Top 12 Non-Dairy Natural Sources of Bio-available Calcium

Calcium is not just about building strong bones and teeth.

It also plays a vital role in:

     -maintaining healthy blood pressure

     -nerve impulse transmission

     -muscle contraction

     -hormone production

     -regulating blood clotting.

Your body gains access to calcium in two ways.  Either through dietary intake, or by breaking down your bones and releasing the bound calcium for use.  Bones are constantly being broken down, however too much of this will result in overall bone loss and increased risk of developing osteoporosis.

Not all calcium in food is absorbed by the body. The % of calcium in a food which our body can absorb is the 'bioavailability'.  

Rainbow Salad

I actually really like to eat this salad with turkey mince mixed through it. I simply cook the turkey mince with a little Tamari which adds a great flavour to this salad. However, you could add chickpeas  or seasoned tofu for a vegetarian version, or serve it alongside salmon patties, a steak, or a piece of fish.

Ingredients:

• 3 cups of julienne carrot, broccoli stalks, and beetroot (I have a confession, I am not very good at the whole julienne thing so I cheated here and bought a pre-prepared packet from the supermarket which is not something I do very often). 
• 2 cups of wom bok cabbage finely sliced
• 2 shallots finely sliced on the diagonal
• 1/2 mint leaves roughly chopped (these add such a great flavour, feel free to add more if you wish).
• 100g of snow peas sliced into thin strips.
• 1/2 cup of carrot sauce (see recipe under 'condiments')

#season with good quality celtic sea salt at the end to taste. 

Method:

• Once you have sliced up all your ingredients, it is really just a matter of combining them all together in a bowl and mixing the carrot sauce through.