Eight Beers That You Should Stop Drinking Immediately

Many of us choose what we eat very carefully, or at least dedicate our minimum attention to it. But when it comes to drinks, especially alcoholic beverages, we do little to make the best decisions for our health. Which is a HUGE mistake. All the work for your body can be ruined in a weekend out. While foods and non alcoholic beverages are required to list their ingredients and are monitored by the FDA, beer does not belong in either. Alcohol industry had lobbied for years to avoid labeling its ingredients. Some to protect its recipes, but most – to hide harmful ingredients.

Here’s some harmful ingredients that are commonly found in beer:

GMO Corn Syrup
GMO Corn
High Fructose Corn Syrup
Fish Bladder
Propylene Glycol
Monosodium Glutamate (MSG)
Natural Flavors
GMO Sugars
Caramel Coloring
Insect-Based Dyes
Carrageenan
BPA
& lots more!

Here are the 8 beers that are commonly found in bars in United States that you should stop drinking immediately.

1. Newcastle Brown Ale

The Newcastle beer has been found to contain caramel coloring. Class 3 and 4 caramel coloring is made from ammonia, which is classified as a carcinogen. “The one and only” beer with cancer causing qualities.

2. Budweiser

One of the most popular beers, or most advertised is Budweiser. Budweiser contains genetically modified (GMO) corn. In 2007, Greenpeace discovered experimental GMO rice in Anheuser-Busch (Budweiser) beer.

3. Corona Extra

I used to love Corona’s commercials. They were so peaceful and relaxing. That is until I found out that the beer contains GMO Corn Syrup and Propylene Glycol. Propylene Glycol is controversial, and is said to may be potentially harmful to your health.

4. Miller Lite

This is another very popular beer in America that contains GMOs. Miller Lite contains GMO corn and corn syrup. It’s “GMO time”.

5. Michelob Ultra

Less popular but still readily available Michelob beer, should be eliminated from your choices. This beer has been found to contain a genetically modified sweetener (GMO dextrose).

6. Guinness

Guinness is often praised for it’s smoothness.  However, several investigations proved that Guinness ingredients are quite disturbing. The beer  contains fish bladder and high fructose corn syrup. High fructose corn syrup has been long banned from many stores and drinks.

7. Coors Light

Coors light is a drink that is very popular at bars and among college students.  Mostly because its cheap. The beer contains GMO corn syrup.

8. Pabst Blue Ribbon

Pabst Blue Ribbon contains GMO corn and GMO corn syrup.

Healthy Beer Alternatives

So when it comes to beer you have to be very careful. Your best option is to find a microbrewery that you can trust. As with everything, try to avoid cheap, low-quality products. Bars may offer Coors Light, Miller Lite or Budweiser specials, but they are cheap for a reason. The rest of the world is banning GMOs everywhere, while USA is lagging years behind, and only several states offer GMO labeling laws. Try to stay away from any American beers. Choose organic beer. Beers that contain 100% organic labels, have to have ingredients that are all 100% organic. While an “organic” label just means 95% of it will be organic.  European beer is most likely to be safe from GMO ingredients but unfortunately, most other beer contains GMO artificial ingredients, stabilizers, grains and preservatives, plus, HFCS.

GMO Free Beers:
Organic Beers (Unpasteurized & Unfiltered)

Wolaver’s – all beers
Lamar Street – Whole Foods label (brewed by Goose Island)
Bison – all beers
Dogfish Head (organic when ingredients available)
Fish Brewery Company – Fish Tale Ales
Lakefront Brewery – Organic ESB
Brooklyn – (organic when ingredients are available)
Pinkus – all beers
Samuel Smiths – Samuel Smiths Organic Ale
Wychwood – Scarecrow Ale
Non-Organic Beers (Unpasteurized & Unfiltered)

