14 März 2006

tomatoes-carrot soup

4/5 carrots
2 small tomatoes
7-8 whole black pepper

1 onion Chop the onion into fine pieces. In a soup vessel, place 1 tablespoon of butter. Heat on low flame. After the butter melts, put the chopped onions, fry well for 5-6 minutes. Cut the carrots into small pieces, put them in, also cut the tomatos and put them in. Pour 2 glasses of water, increase the heat. Allow the water to boil well, put whole pepper into it and continue to boil for 5-7 minutes.

Switch off heat, allow the semi-boiled carrots and tomato to cool. Transfer the contents to a mixer/grinder, run the mixer for 4-5 minutes, stopping once a minute to check.

Take a large metallic juice strainer, slowly pour the contents from the mixer through the strainer, back to the soup vessel. Stir with a spoon. Finally, press with hand to squeeze the liquid portion through the strainer, leaving the pulp above. If there are pieces of carrots left do not worry. Now, tranfer the pulp back to the mixer, pour 1/2 glass of water, run the mixer again and repeat the straining process.

Put the soup vessel on a low heat, put enough salt to taste. Heat till the soup is hot but do not allow it to boil. Serve hot in bowls, this one will taste great and provides one serving for 4 people. It will build good appetite, serves as a refreshing hot drink in cold weather. For children, it is one of the good ways to provide lots of carrot.

hope you like ist...

12 März 2006

What is MS?

MS is a disease of the central nervous system (CNS); it damages the protective coating around the nerves (neurons) which transmit messages to all parts of your body, especially to do with the control of muscular and sensory activity. It is thought to be an autoimmune disease: this is where your body’s own immune system appears to attack itself. As the damage to the protective coating around the nerves – called myelin – increases, it leads to a process known as demyelination where the coating is gradually destroyed. These nerves then become less and less efficient at transmitting messages. The messages, as it were, ‘leak’ from the nerves where demyelination has occurred, rather like the loss of an electric current through a cable that is not insulated. As the messages ‘leak’, they become weaker and more erratic, thus leading to greater and greater difficulty in controlling muscles or certain sensory activities in various parts of your body. However, which nerves are demyelinated, in which order, and at what rate, varies very widely between individuals, so the corresponding loss of muscular and sensory control also varies widely. Moreover, even when damage does occur to the myelin, it is gradually repaired (i.e. remyelination occurs) through internal body repair mechanisms; also, what might be described as ‘inflammation’ at the site of the damage often becomes less over time. However, in MS the rate of repair is slower than the rate at which the myelin is damaged; so the damage tends to accumulate more and more throughout the central nervous system. This damage results in plaques or lesions, which take the form of patchy scarring (multiple scleroses) where the demyelination has occurred. Thus the name ‘multiple sclerosis’ has evolved.

this is my biggest problem but on the other hand a "gift" life gave to me...