Healthy eating Habits

 

You are going to love these ones because they're going to help!

you can improve your meal and snack choices and just boost healthy eating and

nutrition all-around.

Now some of these tips you might have heard of before, some of them though, are going to be completely new. At least I hope so.

So, let's dive in.

When I was studying nutrition, this was one of the most common tips that we were taught to share with our clients and it's that you eat what you see. Now this works equally well for people who want to gain weight, who want to lose weight or for people who are just looking to make more wholesome food choices. For example, if you want to eat more fruits, keep it on the counter in clear sight and instead of just throwing an orange into your bag, which let's be honest, hardly ever finds its way out, we can instead peel it up or cut it, put it in a container and put it on our desk to enjoy when hungry. And if we cut them up and put them in front of our partner or kids it'll also increase the chance that they'll eat it too.

If you usually place a bowl of chips on your desk, maybe swapping it out for something like nuts might help. And when you open your pantry and chocolate is the first thing you see, chances are that's what you're gonna reach for. So, maybe try shifting it to the side or behind some of the dried fruit or trail mix. This isn't to say that that food is forbidden,

it just means we're less likely to impulsively reach for it if it's out of sight. And the same thing goes for drinking our fluids, whether it's tea or water, placing it in front of you while you work or study. It's gonna increase the chances that you'll take periodic sips and stay hydrated throughout the day.

Carrots and celery are awesome carrying devices for our favorite dips and sauces, but if you've ever tried to cut them up ahead of time to store in the fridge, you might have noticed that they lose their crunch and sometimes they get this slimy film. So, there is a way to avoid that and it's just to store them in a glass container or jar with some water. It helps the veggies stay crisp and fresh and they store in the fridge for a longer time. Just change out the water every couple of days or so, and keep in mind that the carrots will keep longer than the celery.

Now I know some people might be worried about cutting up their veggies ahead of time because you feel you might lose some nutrients. Now there are three factors that can cause nutrient loss and that is heat, oxygen and light.

In this case there's no exposure to heat or light, just oxygen and the nutrient that's most easily affected by this is vitamin C and sometimes vitamin E, but what you don't lose are all the other incredible nutrients like fiber, some of the B vitamins, minerals and many more. So long story short, the benefit of eating pre-cut veggies, even with a little less vitamin C, it far outweighs not eating the veggies at all or reaching for less wholesome convenient foods instead.

This next one is a tip that my mum actually recently taught me. I go through a lot of nut butters.

Peanut butter and almond butter especially, and as nutrient-dense as they already are there's something we can actually do to pump up the nutrition a little bit more. And how we can do that is with seeds.

Seeds offer a unique combination of phytonutrients and antioxidants that have a whole bunch of health benefits. So I take a full jar of peanut butter, I empty out about a third of it.

I store that away to enjoy later. And to the large jar I add a couple spoonful’s of some seeds. You can use whatever you have on hand.

I use sunflower seeds, hemp seeds, coarsely ground flax seeds, chia seeds, lightly toasted sesame seeds, and pumpkin seeds. I then give it a mix and store it in the fridge. You can add it to oatmeal or spread it on toast. It just makes for a colorful and nutrient-packed addition to any meal. And if you can't tolerate nut butters you can still make the seed mix alone and use it in the same way, like add it to smoothies or parfaits.

I feel like it also makes the foods just look so much more vibrant and wholesome. You might have heard of this little hack to fill a few Tupperware containers with the ingredients you need for a smoothie. That way when you're looking for a morning or afternoon pick-me-up you just pop it into a blender, no chopping required, add a splash of plant milk or maybe some greens or nut butter to accompany it.

It's also an awesome way to use up leftover fruits that are at their peak ripeness. But if you already make smoothies you might find that you've kind of gotten into this routine of making the same thing over and over again. At least I know that that happens to me. So I have two ingredients that I want to recommend.

These are nutrient-dense additions to your frosty drink and trust me, you can't even taste them in there.

First up is frozen zucchini. And this is especially great for people who can't tolerate bananas or just don't like the taste of it. Because it gives it a similar creaminess but without that banana flavor. And the second one is white beans. These are packed in protein, fiber, vitamins, antioxidants and again trust me, you won't even know that they're in there! So if you're looking for a new twist to your smoothies give these two a try.

You know how they say an apple a day keeps the doctor away? It's more like something that berries are capable of doing. An apple, for example, has 60 units of antioxidants, whereas a cup of berries offers 650 units. And that's why Zain and I try to have at least a handful of berries each day. Either on our oatmeal, on a parfait and smoothies or just as a snack. So this little tip is just a reminder to up that berry intake if you can. And I know that berries can be expensive when they're not in season so in the colder months we opt for frozen berries and you know that frozen berries in many cases are more nutrient-dense than fresh berries.

But another side kind of tip is: if you are lucky enough to have access to berry picking in the summer months wherever you live, load up on that stuff, cut it up and put it in the freezer to enjoy in the fall and winter months.

Now we've talked about the nutrient density of spices and many spices come from fresh herbs. You've likely noticed we use a lot of fresh herbs in our recipes. And as much as I've gotten better at keeping my potted herbs alive, sometimes they just die for certain dried out ones like rosemary and thyme you can just pick off the branches and use as a spice but you can also salvage some of the living leaves by picking them off the plant chopping them up and then placing them in an ice cube tray with some water alternatively you can also add them to a food processor with equal parts oil and water blend it and then add that to the ice cube tray once it's frozen I then transfer the cubes into a Tupperware container now the herbs they're not going to freeze in a way that's going to retain its former glories but it's going to retain its flavor and nutrient profile if you enjoy it with a 1 to 2 month period you can then add these cubes to soups or stews or pasta sauces it's a great way to reduce food waste and add some flavor to dishes plus some extra vitamins minerals and antioxidants something I've noticed I've been doing lately which I never used to do before is adding spinach to my cooked meals and I do it in super huge quantities because within just a few minutes the big pile of greens cooks down to a super small amount and it hides perfectly well in dishes like curries stir fries its soups and more as with other veggies.

There are pros and cons to both the raw and cooked form with spinach for example the raw form offers higher amounts of certain nutrients whereas the cooked form offers higher amounts of other nutrients so longer the short enjoy both the cooked and raw versions but don't shy away from cooked it's just such an easy way to get a whole bunch of greens onto your plate and into your body with loads of nutrients to accompany it we've all been there feeling like you're hungry for no reason but you just want something to snack on or maybe you're legitimately hungry but you don't have the energy or patience to figure out what you want to make so if there's one tip I can give it is to have 3 snack ideas in your arsenal that take 2 minutes or less to put together that way they serve as alternatives to something that might have been a little less wholesome so for example my three quick and dirty snacks or medjool dates filled with nut butter an apple that i dip into plant yogurt and sometimes I put into the cinnamon or maple syrup and some hummus on crackers or rice cakes topped with cucumbers tomatoes and arugula having an arsenal of crazy easy wholesome snacks it's not only going to limit decision fatigue around snack choices it's also going to give you a nutrient-dense energy boost.

There is no doubt about it planning our meals helps us make more wholesome food choices and it helps to decrease the food waste and it's 100% natural to not be able to stick to it 100% of the time but if we plan our meals like a week in advance chances are more often than not that we do stick to its some of the time

I recommend whipping together your own wholesome contribution that others can also enjoy whether it's a huge batch of filling and comforting soup or a platter with dips crackers fruits or veggies or hummus pinwheels it's one of my favorites to take which is just loaded with fresh and roasted veggies and it's always a crowd-pleaser everyone always appreciates contributions and I think you might appreciate having something that you can fill up on that helps you feel a bit more balance