Sierra Nevada – all choices
Duck Rabbit – Brown Ale, Porter, Amber Ale, Milk Stout
Dogfish Head- 60 Minute IPA, Shelter Pale Ale, Chicory Stout
Shipyard – Summer Brew
Victory Brewery – Whirlwind
North Coast – Blue Star
Bridgeport – IPA (Bottle conditioned)
Ayinger – all choices
Royal Oak – Pale Ale
Fraziskaner – Hefeweisse and Dunkel Weisse
Weihenstephaner – Hefe Weissbier
Maisel’s – Weisse
Hoegaarden – Belgian Wit
Other

Heineken
Steamwhistle
Amstel Light
Duchy Original Ale Organic
Mill Street Brewery
Fuller’s Organic
Nelson Organic Ale
Natureland Organic

Share This with Fellow Beer Drinkers
It’s important to expose companies that use harmful ingredients in our products. This information is hidden from the public with millions of dollars of false advertising, laws, etc. You can always vote with your money. As this information about GMO beers spreads, we will see a decrease in production of these beers and the companies may eliminate the harmful ingredients altogether. Most importantly, when you hang out with your friends, you will be able to share beer that’s more delicious and healthier.

If you have any additional information about GMO or non-gmo beers, or want to correct some of the information, simply e-mail us or leave a comment with evidence bellow.

Sources:
www.atsdr.cdc.gov
foodbabe.com
www.greenpeace.org

66 Facts You May Not Have Known About The English Language

The English language is, quite literally, the greatest language in the world. Great in terms of size - the current edition of the Oxford English Dictionary contains 615,000 entries. Great in terms of scope -- it's an official language in seventy-nine countries and territories. And great in terms of, well, greatness -- it's just one fantastic mishmash of borrowings, inventions, corruptions, misinterpretations, misspellings, alterations, words you'll never need, and words you never even knew you'll never need.

Since December 2013, @HaggardHawks has been trying to prove precisely this by tweeting odd words, word origins and language facts everyday. 1,300 tweets later, it turns six months old this week and so to celebrate, here are 66 random facts from our first semester that hopefully go some way towards showing how great -- and how downright bizarre -- the English language can be.

1. In the 17th century, magpies were nicknamed pie-maggots.

2. The part of a wall between two windows is called the interfenestration.

3. If you were to write out every number name in full (one, two, three, four...), you wouldn't use a single letter B until you reached one billion.

4. The part of your back that you can't quite reach to scratch is called the acnestis. It's derived from the Greek word for "cheese-grater."

5. A hecatompedon is a building measuring precisely 100ft × 100ft.

6. A growlery is a place you like to retire to when you're unwell or in a bad mood. It was coined by Charles Dickens in Bleak House (1853).

7. There was no word for the color orange in English until about 450 years ago.

8. The infinity sign, ∞, is called a lemniscate. Its name means "decorated with ribbons" in Latin.

9. A Dutch feast is one at which the host gets drunk before his hosts do.

10. Schoolmaster is an anagram of "the classroom."

11. To explode originally meant "to jeer a performer off the stage."

12. Funk was originally a Tudor word for the stale smell of tobacco smoke.

13. In written English, only one letter in every 510 is a Q.

14. The opposite of déjà-vu is called jamais-vu: it describes the odd feeling that something very familiar is actually completely new.

15. A scissor was originally a type of Roman gladiator thought to have been armed either with a pair of swords or blades, or with a single dual-bladed dagger.

16. To jirble means "to spill a liquid while pouring it because your hands are shaking."

17. Samuel Johnson defined a sock as "something put between the foot and the shoe."

18. In Victorian slang, muffin-wallopers were old unmarried or widowed women who would meet up to gossip over tea and cakes.

19. Scarecrows were once known as hobidy-boobies.

20. The longest English word with its letters in reverse alphabetical order is spoonfeed.

21. Shakespeare used the word puking in As You Like It.

22. Flabellation is the use of a fan to cool something down.

23. Bamboozle derives from a French word, embabouiner, meaning "to make a baboon out of someone."

24. A percontation is a question that requires more than a straightforward "yes" or "no" answer.

25. The shortest -ology is oology, the scientific study of eggs.

26. As a verb rather than a noun, owl means "to act wisely, despite knowing nothing."

27. A shape with 99 sides would be called an enneacontakaienneagon.

28. In the 18th century, a clank-napper was a thief who specialized in stealing silverware.

29. Noon is derived from the Latin for "ninth," novem. It originally referred to the ninth hour of the Roman day -- 3pm.

30. 11% of the entire English language is just the letter E.

