Part 3: Should you eat this or not?

This blog entry will be about what to eat and what you should avoid if you’re on a diet. Most people usually reduce the size of their meal, or skip meals. Ok, if you've read my previous blog, I mentioned that skipping meals or starving yourself is a no no! Anyways, I won't go over it again. 

First, you should know that we gain weight because we are consuming more calories than we burn. In other words, the excess energy from food is stored as fat. Therefore, this means we need to burn more than what we eat in order to lose weight and do an intensive workout. We also need the three macro-nutrients; carbohydrates, proteins and fat.

Carbohydrates

Having too much carbohydrate will make you gain weight, so many nutritionists and fitness trainer advice to cut down on carbs. But do not take it the wrong way and have very little amount of it or even totally cut out carbs- actually that’s impossible because everything has carbs in it but just in different portions.  Why? Well, have you heard of the Atkin diet? It’s a low carbohydrate diet. I don’t know too much about it but have read a few things about it and in my opinion that one is not very realistic. I would say it only works if you’re an extremely lazy person, that doesn’t exercise or move around a lot. I say this because carbs is a source of fuel for our body, and if you do some intensive workout or move a lot, you won’t have the energy to do so. No carbs no energy.

Have the following:

Replace white bread (refined) with wholemeal bread

Replace white rice (refined) with  brown rice/ wild rice

Replace refined pasta with wheat ones, you find them brownish.  

Basically, change everything to whole grain if you can.

Proteins

Protein will help your body burn fat, it helps repair damaged cells and build new cells.

When you do an intensive workout, you are actually damaging cells in your muscle. Ok, it may sound bad BUT it’s not as bad as it sounds. PROTEIN comes to the rescue! Protein repairs damaged cell and build new cells, so if you have more protein the quicker the cells will be repaired which means you’ll get toned quicker! Oh! Don’t be thinking ‘I’m not going to be doing hardcore exercise because I don’t want to be damaging my cells’. That’s a mistake because you’re damaging your cells every day from your daily routines; lifting shopping bags, running for bus, basically anything that requires more force and muscles (that’s almost everything). So up your proteins!

Have the following:

Have lean chicken and turkey breast- avoid red meat and processed meat e.g. sausages.( I love my hotdogs and bangers & Mash! A little won’t hurt sometimes. lol!!)

Have 2 eggs in the morning as part of the breakfast (If you have high cholesterol, avoid the yolk and just have the egg white. People aged 30+ should really avoid or cut down egg yolks)

Have whole grain products, fish, nuts, soy foods like tofu, vegetables and fruits.

By the way, do be careful with some food product. It says it’s has high protein but has HIGH saturated fat!

Fat

There are 2 types of fat; one is yucky fat(saturated) from those greasy chicken and chips and another is essential fats like Omega-3 from fish. 

Protects and supports your organs (good for the heart- prevent heart disease), keeps you warm and it is also important for the cell structure.  Fat and carbs together conserves protein.

Have the following:

Fish- Salmon and Mackerel are high Omega-3, if you don’t like fish take fish oil pills.

Nuts, avocado. 

What else?

Have more fibre, that's more vegetables and fruits. Helps wash your body system, get rid of waste.

Porridge/ oatmeal, weetabix and muesli are high in fibre and protein. Great for breakfast, also helps lower cholesterol. I remember my mum's friend (she's a beautician) said that porridge is good for your skin because porridge washes your body system which goes back to what I just mentioned. That means you look better when you eat healthy!

I better stop here, wrote another long blog lol. Next blog the WORKOUT!