Habits For Healthy Eating

Healthy eating habits are still possible when you are always on the go. Here are some tips that are good for you to know:

1. Always eat a good breakfast. When there is no time to sit down and enjoy your morning meal, grab a bagel, a piece of fruit, and some juice.

2. If you must eat fast-food, make wise choices. For example, choose pizza with half the amount of cheese, a regular size roastbeef sandwich, baked potato, or green salad with reduced calorie dressing. Limit high-fat items like french fries, fried chicken or fish sandwiches and be careful of salad dressing.

3. Keep healthy snacks at hand in case hunger strikes. Healthy snacks include fresh or dried fruit, pretzels, un-buttered popcorn, rice cakes or whole wheat crackers. Also consider raw vegetables with low fat yogurt or cottage cheese dip.

4. Eat plenty of foods which are rich in calcium. If you do not like milk, try to include ample amounts of low fat yogurt, low fat cheese, and green leafy vegetables in your diet.

5. If you need to lose weight, try to do it sensibly. Starvation and/or diets that offer a quick fix usually backfire and are more harmful than anything else. There’s no truth to the theories that suggest that eating foods in any particular combination will promote weight loss. The only safe way to lose weight, feel good while doing it, and keep it off is to eat a healthy, balanced diet.

6. Sugar provides calories to your diet but few other nutrients. It also contributes significantly to tooth decay. Use it sparingly and consider sweetening coffee, tea, cereal and fruit with artificial sweeteners instead.

7. The salad bar can be either an asset or a detriment to your diet depending on how you choose from it. Of course, leafy greens, raw vegetable and fresh fruit are beneficial to you. But if you choose lots of creamy dressing, bacon bits, and mayonnaise based salads, the calories and fat may equal or even exceed those of a hamburger and fries. Try dipping your salad instead.

8. If you drink alcohol, bear in mind that it supplies calories but no real nutritional value. A light beer, a glass of wine, or an ounce of liquor have each about 100 calories. Furthermore, there are also many health problems associated with drinking alcohol.

9. Try to drink lots of water. Your body needs at least eight glasses of water a day, and if you exercise vigorously, you may even need more. To remind yourself, carry a water bottle along with you and keep it handy.

10. Remember, food is a lot more than just nourishment for our bodies. Enjoy it and savour it.

 


John Rifkind is a contributing editor at FitnessHealthArticles.com. This article may be reproduced provided that its complete content, links and author byline are kept intact and unchanged. No additional links permitted. Hyperlinks and/or URLs must remain both human clickable and search engine spiderable.

Facts On Fast Food Nutrition

Fast food is a convenient and fun way of eating. But can it be healthy eating?

Are too many ‘Happy Meals’ one of the reasons more kids today are overweight?

The increase in families substituting a family meal with a trip to McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s, etc. is very likely one of the causes for the increase in overweight kids, but it’s not the only cause. Other factors also play a role, including an increased time watching TV and playing video games and a decreased time in physical activity as well as unhealthy food choices.

The choice you make when eating fast food can also determine how healthy or ‘unhealthy’ it will be.

How can you make fast food healthier?

One of the easiest ways to make fast food healthier is to be careful of your portion sizes and understand how many calories and how much fat you add to a meal when you ‘super-size’ your order. It might seem like better ‘value’ to go with the special or large meal sizes, but you must also think about what the extra calories will cost you later as your child tries to burn them off in order to lose weight.

Healthier Eating Choices

Further to choosing smaller portion sizes, checking the menus at your favorite fast food restaurants will likely help you to find other low calorie, low fat alternatives to traditional fast foods which are really healthy. This could include a salad, baked potato, or grilled chicken salad.

With other sorts of fast food, such as pizza, choose a thin crust cheese pizza and try to avoid adding lots of cheese or extra meat toppings.

It can also help your child to be healthier if you avoid ‘fast food’ at more traditional restaurants that you visit. It unfortunately seems like almost every restaurant, whether Italian, Chinese, Mexican, etc. has a kids’ menu with high fat and high calorie foods, like chicken nuggets, french fries, etc.

Instead of always relying on the kid’s menu, why not consider getting a half order or child plate of a more traditional and healthier item at the same restaurant?

 


John Rifkind is a contributing editor at FitnessHealthArticles.com. This article may be reproduced provided that its complete content, links and author byline are kept intact and unchanged. No additional links permitted. Hyperlinks and/or URLs must remain both human clickable and search engine spiderable.