31. Oysterhood means "reclusiveness," or "an overwhelming desire to stay at home."

32. A puckfist is someone who braggingly dominates a conversation.

33. The bowl formed by cupping your hands together is called a gowpen.

34. To battologize means "to repeat a word so incessantly in conversation that it loses all meaning and impact."

35. A zoilist is an unfair or unnecessarily harsh critic, or someone who particularly enjoys finding fault in things.

36. In 19th century English, a cover-slut was a long cloak or overcoat worn to hide a person's untidy or dirty clothes underneath.

37. Happy is used three times more often in English than sad.

38. Trinkgeld is money meant only to be spent on drink.

39. Aquabob is an old name for an icicle.

40. In the 16th and 17th century, buttock-mail was the name of a tax once levied in Scotland on people who had sex out of wedlock.

41. Witzelsucht is a rare neurological disorder whose sufferers have an excessive tendency to tell pointless stories or inappropriate jokes and puns.

42. A repdigit is a number comprised of a series of repeated numbers, like 9,999.

43. In Tudor English, a gandermooner was a man who flirted with other women while his wife recovered from childbirth.

44. A cumberground is an utterly useless person who literally serves no other purpose than to take up space.

45. Sermocination is the proper name for posing a question and then immediately answering it yourself.

46. The earliest known reference to baseball in English comes from Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey (1798).

47. Whipper-tooties are pointless misgivings or groundless excuses for not trying to do something.

48. Anything described as transpontine is located on the opposite side of a bridge.

49. In the early days of Hollywood, the custard pies thrown in comedy sketches were nicknamed magoos.

50. Checkbook is the longest horizontally symmetrical word in the English language -- although if proper nouns are included, Florida's Lake Okeechobee is one letter longer.

51. The earliest record of the phrase "do-it-yourself" comes from a 1910 magazine article about students at Boston University being left to teach themselves.

52. The paddywhack mentioned in the nursery rhyme "This Old Man" is a Victorian slang word for a severe beating.

53. The Kelvin temperature scale, the forsythia plant, Boeing aircraft and the state of Pennsylvania are all named after people called William.

54. Xenoglossy is the apparent ability to speak a language that you've never actually learned.

55. Mochas are named after a port in Yemen, from where coffee was exported to Europe in the 18th century.

56. In mediaeval Europe, a moment was precisely 1/40th of an hour, or 90 seconds.

57. To quomodocunquize means "to make money by whatever means possible."

58. Porpoise literally means "pork-fish."

59. Shivviness is an old Yorkshire word for the uncomfortable feeling of wearing new underwear.

60. The adjectival form of abracadabra is abracadabrant, used to describe anything that has apparently happened by magic.

61. Straitjackets were originally called strait-waistcoats.

62. Aspirin and heroin were both originally trademarks. They lost their trademark status as part of the Treaty of Versailles.

63. An autological word is one that describes itself -- like short or unhyphenated.

64. In the 18th century, teachers were nicknamed "haberdashers of pronouns."

65. The burnt or used part of a candlewick is called the snaste.

66. The expressions "bully pulpit" and "lunatic fringe" were coined by Theodore Roosevelt.

90% Of People Can't Pronounce This Whole Poem

The Chaos is a poem by the Dutch writer and traveler, Gerard Nolst Trenité, which is meant to demonstrate the extreme irregularity of the English Language. This classic English poem contains about 800 of the worst irregularities in English spelling and pronunciation.

See if you can pronounce the entire poem. If so… you’re doing better than 9 out of 10 people out there!

If you can pronounce correctly every word in this poem, you will be speaking English better than 90% of the native English speakers in the world.

After trying the verses, a Frenchman said he’d prefer six months of hard labor to reading six lines aloud.

