vitamins minerals, nutritional supplements I am going to work very hard this weekend to keep up the routine of vitamins minerals and antioxidants amidst all the Independence Day grilling. There are some plump, tasty looking apple sausages sitting in my refrigerator who can’t wait to hit the hot iron grill on Saturday. BBQing is as American this weekend as the thousands of firework shows set to blast off Saturday night. I love grilled meats, vegetables, and all that. Before taking a nutrition class, I thought grilled vegetables had all of the vitamins minerals and good stuff found in their refrigerated brothers. Not the case. Grilling vegetables, I learned, zaps many of the nutrients out of them. It doesn’t mean veggies aren’t going be served with grill marks this weekend, for me it means combating that loss in vitamins minerals and antioxidants with nutritional supplements.

Word to the wise, when making vegetable laden kabobs, be sure to soak the wooden skewers for 30 to 45 minutes. Last week, in a hurry because of a grumbling stomach I soaked some wooden skewers for like 15 minutes before loading them up with fresh chicken, green peppers, onions and red peppers. Coming to check on them after letting them grill for five minutes, I saw a bunch of smoke coming out of the grill. I opened the lid everything was on fire, charred to a crisp and trashed.