lifestyle

You might not have given much thought in the past to the notion of eating ‘seasonally’ – in other words, eating certain foods at the times of year when they are actually grown. After all, you’re probably used to walking down your local supermarket’s veggie aisle during any season, and seeing no shortage of varied produce from around the globe.... Read More

This ultimate breakfast smoothie is a triple threat as it's filling, nutritious and oh so tasty. It's great to take with you to have on the go or to enjoy at home whilst getting ready for your day. Not to mention, this smoothie is packed with fibre so it will have your gut thanking you! Ingredients:  1 medium frozen banana... Read More

This fibre-filled barley salad will have your gut feeling great. The soluble fibre found in barley has also shown to lower glucose and cholesterol levels in the blood. And not only does this barley salad have an amazing range of nutritional benefits but it tastes great and is super filling too.  Ingredients: ½ Butternut squash, diced into large cubes 150g... Read More

There is nothing more soothing than a hearty chicken soup. This chicken soup is especially special because it is packed with 6 different kinds of vegetables and has barley which is a high fibre food. Fibre and gut health go hand in hand so for a healthy gut, why not try this soup throughout your week? Read More

With the weather getting warmer, it’s definitely time for salads to shine. This epic side salad recipe goes so well with soups, pasta or to serve at your next picnic in the park! Packed with lots of vegetables and good fats this side salad is super tasty too.  Ingredients:  A handful of spinach leaves  A handful of rocket leaves 6... Read More

If you suffer from back pain, you are in good company – around one in three people do so every year, according to Dr Tom Charlton, a former Clinical Fellow at the healthcare group Bupa UK. However, that statistic may be of little comfort to you if your anguish over your back pain keeps you awake night after night. Fortunately,... Read More

Although 71% of our planet is covered in water, only 3% of that water is freshwater and only 0.5% of that is available for drinking; the remaining 2.5% is locked in ice caps, glaciers, the atmosphere, or under the earth’s surface, or is too polluted for consumption. The number of people on Earth is constantly increasing, but the water supply... Read More

The fight to save the planet starts, quite literally, at home. You don’t strictly have to make dramatic, sweeping changes, either. It’s often perfectly possible to complete many of your routine responsibilities, from sourcing food to cleaning around the house, in a more eco-friendly fashion. So, let’s look at some of the ways you can do exactly that. Grow your... Read More

Pretty much everyone experiences a stuffy nose – usually referred to in more formal contexts as ‘nasal congestion’ – from time to time. It’s easy to dismiss the cause as a simple case of the cold or flu – but did you know that this common everyday symptom can actually have many more causes? Indeed, the below are just seven... Read More

By now, you’d have practically needed to have been living on Mars since early 2020 to not know the various frequent mantras of how to lower your risk of COVID-19: wash your hands frequently, wear a face covering when near others, maintain social distancing... you get the idea. Another thing that many people around the UK and the wider world... Read More

A message from our Founder, Sunna van Kampen. Your immune system is your body’s strongest weapon. It is what works tirelessly, day after day, week after week, and month after month quietly in the background, keeping you healthy from viruses, bacteria and germs. It was my neglected immune system that meant I was getting 3-4 colds a winter, and which... Read More

Stress, of course, is an unavoidable part of all of our lives. We all face challenging and even chaotic situations from time to time – ranging from those tight work deadlines and worries about finances, to personal-life dramas and even acute medical emergencies. It is at such stressful moments that our body’s “fight or flight mode” is often activated to... Read More

Zinc is essential to sustain a functioning immune system by regulating the elimination of pathogens. Zinc is also responsible for the production and activation of certain immune system cells such as neutrophils and natural killer cells. Researchers showed (2019, Read, et al.) that zinc has vital role in anti-viral immunity. They showed that zinc inhibits something called RNA polymerase which is required by viruses to replicate, therefore... Read More

 Vitamin C may well be our favourite vitamin, especially when it comes to immune health. Here are some of the many ways in which vitamin C contributes to the optimal functioning of the immune system: By stimulating the production of white blood cells, which are crucial for fighting off infections By supporting the skin (epithelial cell) as a barrier, preventing pathogens from entering the... Read More

Vitamin D is essential for a functional immune system by activating anti-inflammatory and immunoregulatory properties, so we're doing all we can to make sure we get enough of it. Some of the of the other benefits of vitamin D include regulating the body's levels of calcium and phosphate, which are essential if we want healthy bones, teeth, and muscles. A recent study (2020, Kara,... Read More

The feeling of a stuffy congested nose is simply the effects of your immune response. When you get a cold, your nose, sinuses and throat will be infected with virus cells that trigger a flood of white blood cells to the areas and the dilation of blood vessels means that more white blood cells can travel to the affected area. Pure effectiveness if you ask us! White... Read More

It’s been a long time since striving to live in a more environmentally-friendly way was simply the preserve of ‘eco warriors’! Today, more and more of us are becoming aware of the needless damage caused to our planet by manmade factors. And for 2021, you might have decided to do something about it. In fact, according to a recent poll,... Read More