Read it aloud (good luck!):

Dearest creature in creation,

Study English pronunciation.

I will teach you in my verse

Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.

I will keep you, Suzy, busy,

Make your head with heat grow dizzy.

Tear in eye, your dress will tear.

So shall I! Oh hear my prayer.

Just compare heart, beard, and heard,

Dies and diet, lord and word,

Sword and sward, retain and Britain.

(Mind the latter, how it’s written.)

Now I surely will not plague you

With such words as plaque and ague.

But be careful how you speak:

Say break and steak, but bleak and streak;

Cloven, oven, how and low,

Script, receipt, show, poem, and toe.

Hear me say, devoid of trickery,

Daughter, laughter, and Terpsichore,

Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles,

Exiles, similes, and reviles;

Scholar, vicar, and cigar,

Solar, mica, war and far;

One, anemone, Balmoral,

Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel;

Gertrude, German, wind and mind,

Scene, Melpomene, mankind.

Billet does not rhyme with ballet,

Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.

Blood and flood are not like food,

Nor is mould like should and would.

Viscous, viscount, load and broad,

Toward, to forward, to reward.

And your pronunciation’s OK

When you correctly say croquet,

Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,

Friend and fiend, alive and live.

Ivy, privy, famous; clamour

And enamour rhyme with hammer.

River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,

Doll and roll and some and home.

Stranger does not rhyme with anger,

Neither does devour with clangour.

Souls but foul, haunt but aunt,

Font, front, wont, want, grand, and grant,

Shoes, goes, does. Now first say finger,

And then singer, ginger, linger,

Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, gouge and gauge,

Marriage, foliage, mirage, and age.

Query does not rhyme with very,

Nor does fury sound like bury.

Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth.

Job, nob, bosom, transom, oath.

Though the differences seem little,

We say actual but victual.

Refer does not rhyme with deafer.

Foeffer does, and zephyr, heifer.

Mint, pint, senate and sedate;

Dull, bull, and George ate late.

Scenic, Arabic, Pacific,

Science, conscience, scientific.

Liberty, library, heave and heaven,

Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven.

We say hallowed, but allowed,

People, leopard, towed, but vowed.

Mark the differences, moreover,

Between mover, cover, clover;

Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,

Chalice, but police and lice;

Camel, constable, unstable,

Principle, disciple, label.

Petal, panel, and canal,

Wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal.

Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,

Senator, spectator, mayor.

Tour, but our and succour, four.

Gas, alas, and Arkansas.

Sea, idea, Korea, area,

Psalm, Maria, but malaria.

Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean.

Doctrine, turpentine, marine.

Compare alien with Italian,

Dandelion and battalion.

Sally with ally, yea, ye,

Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, and key.

Say aver, but ever, fever,

Neither, leisure, skein, deceiver.

Heron, granary, canary.

Crevice and device and aerie.

Face, but preface, not efface.

Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.

Large, but target, gin, give, verging,

Ought, out, joust and scour, scourging.

Ear, but earn and wear and tear

Do not rhyme with here but ere.

Seven is right, but so is even,

Hyphen, roughen, nephew Stephen,

Monkey, donkey, Turk and jerk,

Ask, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.

Pronunciation — think of Psyche!

Is a paling stout and spikey?

Won’t it make you lose your wits,

Writing groats and saying grits?

It’s a dark abyss or tunnel:

Strewn with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale,

Islington and Isle of Wight,

Housewife, verdict and indict.

Finally, which rhymes with enough –

Though, through, plough, or dough, or cough?

Hiccough has the sound of cup.

My advice is to give up!!!

Book review: Mom and Me and Mom

My latest book review: Mom and Me and Mom by Maya Angelou in today's Kannada Prabha. Here's the link: 

Day 4: On a houseboat in Kumarakom

The funniest part in the reception was a priest requesting the guests to give gifts to the couple. After the photo session, we had a sumptuous lunch, as usual, boiled rice, non-veg items.

