Chapter 4 Vol 3
The Healthy Eating Guidelines

The shape of the Food Pyramid immediately suggests the type and amount of food to be eaten often regularly or occasionally. It emphasizes the importance of eating a balanced diet to live a healthy and long life. The following are the essential elements of healthy diet.

 

Choose Water

Water is one of the most essential elements to health. Water makes up more than two thirds of human body weight. Our body losses water through sweating, breathing and digestion. Therefore, it is important to keep ourselves hydrated. Adults should drink at least 1.5 liters of water per day to help keep body properly hydrated. Therefore, drink more water and avoid sugary options like energy drinks, hot chocolates and instant powdered drinks.

 

Herbs And Spices

Throughout history, the use of herbs and spices has been incredibly important. If you’re looking to round out your healthy lifestyle, you’ll want to stock up on the following herbs and spices and use them generously in your cooking, or use them on their own to enhance the absorption and benefits received.

Here we’ve gathered some of the healthiest spices and herbs enjoyed around the world:

• Arrowroot
• Cinnamon
• Turmeric
• Basil
• Cayenne
• Dill Weed/Seed
• Mint
• Cayenne
• Oregano
• Curry Powder
• Rosemary

 

Limit Salt And Sugar

We should all cut down our daily salt and sugar intake as the world today is actually intoxicated with too much sodium and glucose.

A quick examples will be the processed food – Obscenely high in sodium and sugar (You can find eerily high percentage of them in your carbonated drinks!)

Even worse, the most conventional way of cooking today is to put in a lot of salt and sugar for taste! That’s a surefire way to put you on the hospital bed.

Thus, the best way is to be aware of how much sodium and glucose you’re ingesting in daily basis. If possible, track them. You’ll be surprised that you’re overdosed with high level of them in your diet without even noticing.

So, avoid canned food or any processed food as often as possible. Chances are, they’re incredibly high in food addictives.

As mentioned, eating out can also be dangerous too! As most of the restaurants out there have little to no interest to your overall health and they’ll do whatever they can to bring up the taste. Hence, the overdose of salt and sugar.

The best way to deal with this is to choose to eat home as often as you can (But also keep in mind that you don’t use too much “taste enhancer” in your cooking).

If you wish to spice up your home cooked meals, why not use natural herbs and spices instead?

Bear in mind that even reducing these by small amount can make us healthier. So, choose to eat healthy today!

Sodium

You probably aren’t even aware of just how much sodium is in your diet. While it is essential for our body to have small amount of sodium to function properly. However, too much sodium can be bad for health. Evidence shows that consuming too much sodium will increase risk of heart failure, kidney disease, stroke and stomach cancer. According to the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, it is recommended to limit sodium to less than 2,300 mg a day. Therefore, aim for a lower sodium diet to avoid health risk. Instead, use herbs and spices to flavor our food.

Added Sugar

Added sugar is the single worst ingredient in the modern diet. It is also one of the main reasons for obesity and the increasing risk of heart diseases, Diabetes Mellitus and cancers. If you have a sweet tooth, you’ve a really high chance to visit your dentist too! As added sugar damages your tooth, causes cavities and other nasty dental problems. Hence, it is important to watch how much sugar we add to our food. It is something we should all work towards to lead a healthier diet and lifestyle.

 

Some examples of food that may contain added sugars include:

• Grain-based desserts such as cakes cookies, and pies
• Sugar-sweetened beverages
• Fruit drinks
• Milk products and dairy desserts and milk products including sweetened milk, ice cream, sweetened yogurt
• Sugar and candy
• Other grain based food such as honey-nut waffles and cinnamon toast.