It seems that every January, many millions of us make the same vow, that this will be the year when we finally fully embrace that exercise routine, shed the pounds and tone up, all the way to the physique (and mental wellbeing) we’ve always wanted. Yet, every year, many people setting a more active lifestyle and better fitness as their... Read More

It’s well-known that the skin is the body’s biggest organ – and of course, it’s also the most visible. Unsurprisingly, then, the skin is one of the first places where signs are often seen of what may be more serious underlying health problems – or even just the need to alter one’s lifestyle. Whether it’s the cosmetic effects of certain... Read More

‘Blue Monday’ is used to refer to what is apparently the ‘most depressing day of the year.’ This day usually falls on the third Monday in January, which means today will apparently be the most depressing day of 2021! While on the one hand this might seem like good news, in that at least we’ll soon have the worst of... Read More

When stepping outside on a cold winter morning or on a snowy day, the air often has a particular smell that is difficult to put into words. What most people don’t realise is that there are a few factors that play a part in the ‘smell of winter’ that range from physical factors and psychological factors.     It’s not that there are less smells in winter, the odour particles move less.  In... Read More

We’re arguably often guilty of failing to pay as much attention to our hormone health as we should. After all, your body secretes around 50 hormones, which – together – profoundly impact on some of the body’s most crucial functions, ranging from mood and appetite to sexual activity and heart muscle contraction. To maintain the very best physical, mental and... Read More

As you may already have guessed, here at Tonic, we’re of the opinion that making sure your immune system can perform at its best should always be a priority. And given that we’re in the middle of cold and flu season and since COVID-19 unfortunately doesn’t seem to be going anywhere anytime soon, you may have decided that 2021 is... Read More

As a supplement, GABA has long been the subject of a lot of confusion. That’s probably partly due to it being not only a supplement capable of ingestion, but also a chemical produced within the body. And while those two things are also true of melatonin, GABA is nothing like as well-known. GABA is important to the body in terms... Read More

And now, for the show-stopper we've all been waiting for: the Tonic Jelly Trifle! Our final Christmas Immunity recipe contains the ever-nutritious elderberry as well as some trusty Elderberry & Blackcurrant flavour high-dose immunity sachets so you can have your (immune-friendly) trifle and eat it too!   Recipe for the Tonic Jelly Trifle  Serves: 10 Ingredients:  600g frozen summer berries (raspberries, blackberries,... Read More

Now onto dessert! Everyone loves a good gingerbread biscuit, but since sugar's not great for the immune system, we've given this quintessential Christmas treat an immune-friendly upgrade by swapping out the sugar for sweetener.    Recipe for Sugar-Free Gingerbread Men Makes 30 Ingredients: 110g butter, softened 4 tbsp sweetener of choice or more, to your taste 1 egg 200g almond flour 4... Read More

Delicious inside a turkey or by itself, this nut stuffing is a great way to get some healthy fats, protein, and fibre.    Recipe for Nut Stuffing Serves: 6 Ingredients 1 tbsp avocado or olive oil 1 medium onion, chopped 350g unsweetened chestnut puree  50g pine nuts, toasted 50g cashews, chopped 50g sultanas, soaked in concentrated vegetable stock for 3+ hours 2... Read More

We love vegetables for their vitamin content and honey for its many health properties; so why not combine them! These honey-glazed carrots & parsnips are definitely one of Team Tonic's favourite dishes, and not just at Christmas!    Recipe for Honey-Glazed Carrots & Parsnips Serves: 8 Ingredients: 250g parsnips 250g carrots 2 tbsp flour 2 tbsp honey 3 tbsp avocado... Read More

Love 'em or hate 'em, Brussels sprouts are a Christmas dinner staple - and a very healthy one at that! If you haven't been a fan of sprouts before, we recommend you try this tasty (and immune-friendly!) upgrade and see if it changes your mind.    Recipe for Garlic & Chilli Brussels Sprouts  Serves: 6 Ingredients: 600g Brussels sprouts, trimmed at the... Read More

Next up on the menu of Tonic's 7 Days of Christmas Immunity Recipes is a Christmas dinner essential: cranberry sauce! This time we've added our all-time favourite berry to maximise the antioxidant content of this side-dish.    Recipe for Tonic's Cranberry-Elderberry Sauce Serves: 6 Ingredients:  100g light brown sugar 100ml fresh orange juice 1 sachet of Tonic Elderberry & Blackcurrant... Read More

Hot toddies are the perfect drink to have before bed-time in the winter when it's cold or wet outside and you want something warm and soothing to help you get to sleep. Hot toddies have also traditionally been used to relieve cold and flu symptoms, though we can't comment on how effective they actually are. Normally at the sign of a cold we'd... Read More

It’s not so long ago that the mere notion of the mind being intimately connected to the body might have been met with ridicule from certain quarters. Indeed, it was only as recently as the 1980s that the first rigorous research was undertaken into the link between stress and immunity in humans. But with our own recent survey of more... Read More