After the lunch, we rushed to the hotel for a siesta, before heading towards Kumarakom. Rajeshattan told us to take rest for 1 hour, but we had a nap for over 2 hours. We checked out of the room in the evening and went to Rajeshattan’s house in Kottayam. His mother and sister at home made us feel comfortable. Tall, good looking and elegant, Rajeshattan’s mother didn’t look like a Mallu! Neither his sister did, may be because of the accent which was polished.

Later, we went to the club to inform the staff that we were going to the cottage. What I observed after travelling for two days was the roads were very narrow and maneuvering them needs skill.

The road leading to the cottage was so narrow that even if a two-wheeler came from the opposite direction, it was very difficult for both motorists.

By the time we reached the place, it was dark and couldn’t see the backwaters. The moment we stepped in, the staff informed us that there was only one room, which enraged Rajeshattan. He started shouting at the staff for not reserving the rooms, as the rooms were booked one month ago.

Rajeshattan had confirmed and re-confirmed the booking several times before we went there. After an hour’s shouting and making several calls, the staff had no other go but to give the room booked for someone else! His anger was legitimate. What if someone from other state visits and comes to know that the reserved rooms were given to someone else? If they don’t have any acquaintance in the place, it is very difficult to find accommodation in the night in a new place.

Though a tiring journey, the men sat for a drink and later, Rajeshattan’s friend Benny joined them.

Benny, Rajeshattan and Paapi

Viji and me shared our past sitting on a swing. Cool breeze from the backwaters gave a nice company for us.

On the swing

After eating Kerala Paratha with chicken curry, we slept off planning to get up early.

I woke up at 6 am to see the lake and it was like Oh My God! I was speechless for a moment. It looked like an ocean rather than a lake, water water every where…

Vij looks at kayal from the room

I woke up Vij and he didn’t mind to come out of the room even though the hangover had not gone completely. He was taken aback to see the vastness and beauty of the lake.

Vembanad Lake

Both watched the serene lake and a few houseboats moving before capturing the beauty in the camera.

Our room in Kumarakom was a fabulous private cottage. From the wonderful location overlooking the backwaters, clean and spacious room, good cuisine, cheery, polite and attentive staff made the stay most memorable one.

The cottage was meant for club members and was not given for outsiders.

old motor boats

There were few old motor boats anchored in the cottage.

water hyacinth (water lilies)

Water lilies completely covered the surface and we were unable to see the depth of the lake near the cottage.

The vast lake behind me

I was badly in need of drinking water and I remembered how sweet our Cauvery water is and I missed it there. The water didn’t taste good and I was feeling thirsty not for any water, but for our water! No other go, I asked the staff if I could get a tender coconut (red one in particular) and the person got me not one but two. It tasted so delicious that I felt like taking the other with me for the boat journey, but I didn’t.

The houseboat waiting for us near the cottage

Rajeshattan told us that Kumarakom was practically unknown till Henry Baker purchased the land from the erstwhile Raja of Travancore to build himself a grand home.

Kottayam Kunjachan, named after a Malayalam flick

When they left India, Taj hotels stepped in to turn it into a fancy resort, changing the fortunes of the once quiet fishing hamlet. But today, it is a maze of modern resorts and heritage homes-cum-hotels spilling over the island banks.

Our houseboat coming near the cottage

The houseboat came near the cottage around 9.30 am and round 10.30 am, we embarked on a voyage of dreams in our exquisitely built houseboat. Traditionally, houseboat was called Kettuvallam, which means a boat made by tying together pieces of wood. Unbelievable as it may sound, not a single nail is used in the making of a Kettuvallam. Jack wood planks are joined together with coir rope and then coated with black resin made from boiled cashewnut shell oil, which acts as a protective coating. The roof is made of bamboo poles and palm leaves. A houseboat will be about 60 to 70 feet in length and a width of around 15 feet in the middle.

Our houseboat had well furnished and bath attached three bedrooms, sun bath-deck, lounge-cum-dining room and a kitchen. The boat had modern facilities like air condition, electric lights, fans, European style bathrooms and showers in all the three rooms.

