Healthy eating is very important for you and your family – but it’s not always the easiest thing to do. Here at goodtoknow, it’s our mission to help you eat healthily – without being left hungry. We have over 1,000 healthy recipes for your family, so you should never run out of ideas!
Top tips for healthy eating
Don’t forget breakfast!
We know everyone always says it but breakfast really is the most important meal of the day. A big, filling breakfast will set you and your family up for day and will mean less snacking in the morning. You don’t need to spend ages making it either, make your own porridge, muesli – or even bake some muffins – in bulk in advance so you can grab something nutritious and delicious quickly. Try and sprinkle dried fruits or nuts over anything your eating to increase the protein of your meal.
Keep full
You can have the best intentions, but if you’re hungry – you’re going to snack. Keeping full will mean that you can eat only what you want to, rather than giving into cravings. Drinking lots of water, eating filling meals and snacking on fruit, veg and nuts will stop your stomach rumbling.
Get your 5-a-day
One of the easiest ways to keep track of how healthily you’re eating is to keep track of how many fruits and vegetables you are eating. The standard 5-a-day is a good measure but you can, of course, have more. Keep a mental, or physical, list of how much of your 5-a-day you are having and work out how to get more into your diet. One for breakfast, one for lunch, two for dinner and one for a snack is a good way of dividing it out.
Know your food
Understanding your food and knowing how to use different ingredients will give you much more scope to create healthy meals. If you don’t know how to cook, it’s easy to reach for unhealthy ready made options but it’s really easy to learn the basics. A homemade pasta sauce, soup or smoothie is much healthier for you and will taste better if you make it yourself. Once you know how to use vegetables in lots of different ways, it makes them much less boring – for the kids and for you!
Treat yourself
Never allowing yourself a treat will only make you crave them more. Every now and again, give in and have what you really, really fancy. As long as you are generally quite healthy most of the time, it really won’t matter – food is meant to be enjoyed! Some people are healthy during the week, then splash out at the weekend, others have a day or two where they forget about the diet – whatever works for you. If you find yourself needing a treat pretty much every day, you can cheat and have a lower-fat cake or dessert – if you make the right one, you won’t be able to tell the difference.