Healthy Eating Recipes

ChloeJane0823

I am trying to focus on my carb, fat, and cholesterol intake. Does anyone have suggestions on a clean eating or healthier choice book that gives detail? I don't only need recipes, I also need more information on substitutions and what's what. Thanks.

galgenstrick

what about carbs and fats are you trying to focus on? Dietary cholesterol has been shown to not significantly affect blood cholesterol, so not really a need to avoid it.

ChloeJane0823

Oh ok. See, I definitely need more education on what my body needs. I am trying to cut out sugar that's not natural, and I need to keep my fat intake under 200/day. At least that's what I read I should do to help lower cholesterol. My cholesterol was only slightly over at my doc appointment, but she had me start on fish oil and red yeast rice daily.

diannethegeek

A lot is going to depend on your particular needs and wants. For instance, clean eating has a lot of different meanings. You could buy 3 clean eating cookbooks and find 3 completely different sets of rules.

galgenstrick

Losing weight will help lower your cholesterol unless it's a genetic problem. No need to cut out sugar if you are not instructed to by your doctor, it's just simple carbs and nothing wrong with a little sugar.

To simplify things. You want to make sure the majority of your food is from nutrient dense sources for overall good health. Eat lots of foods high in vitamin and minerals and get a good amount of your fats from sources that contain EFAs. Focus on eating protein and fat minimums (protein and fats are essentail for your health, so view them as minimum values) Once you hit the minimums you can eat as much carbs as you want, no need to cut them out.

Daily Protein minimum ~0.6g per pound of body weight for health or 0.8g-1g per pound if you're weight lifting and trying to gain or retain muscle
Daily Fat minimum ~0.4g per pound of body weight

You can play with your numbers to see if you feel better eating more fat than this, but most people do pretty good eating carbs instead of extra fat.

That's pretty much it. If the majority of the food you eat is from nutrient dense sources, and you get enough fat and protein in your diet, you can eat pretty much anything else. No need to cut out things like pizza or ice cream, but the one thing you should avoid completely are artificial trans fats, which have detrimental affects on the body. These are found in lots of packaged "junk foods" and fried foods, so read the labels and look for hydrogenated oils in the ingredients.

ChloeJane0823

I just want to change my eating style around so I am not constantly putting junk in my body. I know to buy whole foods and avoid prepackaged items, but I don't know a lot about what I am avoiding in these types of items. I want to make meals that have substitutions in them for all of the things I normally use. Am I making any sense? I'm sorry I use to play sports so I kind of just ate what I wanted because I was going to burn it off anyways. After I had my second kid though and became a stay at home mom I finally noticed how horrible I was eating.

galgenstrick

ChloeJane0823 wrote: »

I just want to change my eating style around so I am not constantly putting junk in my body. I know to buy whole foods and avoid prepackaged items, but I don't know a lot about what I am avoiding in these types of items. I want to make meals that have substitutions in them for all of the things I normally use. Am I making any sense? I'm sorry I use to play sports so I kind of just ate what I wanted because I was going to burn it off anyways. After I had my second kid though and became a stay at home mom I finally noticed how horrible I was eating.

The only thing you would be "avoiding" is trans fats. Some of these pre packaged items might not have as much nutritional value, so you have to judge if you've met your nutrition needs elsewhere before eating them.

ChloeJane0823

Ok thanks. That's good information. I am going to meal plan tomorrow so I will keep the advice in mind. Thanks again, this really was helpful.