Back in January I decided to get serious about my eating habits and focus on healthy choices. I put myself on the Mediterranean Diet and went from a high of 209 pounds on New Year’s Eve, to a very comfortable 187 without much effort.
Along the way I decided to chart my success and keep track of the changes I was making. I also starting writing down helpful advice shared on many different websites. Below is a list of 51 healthy eating tips that along with the Mediterranean Diet are sure to bring about weight loss and improve your over all outlook. Look for 50 more mid week.
Start Your Day with Breakfast: Breakfast not only gives you energy and brain power, it helps lessen the likelihood of overeating during the day! Never skip Breakfast!
Go Easy on the Fats and Oils: Although there are good fats and oils such as olive, canola, peanut oils, avocados, fish, nuts and nut butters, you should still go easy on them to promote good health.
Six Meals a Day Will Keep the Weight Away: Hunger is the downfall of diets, and splitting meals into six allotments will help combat hunger between meals. Make sure your meals are well equipped with good proteins and fiber-rich foods. Eat to lose weight!
Handle Appropriate Portion Sizes: Portion size is important to weight management. You can learn how to handle portions by employing a common sense approach, such as using the palm of your hand or your clenched fist for gauging the portion sizes of food. This was the biggest factor in my weight loss.
Drink Your Weight Away with 10 Glasses of Water: Hydration is important to fitness, and drinking water helps flush salt and other toxins. Drink at least one glass of water with each of your six meals, four more throughout the day, and an additional glass per diuretic beverage.
Stay Full with Fruits and Vegetables : Make sure to have 5 servings of fruits and vegetables per day. Fruits and vegetables are low in calories and packed with beneficial fibers, vitamins, and antioxidants. They fill up your stomach fast, so you feel full earlier. Fruits are great midday snacks!
Read Food Claims and Labels: Always read the nutrition label on the packaging because a product labeled with a fat-free claims does not mean that it is low in calories. Similarly, a product labeled as low-sugar or low-carb does not mean it is low in fat or calories. I discovered that the Fiber-One cereal I was eating every morning had more grams of sugar than Fruit Loops.
Fuel Up with Carbs: Eat more fruits, vegetables, and complex grain products for a boost of energy. In addition to being convenient and loaded with vitamins and minerals, these foods are low in dietary fat and are good sources of complex carbohydrates.
Select Your Beverages Wisely: Drinking beverages such as soda, fruit juice, sports drinks, alcohol, specialty coffees and teas can add up to many “empty calories” which contribute little nutrition to our diets and increase weight gain. Since it is important to drink fluids throughout the day, select skim milk, fruit juices, and water. A Glass of Red Wine each night is a good thing!
Stick with Whole Wheat: Whole wheat offers more fiber, which helps reduce the risk of heart disease, stroke, cancer, diverticulitis, and diabetes (to name a few). Set aside the white flour and bread, and reach for products that are made from oats, barley, buckwheat, bulgur, rye, brown rice, millet, and wheat. Try whole wheat pasta!
Don’t Juice Up: Juice Less: A common myth is drinking fruit juices or eating low-fat fruit roll-ups eliminate sugar. The fact is that some fruit juices have more sugar than a soda. Reduction of sugar is important to good health; therefore, always check out the sugar content of anything you put in your mouth. Read the label!
Make It Hot: Hot, spicy foods such as cayenne, curry, and chilies help trigger endorphins. Endorphins are like a natural morphine that helps ease pain and provide a sense of well-being. The next time you are feeling a little down or have some minor pain, try eating something spicy.
Combat Overeating with Water: Drink a glass of water before a meal, so that you feel fuller without actually having to stuff yourself. Have another glass of water while you are having the meal because it is another way to prevent overeating. Take sips after each morsel to help the food to settle faster. My second biggest adjustment was to drink plenty of water!
Go For Fresh Fruit : Juice is often sweetened, but fresh fruits have natural sugars. You are taking in a lot of fiber when you eat fruit, and fruits are an excellent source of vitamins. Fruits, they just make good eating sense!
Steer Clear of Crash Diets: Crash diets are bad for your health, and they are not a solution to weight loss. It might seem as if you have lost a few pounds, but everything will bounce back with a vengeance the moment you give up on the crash diet. The Mediterranean Diet is a more than a diet, it’s a life style change!
