One thing I have learnt in my quest to be healthy is that you don’t need to cut out all of your favourite foods. If you completely restrict yourself, you are much more likely to slip up and fall off the healthy wagon. Having a well-balanced diet, with a little bit of what you fancy, stops that feeling of deprivation. Here are a few ways that you can still enjoy your favourite foods but not have to think about how bad they are for you.
Add More Fruit & Vegetables
Fruits and vegetables provide a simple way of adding flavour. They also add a significant nutritional value to meals that would otherwise be lacking in health benefits. There are so many options when it comes to cooking and adding more fruit or veg. You can stir in spinach, peas or chopped tomatoes into pasta dishes or curries.
Cereals can be so high in sugar so choosing a low-sugar option, like https://www.dorsetcereals.co.uk is a good choice. So that it isn’t like eating rabbit food, add some chopped banana or dried fruit. This will help to sweeten something plain like muesli but add natural sweetness. It also packs a lot of nutrition and fibre into the cereal.
Portion Size
It is also a good idea to think about your portion size. Think about using a smaller plate to start off with. It sounds silly, but if there is a large plate or bowl in front of us, we are much more likely to fill it. If you are adding more vegetables and whole foods into your meals, you will feel more full anyway. So you will want to have smaller portions.
Exercise
You gain weight when what you put in your body, is more than what your body outputs if that makes sense? If you want to have a fast food meal, then first think about portion size. Do you need to go super sized? Fast food prices can vary a lot. But you can now look up the menu prices of fast food places. So if you want to see how much your local KFC is for example, go on https://www.fastfoodmenuprices.co.uk/kfc-prices/. Second, you need to think about what you can do to use all the energy from the calories you will have consumed. Exercise is such an important part of staying healthy, and it allows you to have a few treats that you want to have.
Trim Off the Fat & Skin on Meat
If you are a meat eater, then think about how you prepare the meat you eat. You don’t have only to be a plant-based vegan to be healthy! If you have bacon with a salad for example, then make sure you grill it rather than fry it. Next, chop off the fat. Having only the meat will be more beneficial than eating the calorific fat. The same goes for chicken; make sure you trim off the skin. It might taste good, but it is full of empty calories.
So the key is not to deprive yourself. You just need to learn to discipline yourself and you can still be healthy.