Real Life Healthy Eating - Part 1
Week 1 - All About Adding
I’m challenging you (and me) to a 2 week food challenge. Or a 1 week challenge if that works better for you :).
We’re starting with adding healthy foods to our diet (instead of removing things, like sugar) for one simple reason – it makes healthy eating so much easier! Why? Because saying no takes so much darn energy.
Every time we have to say no to something (like sugar, gluten, or junk-food) we drain our body of a bit of energy and a bit of willpower. Eventually, our tank will run dry.
All of those times that you were following a diet and “fell off the wagon” wasn’t a “failure” (man, I really don’t like that word). Your willpower muscle just ran out of steam. That’s all…and it was inevitable. In the same way you can’t hold your hands over your head forever, you can’t follow a diet plan for months or years. It’s just impossible.
So, let’s SAY YES to food instead! Woo!
This is also about stretching yourself out of your comfort zone a little bit.
You want to stretch your food boundaries every once and a while for a set period of time. Having an end date in the very near future will help you through the harder days, and when you’re done, you’ll bounce back to your old life with an increased love for fruits and veggies (it really does work:)
So, if you feel a tad rabbit-like, nibbling on veggies all day, don’t worry - it’s just for two weeks (or just one if that feels more comfortable to you :)
Instructions -
Goal - To add 3 - 5 more servings of veggies and fruits to your daily diet this week.
Start wherever you are today, and add 1 more serving of a fruit or veggie
Keep that extra serving in, and increase by another one every 3 days or so (or every day if you love a challenge)
Keep that up for the whole week, or until your diet reaches 10 daily servings of fruits and veggies
What to do —
buy fruits and veggies you LOVE
buy 1 fruit or veggie you don’t normally eat - try a new recipe or enjoy it raw
And enjoy!
Tips
(you can take these with a grain of salt, or follow them exactly) -
Start by adding a fruit or veggie snack to your day. Having a fruit or veggie snack in the afternoon is a pretty easy one :)
Next, add one to your lunch (or another one if you already have veggies for lunch)
Add another to supper and/or add fruit or veggies to breakfast
Bonus - can you get 2 servings of fruit or veggies for breakfast?
examples - 2 eggs, spinach, and zucchini
Organic yogurt, blueberries, and a kiwi
2 eggs, zucchini, and a piece of fruit
1 egg, some roasted potatoes (about a handful), and 1/2 a zucchini
What the heck is a serving of veggies?
Fruit is easy to determine a serving - it’s either 1 piece or a handful of berries.
Veggie servings can be more complicated - here’s a good guide:
Salad greens - 2 cups
Non-starchy veggies - 1 cup
Starchy veggies - 1/2 cup
Cooked leafy greens - 2 cups before wilting (it ends up being 1/4 - 1/2 cup after cooking)
But – don’t worry too much about exact measurements…you won’t get a visit from the veggie police. Just add more :)
This week is ALL about adding more healthy fruits and veggies to our diet. These wonderfully delightful foods will help to squish out anything you'd rather be eating less of AND will give you a boost of energy. It's a win-win :)
FAQs
Why do I recommend fruit? Isn't that just full of sugar?
A piece of fruit is a beautifully packaged taste of sweet. It's full of nutrients and fibre...and just enough sweet to bring your blood sugar back up to a healthy place. There's nothing wrong with that :).
And, a common idea right now is that all sugar is bad for us, and this lumps everything sweet into the same category. Cookies, cakes, and fruit are all the same. But they're not; they affect our body very differently when we consume them.
Sweet is an important flavour, and for some of us, it balances us. If we stop eating everything sweet then our cravings go into overdrive. And, if we deny them for too long we'll eventually dive head-first into a bag of marshmallows (or your favourite sweet…it happens to all of us no matter how strong our willpower muscle is).
So...a bit of fruit to satisfy your sweet tooth isn't such a bad thing :). My body loves a kiwi with breakfast and an apple in the afternoon.
Don't want to just eat salads all week?
Ya, I hear you! I love a salad in the mid-summer heat, but I don't like nibbling away at them all day long, and I REALLY don’t like them in the fall and winter months.
If you're like me, try -
a quick stir fry with broccoli, swiss chard, and some protein (chicken or organic tempeh is nice). Serve over rice or quinoa. I drizzle Miso Gravy or EVOO and Balsamic over the top for flavour.
add a handful of spinach to your eggs, it wilts into only a few bites of green :)
slice a zucchini lengthwise, drizzle olive oil (or avocado oil) and sprinkle on some salt and pepper. Grill on medium on your BBQ, about 10 mins per side. It's my favourite summer recipe.
But, if you LOVE salads, but hate prepping them, try a mason jar salad. They keep for up to 5 days! Click here for a recipe.
Got any questions or comments? Jump to our private Facebook Group or the Ask Lisa page :)