The boat looked like a mini-palace gliding along the vast green expanse of backwaters, the most exciting spectacle of the world. The simple joys of life amidst the delicate embrace of mists, was enhanced by the pleasant harmony of singing birds. Green stretches of paddy fields surrounded the rustic charm of tiny islands fringed with long rows of swaying coconut trees, as time seemed to stand still while we drifted along.

Rajeshattan, Viji and me on the upper deck

The boat was very spacious and had lot of moving space. The view of the lake from the Sundeck (upper deck) was most spectacular.

Music, dance and jokes by Anglo-Indian friends made the journey more interesting and lively (??!!).

Two experienced boatmen navigated us through the tranquil stretches of the backwaters.

steering the boat

All enjoyed the meals — lunch (avial, thoran, white rice, taravu, fish curry and pappadam), evening snacks (palampuri, I might be spelling it wrong, as Malayalis pronounce it with a nasal sound!), and dinner (rice, sambar, chapati, upperi and pappadam), breakfast (Idli and sambar). Rajeshattan had informed the cook that we need white rice ad not Kerala boiled rice. The food was served on time and we found the quantity to be adequate.

Vij and others, being sea food lovers enjoyed fish delicacies, as the fresh catch from the backwaters went directly from the waters to the kitchen for frying!

What more, the boat stopped near a toddy shop in an island and everybody enjoyed the drink while children kept themselves busy catching small fish in the lake.

A fisherman transporting sea muscles in his canoe

Fishermen not only catch fish in the Vembanad Lake but also small muscles, one of the dietary staples of backwater dwellers, that grow in the bottom of the lake. Fishermen take shells generated by muscles and sell it to factories.

Factories mix the shells with carbon, bake in fire till they turn white and hose with water. The chemical reaction turns them into calcium hydroxide powder.

Lying down on the bed and seeing the sprawling backwaters from the bedroom window made it a perfect holiday!
They docked the boat in the evening and it was already getting dark and my plan of going on a canoe cruise through narrow backwater channels went for a toss. Vij didn’t miss a chance to steer the houseboat when it was anchored!

Vij steering the boat

Eldho and his wife Sheela joined us in the evening to spend night on the houseboat. It was time to bid adieu to others, and one group went to Munnar and the other to a religious visit.

Anglo-Indian group

We went to a small church overlooking the lake and sat on the compound of it and had a quick chat. The chat revolved around Christian beliefs and miracles.

The three men had their own time, pulling each other’s legs and we three women shared our thoughts. Eldho’s wife explained us about the working condition in Thuraif, about people, shopping and other related things.

In the meanwhile, we decided to watch a movie and caught few scenes from Mammooty’s latest flick, where his mother’s role was played by Usha Utthappa. While we were busy watching the film, Rajeshattan was busy swimming in the backwaters. He shouted from there that the water was not deep and if he stands it is coming to his shoulder level. Some parts in the lake are not deep and are shallow and fishermen take shells from such places.

During Onam festival, the lake becomes alive with boat races.

The Kerala Backwaters is a chain of brackish lagoons and lakes lying parallel to the Arabian Sea coast known as the Malabar coast. The network includes five large lakes, including Ashtamudi Kayal and Vembanad Kayal, linked by 1,500 km of canals, both man-made and natural, fed by 38 rivers, and extending virtually the entire length of the state.
Backwaters were formed by the action of waves and shore currents creating low barrier islands across the mouths of many rivers flowing down from the Western Ghats. Vembanad Lake is the largest of the lakes, covering an area of 200 sq km. It borders Alappuzha (Alleppey), Kottayam, and Ernakulam districts. The port of Kochi is located at the lake’s outlet to the Arabian Sea.

On Tuesday morning we bid adieu to our houseboat. We visited the house of Rajeshattan to meet his mother before leaving for Kochi.

Vij and I were eager to meet see Suhana, his close friend Amar’s daughter. It had been so long since we met Amar and his wife Deepa. Eldho dropped us to Amar’s house around 2.30-3 pm.