He adds: "One group from Sweden – two doctors and a chef, who wrote on food that can help prevent cancer – even had an entourage who were filming their every move!" Goo adds laughingly: "We felt a bit kampung (provincial) there." In addition to the Awards, the Fair serves as a meeting point for authors and publishers to discover or promote new titles and talents, or to discuss translation and foreign distribution rights. Goo shares that they met an author who had travelled all the way there just to meet a publisher in order to get his book published. Dr Fong adds: "For authors, they try to sell the distribution rights to other countries." One of the trends observed at this year's Awards was the increasing interest in health-related cookbooks. And this was reflected in the Lifestyle: Health subcategory, which had six shortlisted books, compared to the other subcategories, which mostly had only five finalists each. Aside from Food for Your Eyes, the other health-related cookbooks on the shortlist were Meals that Heal Inflammation by Julie Daniluk (Canada), Cookbook, Nutrition and Medical Advice for Retired People by Josko Kalilic (Croatia), Goodness Me! It's Gluten Free by Vanessa and Mary Hudson (New Zealand), Matfrisk by Lars Beckman, Lars Franzen and Fredric Andersson (Sweden), and Mi Lonchera by Armando Scannone (Venezuela). Winning passion With 66 subcategories in the food section alone and 25 in the wine section, the awards ceremony itself on Feb 24 was a long event. "It was a long night," says Dr Fong. "By the time our category was announced, we were quite tired." That added even more to their shock during the announcement. "Our jaws just dropped (when we heard our book called out)," shares Goo. "We really didn't expect it; we didn't prepare any speech at all," says Dr Fong, who adds that they ended up thanking Wong and her team, who helped them polish and edit the book, as well as photograph the dishes in it. "We were really happy that Julie was there (with us at the Awards), because she really deserves the credit," he says. "The raw data didn't look as nice before she helped polish it," Goo adds. "It was really a team effort." Dr Fong believes that while Food for Your Eyes was, in comparison to other books, was a smaller scale, lower budget project, the judges were able to see beyond the exterior presentation to the passion behind it. "Edward Cointreau, the chief judge, says that he gets thousands of books every year for the Awards, and that he can tell within the first few pages the passion of the authors." He adds: "We weren't thinking about money when we wrote this book; we were really passionate and interested in the topic, and I guess it showed." In fact, profits from the sales of Food For Your Eyes all go to the National Council for the Blind to help increase awareness and prevention of eye diseases. The second and third prizes in the sub-category went to Sweden's Matfrisk and the Kiwi Goodness Me! It's Gluten Free respectively. Dr Fong shares that they actually expected Matfrisk, which was written by two professors of oncology and a professional chef who owns his own restaurant, to take first place. Ironically, the Swedish team told them that they had predicted Food for Your Eyes' win. The two teams coincidentally ended up at the same French bistro for supper after the awards ceremony, where the Swedes sportingly shared a round of victory champagne with the Fongs. The couple also shared that they enjoyed meeting Chef Wan at the event. The celebrity chef also won first prize at the Awards for the Authors: TV-English subcategory with his book The Best of Chef Wan: A Taste of Malaysia, beating out Jamie Oliver's Jamie's 15 Minutes Meals, which came in second. Promoting eye health When asked about how their book has been received so far, Dr Fong says that many people have said that the recipes can be done easily within 30-45 minutes. "Credit has to go to the photographer and food stylist, who made the dishes look so good. "One of my patients said that you cannot read the book when you are hungry," he says with a smile. Goo adds: "I think what separates our book from others is that the first chapter has a lot of information about common eye diseases. There's even an eye chart at the back of the book." Dr Fong agrees: "A lot of people felt very educated by the first chapter. "We didn't want it to be a very lecturing type of book; we wanted it to be a gentle way of informing people about eye health." He adds: "We feel that for RM39.90, you really get value for money. "Julie made sure that the font was as small as reasonably possible, so that we could squeeze in all the information." Although the book is mainly available locally and in Singapore, Dr Fong shares that he has even had an email from an Australian who bought the book online, telling him how useful and helpful it is. He adds that some readers have even suggested that they do their own tv or radio show after their book came out, but they have no such plans. His next big project instead is organising the Malaysian Society of Ophthalmology's national public awareness campaign this May on age-related macular degeneration – one of the leading causes of blindness in those aged over 60 in the developed world. While this disease is not treatable, it can be slowed down by certain foods and nutritional supplements; so being aware of its symptoms is very important for adults, and forms a major part of the content in Food for Your Eyes. "We feel that we doctors need to reach out to the public before it is too late. "People tend to take sight for granted; we want to push the awareness of this disease as it can be terrible living with blindness," he says. > Food for Your Eyes is a bilingual (English/Mandarin) book that focuses on common eye diseases and homecooked recipes, which are alcohol, pork and beef-free, that help promote eye health. It is published by Star Publications (M) Bhd, and is available at all major bookstores in Malaysia and Singapore, as well as online at bookstore.thestar.com.my. Related story |
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