Healthy eating tricks

AllTehBeers

I love veggies but they do get bland and boring after a while so instead of just eating them cooked by themselves, I make them the centerpiece of the meal. One of my favorites is mushroom fajitas. You can get a mix of onions, peppers, spices, ect. Anything you like on a fijita, fry them up in some olive oil and top them with salsa, avacado, lettuce or what ever you like. You can also add a bit of chicken if you don't want it without the meat.

I also cook a home made stirfry. These are great because you can get creative. Along with the peppers and onions, I like adding water chestnuts, almonds, maybe a serving of the crunchy strips you can get with a dash of soy sauce. Its great because you can make as little you want to experiment or make a big pan and portion it out for a couple meals.

Laces_0ut

use a digital food scale to weigh everything you eat because it is much more accurate. dont use measuring cups and spoons at all.

olong

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I need to improve my macros though to have that balance. Working on protein atm, and struggling!

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I struggle with protein, too. I've been adding protein powder to my water and that helps. Though, eventually, I'd like to eliminate the powder in favor of relying less on suppliments and more on lean meats etc...

mrselanco2268

Start experimenting with recipes. My husband didn't love veggies until he ate them prepared with lots of flavor. Cauliflower steamed is kinda bland and boring. But roasted for 20 minutes at 400 degrees with a little olive oil, salt and pepper, and finished with a squeeze of fresh lemon juice it is fantastic. Roasting most vegetables will bring out richness and sweetness.

Also, Mrs. Dash has tons of flavor - and many varieties. I spinkle that on vegetables and it adds a whole new dimension. I add them to sandwiches and wraps.

I personally love vegetables and always have, but I'm converting my husband to be a vegetable lover too. Grilled, roasted and sauteed are much better than steamed and boiled.

I also sauteed a bunch of vegetables and blended them in the food processor to make a sauce for a main course.

Experimenting is going to be your friend.

I started roasting and grilling vegetables a year ago. It does bring out the flavor without losing all the nutrients.

micls

Foods aren't necessarily healthier but the composition of your entire diet. Moderation is the key to success, a happy life, and a healthy one at that. The USDA has something called the discretionary calorie allowance. Consuming 10-20% of your calories from "non-healthy sources" (they are talking specifically in terms of exogenous sugar) has the same health effects as eating 100% of your diet from "healthy sources." Very few people realize this thus the results you see in most studies comparing flexible dieting and strict dieting. The flexible dieters maintain their fat loss over long periods of time whereas strict dieters almost always fail.

I completely agree, and my diary will show I'm as far as you can get from strict in what I put into my body! My problem is that I don't really have the balance at the moment, and that's what I'm working towards.

This is a misconception. Whole grains aren't necessarily better. If you start consuming plenty of whole grain sources on a daily basis then it can inhibit the uptake of some nutrients. Balance is the key. Even then, whole grains are quite overrated. There are many studies that have shown that one's diet being composed 50% of processed grains and 50% from whole grains had similar results to someone on 100% whole grains. Want to know the funny thing? The researchers, to save their bias tails, mention in the study that they still recommend people not to eat that many processed grains. World is littered with agendas, my friends.

Again, I don't plan on ever going 100% whole grain, I'm looking for the balance.

Eat what you want! If you don't like it on its own or on the side then eat it how you ENJOY it. There are hundreds of vegetables and so many to try and taste. Even then, try different cooking methods. Raw broccoli is gross but once you steam it and cover it in cheese sauce it's the bomb. Or what about beef and broccoli, the classic chinese-american dish? I eat almost 500g of broccoli a day that way.

The problem there being if I ate what I wanted there would be no veg Which is why I'm going for these 'tricks'. Never heard of those broccoli dishes but I willing to try them!

Lose the word "clean." It's a horrific word that's produced more failed weight loss than anything on this planet. There's no such thing as clean eating. It's a figment of the dieting community's imagination. You don't know what the healthiest is so I think you should come to terms with that as well.

That was more a comment on what I read on here a lot from others rather than my own opinions. I've never aimed to 'eat clean', and I'm well aware of my own ignorance in certain areas. But in the same vein, I'm also aware of the shortfalls of my current and previous diets and it's worth working to improve it.

prettythinlove

Bump.

AeolianHarp

In all honesty, don't eat whole grains if you don't want to. I don't eat any unless it actually complements and enhances the taste of my meal. For example, some sandwiches are simply enhanced by rye bread.

The bulk of your nutrients will simply come from vegetables and fruits. If you were to increase one thing then that would be the worthwhile one. Whole grains are just painful to increase because they have a cardboard-like flavour for some stuff. Brown rice is just gross.

Oh, almost forgot! I live in Canada and President's Choice makes this semi-white-style pasta that's made with lentil seeds, whole wheat, and all that other mumbo jumbo but it has an excellent balance. Love that stuff. Give that a try. I'm obsessed with it. Here it is:
http://www.presidentschoice.ca/LCLOnline/products.jsp?type=details&catIds=118&productId=19868

I prefer homemade pasta but when I'm on a cut this is the stuff I eat.

mrsmel55

I found something that we really like. I tried the whole wheat pasta and it doesn't take all that good to me. I get Hodgson Mill Gluten Free Brown Rice Angel Hair Pasta with Golden Milled Flax Seed. It tastes really good and a little goes a long way.

modernmom70

Try cooking brown rice in chicken broth. My DH wouldn't eat it before but since I started doing this he loves it.