Being a healthy eater requires you to become both educated and smart about what healthy eating actually is. Being food smart isn’t about learning to calculate grams of fat, or it is about studying labels and counting calories. It is important that we know what is good for health and to know how much to consume to become a healthy eater. So, the question is ‘are you still trying to become a healthy eater? If yes, then read further.
To eat healthy and stay healthy you have to consider the few points discussed below.
Know your body type
It is fact that individual person has a very unique calorie intake capacity and digestion rate. Those capacities and rates do vary to some extent with the physical activity level of the person and also on the genetics of the person. So, it is utmost important that we understand our body type. You must know if you feel hungry frequently (within 4hours) after having your meal, or you do not feel hungry at all or you feel hungry after a prolonged period like 6 – 8 hours after having a meal.
Food types and its effect
Healthy eating is all about balanced and moderate eating, consisting of healthy meals at least three times per day. Healthy eaters eat many different types of foods, not limiting themselves to one specific food type or food group. Carbohydrates, protein and fat are three types of nutrients that our body requires on a daily basis. By keeping a balanced amount of those three-nutrition intake one can achieve a healthy body and lifestyle.
Eating healthily requires quite a bit of leeway. You might eat too much or not enough, consume foods that are sometimes more or less nutritious. However, you should always fuel your body and your brain regularly with enough food to keep both your mind and body strong and alert.
Quantity and quality
Simple carbohydrates like rice, pasta, sugar, wheat take comparatively less time to get digested and absorbed. Protein on the other hand takes longer than carbohydrates to get broken down into simple absorbable form and then comes the fat. One important thing we must remember is that if the amount of carbohydrates and protein fulfills the energy requirement of your body then fat generally gets absorbed and stored for the future. So, the amount of nutrition types that constitute your meal is actually responsible for unwanted obesity.
Advice
Inspect your food plate visually to find a balance among all types. make sure it is not mainly carbohydrates, or fat or protein. If four hours after your lunch you feel hungry but your trouser waist doesn’t feel loose but rather tight, then you should cut down on simple carbohydrates. Your food habit simply indicates that your carbohydrate intake both by nature (simple and more in amount than required) gets converted into fat before it is used. It can also be said that maybe you weren’t hungry at all during your lunchtime because you had a heavy breakfast. So, follow simple rules, eat when you feel hungry, eat in small amounts if you know your next meal is scheduled at a certain time. let your body feel the need for food.
How to choose your food
I will discuss a few simple tips that are useful to decide what to eat and what not to. First thing first, breakfast.
Breakfast
The term itself explains it means breaking the fast. So, it is good if you eat handsomely for breakfast. A healthy breakfast menu should include fruit, bread or pasta or pancakes, egg or bacon or sausages. All together it will satisfy your carbohydrate, protein and fat requirements in the morning.
Lunch
Then comes the challenge, whether you should eat your lunch and if yes, then when and how much? This point is already discussed above in the Advice section.
Dinner/supper
Simple again, eat when you feel hungry. mostly in the western countries dinner time is considered from 6:30pm to 8pm and in India or other Asian countries it is 9pm onwards, however these all timing does differ and depends on one’s provision and will. in western countries they eat dinner earlier than that of the Asians so in west they can have the option called supper, which is absent in Asia where dinner the last meal of the day.
A healthy eater is a good problem solver. Healthy eaters have learned to take care of themselves and their eating with sound judgement and making wise decisions. Healthy eaters are always aware of what they eat, and know the effect that it will have on their bodies.
When someone is unable to take control of their eating, they are also likely to get out of control with other aspects of life as well. They could end up spending too much, talking too much, even going to bed later and later.
You should always remember that restricting food in any way is always a bad thing. Healthy eating is a way of life, something that you can do to enhance your body or your lifestyle. If you’ve thought about making your life better, healthy eating is just the place to start. You’ll make life easier for yourself, those around you, and even your family.
In our country majority of people do not pay attention to their diet. They prefer spicy foods which cause damage to their health l.
Yes, you are right. Asians prioritise taste and flavours over health.