While we are supposed to be eating 5 to 9 servings of fruits and vegetables a day, we're eating closer to 3 servings. And when you get women out of the picture (they tend to eat more of the good stuff than men), only about one in five of us are eating as many servings as we should.
Meanwhile, we are eating a lot more meat than we need to eat. This is serious stuff. Not only because these eating habits tend to make us fat, but also because they predispose us to the chronic diseases including diabetes, heart disease, osteoporosis, stroke and a variety of cancers that are the leading causes of death and disability.
In other words, the way most of us eat is quite literally killing us.
So What can we do about it?
Simple Changes
It's almost absurdly easy to eat a healthful diet that will keep you lean, stoked, and satisfied. Forget about learning the minutia of vitamins, minerals, and trace elements. You don't have to become an expert in nutrition. You certainly don't have to turn your eating habits into some kind of religion.
You can make it as complicated as you like, of course, but the truth is, you're better off (and going to be more likely to burn off that fat and keep it off) if you just eat a good healthful, sensible diet.
Go For Variety
The number one principle of good nutrition is to eat a wide variety of foods.
This doesn't mean staggering your weekly stops at your local burger bar. What it means is working more grains, fruits, vegetables, low-fat dairy products, lean meats, fish, poultry, and dried beans into your diet.
The reason it's important to go for variety and eat more of these foods is that they supply you with much more of the essential vitamins, minerals, and fiber than do those burgers.
Any research suggests that those who eat a diverse diet are less likely to die of heart disease or cancer.
A tremendous amount of research has been done to determine exactly which nutrients do what, and much has been learned, but there is still a lot that experts don't understand. We know, for example, that oranges are good for us because they are loaded with vitamin C, and that if we don't get enough vitamin C, we can get scurvy. We also know that in every orange there is a host of other compounds that do something, but what that something is hasn't been determined.
Different foods supply different nutrients. An orange will give you a dose of vitamin C but no Vitamin B, a hunk of cheese will give you vitamin B but no vitamin C. Which is why the first principle of good nutrition is to try to maximize the variety of nutrients you get.
Follow The Pyramid
How do you know how much of certain foods to eat?
A fairly simple guide is the Food Guide Pyramid. The divides foods into five groups and specifies how many servings a day you should have from each of the groups.
At the base of the pyramid are grains - which include breads, cereals, pasta, rice, and whole grains. The pyramid recommends eating between 6 and 11 servings a day from this group.
The next level on the pyramid consists of vegetables. You should be eating 3 to 5 servings a day.
Next is the fruit group, 2 to 4 servings a day.
Of dairy products - milk, yogurt, cheese - you should have 2 to 3 servings a day.
From the meats group, which also includes dry beans, nuts, eggs, and fish, you should be eating 2 to 3 servings.
Finally, at the top of the pyramid are the fats, oils, and sweets. These don't count as a group, for the simple that you should be eating as little of them as possible.
Eat Less Meat
One huge way to cut back on the amount of fat in your diet (and therefore the amount of fat that ends up on your stomach) is to eat less of the cow and more of what the cow eats.
We eat so much animal protein and there's a strong correlation between eating a lot of meat and being beefy. The more meat we eat, the higher the chance of gaining weight and gaining abdominal obesity. For this reason, we should eat less fats and meats, because we just don't need the calories and they're low, generally, in nutrients; and the proteins, because we don't need that much.
Eat More Grains
Most of the calories in your diet should come not from meats but from grains (and grain products like whole-wheat bread) as well as from fruits and vegetables. Grains include wheat, rice, oats, corn, and barley. Just because it's made from grain, however, doesn't make it good. You should go for the whole grains.
Besides providing you with a lot of essential nutrients, grains (and other plant foods) are your source of fiber. Fiber meets your digestive system working properly and lowers the risk of heart disease and some cancers.
Eat From The Garden
Vegetables - whether fresh, frozen, or canned - are loaded with fiber, vitamins, minerals, and hundreds of compounds that may have a variety of health promoting qualities. If you eat a wide variety of fruits and vegetables, you're getting a wider variety of these compounds.
It's important to eat all kinds of vegetables, not just peas and potatoes. As a rule, fresh is better than cooked (because vitamins are lost in cooking), and frozen is generally better than canned (because manufacturers tend to add a lot of salt to canned vegetables).
The more vegetables you eat, the less likely you are to gain girth.
Eat More Beans
We eat far too much meat and far too few beans. In addition to being high in protein and high in fiber, beans are low in fat.
Beans can make a real contribution to a weight loss program. Substitute a bean dish for a meat dish a couple times a week, and you'll be lopping a lot of fat out of your diet and replacing it with a lot of fiber.
That fiber will do wonders for your cholesterol and your digestive system.
Eat More Fish
We also eat a lot less fish than we ought to. We should be eating fish 2 or 3 times a week. In addition to being a good source of protein, fish contains omega 3 fatty acids, types of fat that seem to be good for the heart. A diet rich in fish can help lower cholesterol, prevent blood clots, and possibly lower blood pressure.
While all fish have some omega 3's, the ones with the most include salmon, mackerel, sardines, herring, and tuna.
Don't fry that fish. Frying not only destroys the omega 3's but turns the turbot into a fat torpedo aimed directly at your gut.
R_Garcia
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