A restful sleep, night after night; it’s one of those things that we all aspire to, but which alarmingly few of us have actually been enjoying consistently, especially since the start of the UK’s first COVID-19-enforced lockdown in the spring. That’s according to the results of a King’s College London and Ipsos MORI study conducted in May, which discovered that... Read More

he flowering plant known as ginger is a familiar part of many of our diets – indeed, Chinese medicine has backed its use for the prevention and cure of all manner of health problems for more than two millennia. So, what are just some of the curious facts about ginger that help to show why this flexible ingredient has persisted... Read More

This year has presented us with quite a few new habits to get used to; more diligent hand-washing (although we’d hope you were doing that one before!), social distancing, and – of course – the wearing of face coverings in confined spaces to help protect others from COVID-19’s spread. But that still leaves all of the other health-supporting habits you... Read More

Sleep, something we all know and love on a lazy Sunday morning, but throughout the week tend to cut back on in order to fit more into our already busy lives. But do you know the impact on your health of just one bad night’s sleep? Why is sleep critical for your immune system? And how are they intrinsically linked?... Read More

Difficulties with getting to sleep are among the most prevalent health and wellness issues of our age; it is thought that about a third of Britons will suffer from insomnia at some point in their lives. It is unsurprising, then, that any remedies supposedly helping to tackle sleeplessness attract considerable attention – and one of those is valerian root. What... Read More

Frequently referred to as the body’s “happy” or “feel-good” chemical, serotonin actually has a broad range of roles beyond its contribution to wellbeing and happiness. Serotonin is certainly key to mood regulation, with normal levels of this neurotransmitter or hormone helping to ensure you remain happy, calm, focused and emotionally stable. But it would also be selling serotonin short to... Read More

What we eat and drink in the day has a huge effect on how well we sleep. Unfortunately for many of us we get into a bit of a catch 22. The biggest reason for insomnia is stress… And here lies the Catch 22:   the more stressed we are, the worse we sleep, and the worse we sleep, the... Read More

Wouldn’t it be amazing if there was just one “magic formula” in life that made everything a bit better? By this, we mean one thing that we could turn to time and time again, in the knowledge that it would help to increase our happiness, energy, self-esteem, pleasure, and even lifespan.  Well, there is seemingly such a thing, and it’s... Read More

The fresh focus that the coronavirus pandemic has thrown on the vital importance of our immune systems may have already prompted you to make certain changes to your lifestyle to help to improve your body’s ability to fend off infection and disease. Some such alterations that one could make – including adopting a steady exercise regime and boosting consumption of... Read More

The old trope of the ‘night owl’ versus the ‘lark’ is a persistent one, partly because it is rooted in a degree of truth. After all, we all have different circadian rhythms, which are our natural sleep and wake cycles that largely determine the times of day when we feel most awake and alert. For ‘night owls’ – that is,... Read More

Given that it has been one of the most historically acclaimed diets since the 1960s, it is especially striking that the oft-cited “Mediterranean diet” isn’t really a diet at all, at least in the sense of comprising a single set of agreed-upon rules and restrictions. And clearly, it isn’t a ‘here today, gone tomorrow’ trend. What it essentially is, is... Read More

Maybe it’s having a French wife that draws me irresistibly to a glass or two of a great, rich, lip-smacking red wine. But when I read how it can also help maintain your immune system, things just couldn’t get much better.  Like most of us in the current context, I’m  more conscious than ever of staying healthy. When I feel my body needs... Read More

The reason why stress affects us so much is that our body really hasn’t changed much in 60,000 years. Cortisol is a stress hormone produced in the adrenal glands (little glands that sit on top of the kidneys) which are hard wired to the body’s ‘fight or flight’ survival response. 60,000 years ago this would’ve been essential to either fight... Read More

If you’re currently preparing to embark on university study for the first time or to return after the summer break, you’re likely to be feeling enough trepidation and strain without your health being an additional cause for concern. The coronavirus pandemic, of course, has put an even more perilous complexion on the matter of how to avoid falling ill due... Read More

On average we go on four diets a year. And as soon as we come off them we put the weight back on. There are lots of reasons why we don’t lose weight and the outdated model of calories + exercise = weight loss often doesn’t work in the long term. Low thyroid function, stress, the wrong type of training,... Read More

These are tricky times when it comes to day-to-day risk management. While lockdown restrictions may have loosened as COVID-19 case numbers fall in many parts of the world – including the green light being given to international travel once more – the pandemic is most definitely not “gone”. So, whether you’re eager to make the most of your summer by... Read More

Ask almost any pet owner, and they’ll tell you that owning and looking after their beloved dog, cat or other furry or feathered friend has definitely been good for their health. However, a lot of the discussion about how beneficial our pets are for our health has long revolved around how their affectionateness after a long and difficult day supports... Read More

The immune system has a vital role: It protects your body from harmful substances, germs and cell changes. It is made up of various organs, cells and proteins. But ever the unsung hero, we don't ever notice it as long as the immune system is running smoothly. Like all things in our body, the immune system can benefit from a bit of TLC now... Read More