What does it really mean to eat healthily? The question can seem like a riddle because there are so many different opinions depending on which nutritional counselors or therapists you listen to. But eating healthy might best be defined as “eating sensibly,” because the basic principles of eating healthy just make good sense.
Tips for developing healthy eating habits include eating a variety of nutritious foods and drinks and consuming the correct number of calories that are right for you – not eating too much or too little.
We’d love to tell you we only eat healthy foods at iuzeit, but since we also say we’ll be transparent with you, we have to admit sometimes our eating habits resemble those of an eight-year-old with no parental supervision. So, we can learn about the benefits of eating healthy together.
Eating Healthy: Calories
Any conversation about healthy eating habits has to begin by talking about calories– those little units of edible energy that our body digests and burns as fuel.
The number of calories you should consume is based on your height, weight, activity level, and medical history. The amount we should take in each day is different for each person.
A rough estimate of calorie intake, based on age, gender, and activity shows that a moderately active female between age 19 and 50 should eat 2,000 to 2,200 calories per day. A moderately active male in the same age bracket should eat 2,600 to 2,800 calories per day. If very active, the calorie intake increases. If older, it decreases.
Unfortunately, a lot of the tasty dishes we all love may blow past the maximum recommended daily calorie intake in just one meal. We’re looking at your microwave, frozen meals.
Worse yet, those favorite foods are often full of “empty calories,” meaning they’re low in nutrients and high in fats. Instead of getting burned as fuel, those calories collect in our bellies and arteries where they expand our waistline and raise our blood pressure.
To get more out of your daily calorie allotment and leave the table feeling full and satisfied, consider a good balance from the following healthy food that provide essential vitamins such as A, C, and D, and beneficial minerals including potassium, zinc, calcium, and magnesium.
Healthy Eating: The Right Nutrients
These nutritional foods also provide the fiber that helps keep arteries and colons clean by sweeping out residual elements that the body doesn’t need.
- Vegetables including spinach carrots, broccoli, garlic, brussels sprouts, kale, green peas, swiss chard, ginger, asparagus, red cabbage, sweet potatoes, and collard greens.
- Fruits including grapefruit, pineapple, avocado, blueberries, apples, pomegranate, mango, strawberries, cranberries, lemons, durian, watermelon, olives, blackberries, oranges, bananas, grapes, guava, papaya, and cherries.
- Whole grains found in oat and buckwheat cereals, wheat-based pastas and baked goods, and baked goods made with rye flour or buckwheat, quinoa, brown rice, corn including popcorn if you lay off the fats, salts, and artificial flavors.
- Low-fat or fat-free dairy products including skim and low or reduced-fat milk, yogurt, hard cheeses like cheddar or Swiss, soft cheeses like ricotta or cottage, puddings, and some ice creams.
- Proteins including seafood, lean meats and poultry, eggs, beans, peas, nuts, seeds, and soy products.
Gluten-free products are becoming popular and are more common in stores, as are dairy alternatives like almond milk and oat milk.
We have still not figured out how a farmer milks an almond or an oat.
The benefit of gluten-free foods and dairy alternatives is that they are less likely to cause inflammation in the gut and bowels, a problem for many people.
A good rule of thumb to buying healthy food at a grocery store is to stay on the perimeter of the store and stay away from the boxed and heavily processed packaged foods normally stocked in the middle aisles.
Eating Healthy: Reading Nutritional Labels
Get in the habit of reading the nutritional label on the foods you buy. Specifically look at the amount of fat, sodium, and sugar. Also, if you can’t pronounce the name of the ingredients, put the package down and walk away.
You can torpedo the health benefits of these nutritional foods depending on how you prepare them, and what you pair with them. If you buy fresh vegetables and then sauté them in loads of butter, you just eliminate the health benefits.
Try to stay away from or at least limit extra salt, sugars, and saturated fats.
Most of the salt we consume comes from the packaged foods we bring home or meals we eat at restaurants. So, taste before you shake more salt on a meal.
Buy food and order meals that are low in salt. Read the nutrition labels on the packages or check the menu for healthy choices. More and more eateries are spotlighting “heart-healthy” selections on their menus, listing nutritional values along with ingredients.
The Sweet Poison
The story on sugar is much the same. While you’re putting sugar in your coffee or tea, food makers are adding syrups and sweeteners to a lot of what we eat.
Sodas, yogurt, and cereals are easy targets, but so are our favorite condiments such as BBQ sauce, ketchup, salsa, some steak sauces, teriyaki sauce, sweet relish, soy sauce, most salad dressings . . . you get the idea. Slather a cut of lean meat with your favorite sauce and you’ve not eaten so healthy after all.
And, of course, we hear a lot about saturated fats. Just the name sounds gross, doesn’t it?
These are the fats that our bodies store rather than burn right away. Some of our favorite foods — especially animal products like cheese, fatty meats and poultry, whole milk, butter, and many sweets and snack foods — are chock full of saturated fats.
Then there’s refined grains and starches in cookies, white bread, and many snack foods. They digest quickly, triggering spikes in our blood sugar, which sends out the insulin to clean us up and then we feel hungry and crave more. Meanwhile, mood and energy can crash while our waistline expands like the government’s budget deficit.
Life doesn’t have to be this way.
One of the biggest benefits of eating healthy is that it can improve your life and even extend it. You’ll feel better, have more energy to do the things you want to do, sleep better at night, and wake up more rested and ready to take on another day.
Bottom line
If you eat healthily, you’ll have a better chance of having more days to enjoy.
Next post, we discuss the difference between healthy eating habits and fad diets. Most nutrition counselors and science say eating healthy needs to be a lifestyle change.