Don’t Forget Dairy: Don’t skip on the dairy because your bones still need calcium to stay strong. Dairy foods and some dairy alternatives, such as enriched soy milk, provide protein as well as calcium.
Choose Whole, Fresh, Unprocessed Foods: Choosing whole, fresh, unprocessed foods enhances weight loss and boosts energy. Plus, processed foods contain extra sugar, sodium, and preservatives that add on calories. Sorry, but the cold cuts have got to go!
All Food Groups are Included in “Team Diet”: Proteins, fats, sugar, and carbohydrates are essential components to energy. Instead, pick good proteins and fats, natural sugars, and complex carbohydrates to include in your diet.
Stick with One All-purpose Multivitamin: Vitamins are great! Though, taking more than one all-purpose multivitamin in a day can lead to safety issues such as iron poisoning or hypervitaminosis.
Burn Food Efficiently: Even though you picked the right foods and fats, you still need to exercise to burn off any remaining fat and calories to lose or maintain weight. Talk a brisk evening walk and have a glass of red as your reward!
Track Your Food Intake: Logging food intake in a journal or Smartphone application will help you know what is working in your diet and what food group you need to increase.
Take the chicken take off its skin: Why? Because, half of the fat from the chicken is in the skin! Plus, you knock off about 40 calories from the chicken by removing the skin.
Eat Fish at Least Once a Week: Fish is considered to be a superfood because it contains essential omega-3s, vitamin D, good fat, and selenium. Plus, fish helps keep the cardiovascular system and brain healthy. This was a happy change for me, as I discovered many great fish recipes.
Opt Out on Margarine: Margarine’s main ingredient is vegetable oil, and vegetable oil is made with genetically modified crops. Also, vegetable oil undergoes a hydrogenation process in order to turn into margarine. Cook with Olive Oil!
Switch From Tea to Green Tea: The tea drinks that are often bottled contain sugar or high-fructose corn syrup. By switching to brewed green tea, you are helping your body out by increasing metabolism, regulating glucose levels, and reducing bad cholesterol.
You Snooze and Lose When You Go to Bed After Eating: You should not go to sleep after eating because the food is just sitting in your belly. The body digests food easier if it’s in the upright position, so you should wait two hours after eating before going to sleep.
Protect Your Heart with Apples: Apples are high in polyphenols, and this compound helps fight free radicals and toxins in our bodies. Apples also lower bad cholesterol. It’s an old one – “An apple a day keeps the doctor away!”
Build Stronger Bones with Bananas: Bananas help with calcium absorption and other nutrients because bananas are rich in oligofructose. This type of fructose increases digestive enzymes in the colon that makes it easier to absorb calcium.
Fight Cancer with Broccoli: Broccoli has a compound called sulforaphane, and this compound helps with maintaining proper cell function and genetic communication with cells. Steamed broccoli with pasta, garlic and olive oil is a great meal!
Boost Memory with Oily Fish: Oily fish such as salmon and sardines helps boost memory because it contains essential fatty acids like omega-3s. Eating oily fish can boost memory by 15 percent and prevent dementia.
Kill Bacteria with Garlic: Garlic is often called “nature’s antibiotic” because 80% of garlic is sulphur compounds such as allicin. These compounds kill bacteria, fungus, and microbes in the digestive tract.
Energize with Honey: Honey is an example of natural sugar, and it is a better option than an energy drink. A spoonful of honey helps increase blood sugar levels.
Decreasing Caffeine Intake: Caffeine does the opposite of the meditation effect. Caffeine increases anxiety and makes the body prone to stress, and the increase in anxiety means irritability and a short fuse. I don’t even finish my morning coffee any more.
Get the Best Out of Beans: The more you eat, the more you manage weight and lower the risk of heart disease and diabetes. Beans are rich in fiber, protein, vitamin B, and other essential vitamins and minerals. Also, beans helps us feel more full to prevent overeating. Beans are a Mediterranean Diet biggie!
Eat the Peel and Keep the Skin: Fruits and vegetables keep their protective chemicals and antioxidants in the skin. These same chemicals and antioxidants help keep us healthy.
