Top Weight Loss Tricks - Typical Diets That Work

Putting together healthy meal plans each week may seem like a lot of work, but with a few simple tricks, a person can spend less time planning and more time enjoying. Healthy meal plans and balanced diets are really as much about avoiding bad foods as they are about steering towards good food. But the most important thing one must have to know which foods to avoid strictly.

The basic rule of planning healthy meal or balanced diet is to opt for whole foods, meaning foods in their unaltered natural state. In other words, dried pasta and frozen chicken are superior to a packaged chicken or pasta meal but homemade pasta and fresh chicken are even better. A person must avoid packaged foods as much as possible. Canned or boxed foods lose a lot of flavor during processing, so this flavor is added again in the form of unnecessary sugars and salt. The packaged foods also contain many added preservatives to keep these food products shelf-stable. One should also know our body has a difficult time processing these artificial additives and they are empty calories.

To have a balanced diet one must make it a point to avid packaged food stuffs as the packaged foods tend to contain lower-grade ingredients, hydrogenated fats, and bleached flour rather than whole grains. Packaged foods also lose vitamins in the processing. A person might feel like he is feeding his family well if he makes it sure to incorporate one or two servings of vegetables at each meal, but if he is serving them from a can, he might not be doing them much good. One should give a look at the labels to find carbohydrates, fats, and sugars, and only trace amounts of vitamins. Frozen foods usually carry a similar problem, although it is generally a bit healthier. If someone is in a hurry, he should try to purchase them in the bagged and pre-made area of the produce section; they will contain less of the bad stuff and more of the good.



Particularly in the produce section, one should always look for organic produce. People should never expect signs by the non-organic produce, advertising the presence of growth hormones, pesticides, and other undesirable ingredients. Since the USDA does not presently have laws mandating nutritional information in this section, it is especially important to be cautious about what a person may be putting into his body. Not all produce types features organic options, but also steer toward those that do; especially with softer produce, which absorbs more pesticide.

Healthy diet plans definitely costs more. They are not as shelf stable and therefore more expensive for the store to maintain. Without added preservatives, more of the produce is lost to pests. All of these added ingredients combine to increase the price. But the payoff is in the health benefits one will not only feel better, but also look better. Even with store-packaged meat or other packaged foods in the food department or at the meat counter, special attention needs to be paid to the label or sign; meat might be free of additives, or it might contain at least 15% solution, which could mean practically anything. It certainly means added salt, possibly MSG and it means that these additives do not need to be in the meat or other food stuffs.

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