IntroEvery day you’re bombarded by people telling you to eat “healthy.” Many people want to eat healthier these days, but without a little knowledge about what “healthy” actually is, it’s easy to be taken in by some high-priced ad campaign designed to sell you the latest meal in a box. If you’re ready to start eating a healthier diet, you need to start by understanding a few of the basics of what you’re putting in your body.
Healthy food choices
There’s so much confusing information out there about what a “healthy” diet actually is, but in reality, it’s not rocket science. You only need to know a few things to be able to make intelligent choices. First, your diet should include a generous amount of lean protein. Proteins are the building blocks of the body and are responsible for the growth of almost every cell in the body, including muscles, bones and organs. Chicken, turkey, fish, lean beef, buffalo, and eggs are a few examples of excellent protein sources. Second, your diet should include carbohydrates (carbs) that are mostly low in sugar (with the exception of fruit – you need fruit in your diet!) and low in starch. Carbs are your body’s primary energy source. Whole grain breads and pastas, red potatoes, vegetables and fruits are examples of healthy carb sources. Finally, your diet should include healthy fats. Fats are responsible for moving nutrients throughout your body. Healthy fats include nuts and nut butters, natural oils, eggs and fish. You’ve probably noticed that everything I’ve mentioned so far is unpackaged, unprocessed food. Keep reading, we’ll get to that.
How much is the right amount?
Even though it’s pretty simple to understand what to eat, it’s more challenging to understand how much to eat. Instead of handing you a diet and expecting you to follow it, it’s better to learn what to aim for. Since you’re just starting out, aim for a pretty simple diet; 30% protein, 40% carbs and 30% fat. Check out the calculator in Eating more for weight loss to help understand how many calories you should aim for when starting out. Also check out Fitday to help count your calories and ratios; it’s much easier than the manual method!
What isn’t healthy
By now, you’re probably starting to wonder where all of your favorite packaged foods fit into your new lifestyle. The good news is some of them can come along; the bad news is some of your favorites won’t be making the trip.
The multi-billion dollar food industry will try to pass off almost anything as “healthy” to get you to part with your hard-earned cash. Think of it this way; if they need a multi-million dollar ad campaign to convince you something is healthy, you might want to take a closer look at that ingredient list. That’s where you’ll REALLY find out what you’re going to put in your body. Most of these so-called “healthy” foods are loaded with chemicals!
The worst offender in most packaged foods is a seemingly unavoidable ingredient called Partially Hydrogenated Vegetable Oil. Once you figure out how to pronounce it, it doesn’t sound too horrible, right? Well, sounds can be deceiving. Partially Hydrogenated Vegetable Oil is actually vegetable oil that has been chemically altered from a liquid into a semi-solid fat! Are you getting a bit more concerned? In reality, when consumed in excess, Partially Hydrogenated Vegetable Oil has a host of negative effects on the body (see Fat doesn’t make you fat for more detail). There’s one very simple rule for reading ingredient lists; if you can’t pronounce it (magnesium tocopherol and thiamin mononitrate? Come on…), limit your intake of that food!
Another common labeling trick is to disguise sugar as something else. Most people that have developed an interest in fitness have learned that loading up on the sugar is a sure way to make the scale go up, not down! If the first thing printed on the label is sugar, that product isn’t going to fly off the shelves. But what if it sounds a lot more innocent? The most common “alias” for sugar these days is High Fructose Corn Syrup. Don’t be fooled! Sugar by any other name tastes just as sweet, and has the same negative effects on the body. But how about when it’s further down the list? That means there’s not as much of it in there, right? Maybe. Take a closer look. A lot of food labels these days use many different “types” of sugar in order to be able to push it further down the list. Oftentimes, you’ll get down the list and see “sugar, high fructose corn syrup, dextrose, sucrose and corn syrup solids.” Each and every one of these is sugar! Ingredients 6-10 just became ingredient #1.
But not all packaged foods are terrible. There are a few simple rules that will help you make healthier choices. First, look for a short ingredient list. Most unhealthy chemicals bring a lot of friends with them. If you see a label with 5 or less ingredients, you can be relatively certain that you’re eating food instead of chemicals. Second, look for the words “certified USDA organic” or “eco-farmed.” While neither are a guarantee of health, both can help you avoid a lot of problems. Summary
It’s a lot of information to digest, but keep at it! Once you start eating a healthy diet, you’ll never want to drop back into old habits.
Copyright ©2009 AskJoeFitness.com