Say No to Fried Foods: Eating fried foods adds on excess calories, cholesterol, and trans fat. Excessive cholesterol and trans fat increases the risk of coronary disease. Instead, opt for the baked, steamed, broiled, or poached choices. I’m a big fan of steaming food. It’s quick and easy!
Slow Down When Eating: Eating slower is a much healthier method because of satiety which is a feeling to make us stop eating. When we eat slow, the body sends a signal to the brain which creates that feeling of satiety.
Home-Cooked Meals Win: When you cook meals, you are in control. You can use better quality ingredients and determine the spices. Often, restaurant food is over-sauced and salted, and restaurant food can be full of fat and calories. It’s a good way to get the family to all eat together, which is a really good thing!
Knock out Insomnia with Lettuce: Yes, lettuce helps with insomnia because it contains a white fluid called lactucarium. This fluid has stress reducing and calming properties.
Feel Happy with Dark Chocolate: Dark chocolate has a chemical called PEA which is the same chemical that gives you that “falling in love” feeling. It also contains a small trace of caffeine, and the approximate caffeine amount is 27mg per 1.5 ounces of dark chocolate. See, it’s not all that tough, who doesn’t like chocolate.
Ditch the Prescriptions for Ginger: Ginger is called an universal medicine for a reason. It is most know to cure digestive ailments, but it also helps with headaches, chest pains, colds, and rheumatism. I found it helps sore joints as well!
Clean Your Engine with Onions: Eat onions raw or cooked to clean your blood of clots. There are more than 150 chemicals found in the onion that raises HDL cholesterol and discourages blood clot formation.
Power up With Sea Vegetables: Sea vegetables such as seaweed and kelp contains about 10-20% more minerals than land plants because it lives in a saline solution. Oddly, the saline solution is similar to the womb. I confess, this is a tip I have yet to embrace.
Cure Ailments with Fasting: Fasting is known as an old fashion form of medicine. Fasting helps with the following: detoxification, digestive system, inflammatory diseases, fat breakdown, high blood pressure, weight loss, immunity, and addictions.
An Orange a Day Keeps the Doctor Away!: Oranges are filled with vitamin C and A, antioxidants, calcium, dietary fiber, and many other vitamins and minerals. There are many health benefits of oranges, such as relieves constipation, lowers blood pressure, prevents cancer, and purifies blood.
Be Prepared: Pack Healthy Snacks: In this busy world, it is beneficial to plan ahead and pack healthy snacks, such as veggie and fruit packs, trail mix, tree nuts, and seeds in order to avoid unhealthy convenient snacks that are found in vending machines and pastry shops.
Don’t Grocery Shop When Hungry: Seriously! This is the worse time to buy food because of the psychological reasons. Studies have shown that the brain is in “reward” mode when the body is hungry, and you are more likely to purchase items that have higher sugar and calorie contents. We all know this one!
Research Healthy Restaurant Choices: It is best to research restaurants that offer healthy choices, so you know your diet options. Many restaurants provide nutritional information about their food online or in pamphlet form in their establishment.
First Course is Salad: Starting lunch or dinner off with salad will help slow you down for the main course. It can also help you decrease calorie consumption during your meal. Though, make sure to avoid unhealthy ingredients in your salad like bacon and high-fat cheese.
Detox with Water: It is that simple: water flushes toxins and chemicals out of your body. When you flush these toxins out, your muscles stay energized, keeps your kidneys healthy, maintains consistent bowel movements, controls calories, and balances bodily fluids. Here’s the water thing again. Take note!
What’s in Season?: There are many benefits to buying produce in its season, such as strawberries in the summer. Due to the long shipping times, the in season crops have more nutrients because the imported crops require preservatives and irradiation which is a process of giving a burst of radiation to the produce, to kill germs.
There you have the first 51. Look for the final 50 later in the week. Nothing too difficult, just good common sense tips to healthy eating.
Wants to learn more about the healthy aspects of the Mediterranean Diet as well as some great recipes. Pick up “The Mediterranean Diet Recipe Book – Gracie’s Guide to Healthy Eating.” Available at Amazon Kindle.
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