The definition of a healthy diet? With tips
For years I worked as a weight consultant in my own practice. Now I no longer have this practice, but am still incredibly interested in healthy eating. But also in exercise and everything related to health.
Questions I get
The question people still ask me is: “What is the healthiest thing to eat??”, “Or is product A healthier than product B.” So many people find confusing. To shed some light on this, I’ll give you some handy tips you can put into practice.
What is healthy food?
Healthy foods contain nutrients, such as fiber, minerals, vitamins and or the necessary carbohydrates, proteins and healthy fats to provide energy. In addition, healthy foods are low in salt, sugar and saturated fat. But you can’t classify a food product in terms of bad or good without looking at the entire diet. A piece of chocolate or fries once in a while is no big deal as long as you eat healthy otherwise. Just eating apples also not healthy…
Tips for a healthy diet
I recommend zooming out and focusing on your entire diet. Meets the necessary guidelines? But what are these guidelines?
Healthy eating guidelines
The Nutrition Center has put together some guidelines. These guidelines help you get enough nutrients, calories, carbohydrates, protein and healthy fats. Do you find choosing the right ratio difficult? Then read this article on choosing the right macro ratio . In addition, the advice is not to consume too much salt, saturated fat and sugar.
The guidelines per day for adults is:
- 2 pieces of fruit
- 250 grams of vegetables
- 4 to 6 slices of bread
- 4 to 5 scoops of whole grain cereals or 4 to 5 potatoes
- 1 portion of meat/fish/poultry/legumes
- 2 to 3 servings of dairy
- 40 grams of cheese
- 65 grams of fats and oils.
What are less healthy products?
There are also products that are less healthy. These often contain too much salt, sugar and saturated fat. Want to know if a certain sandwich spread or pasta sauce is healthy? Download the app from the Voedingscentrum .
How many unhealthy products fit into a healthy diet?
The Nutrition Center has put together some guidelines for this as well. These guidelines will help you avoid ingesting too much salt, sugar and unhealthy fats.
3-5 small snacks per day
The first guideline is to have 3 to 5 small snacks per day. For example, a small snack is 1 licorice and 1 honey sandwich.
2-3 large snacks per week
The second guideline is to have two to three large snacks per week. A large snack is, for example, a syrup waffle, a croissant or a serving of white pasta ( instead of whole wheat pasta).
Conclusion
This article revealed that healthy eating helps ensure that your body gets the nutrients and carbohydrates, healthy fats and protein it needs. Besides you have read that it is much more informative to look at your entire diet. I used to always give my clients a food diary to fill out. This gave them a very good idea of what they were taking in too much or too little nutrient. It might be a tip to keep a food diary yourself, if you don’t always know what you eat in a day either.
Do you eat enough fruits and vegetables every day?
This article is a collaboration with De fit methode, earlier I wrote a review about this book
