Making healthier choices

Trying to eat better doesn’t mean you have to follow a strict diet or cut out everything you like to eat. A lot of the time there is a healthier choice you can make, whether that means that you grill or bake something rather than frying it, use sweetener instead of sugar or choose brown rice instead of white.

If you’re thinking about starting to eat healthier, a good place to start is by keeping a food diary. This can let you reflect on what foods you are eating and think about where you can make some changes.

Breakfast

Breakfast cereals can contain a lot of hidden sugar, even those that you may typically think of as a healthy choice such as muesli or granola. If you like starting your day with a bowl of cereal choose wholegrain varieties and check to make sure they have no added sugar or salt.

Lunches

Try and plan your lunches for the week ahead of time. This stops you grabbing something quickly just because you’re hungry which might be full of fat, sugar and salt.

Have a look through the slides below to see what changes you could make to your breakfast and lunches:

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Whether it’s breakfast, lunch or dinner, planning ahead and knowing what you are eating for each meal is key in helping you to eat healthier. Filling out a meal planner for the week means you can buy all the ingredients in advance so that all you need to do on the day is cook it!

Public Health England has the Easy Meals app which is a great resource to find foods and recipes that are healthier for you. Meal ideas are split into breakfast, lunch, evening meal and puddings and it gives you a daily meal plan with the ability to swap out the recipes. It also compiles a shopping list of the recipes you choose to make; gives you tips on healthy eating, cooking and buying foods in season. The Easy Meals app is free to download both on the App Store and Google Play.

Snacking

Most people consume a lot of snacks throughout the day and do not realise how quickly all these calories can add up. Just cutting out a few biscuits, crisps and cakes can support weight loss and reduce the amount of glucose in our blood. If you are trying to lose weight, its best to cut out all snacks or choose healthier alternatives such as fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds.

Eating out

Going out to eat doesn’t have to mean eating healthily goes out the window. As a society we are becoming more health-conscious, have more dietary requirements and increased awareness of what’s in the food we eat, and restaurants are not immune to this.

Eating healthily when you’re out doesn’t mean that you’re going to be stuck eating a salad, there are far more healthy options on menus now than there used to be in the past. Have a look at our tips below for dinners and eating out:

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Takeaways

Takeaway meals generally are not the healthiest and can often push you over your daily recommended amounts for calories, fat, sugar and salt. However, there are different choices available when ordering a takeaway to make it healthier. We’ve included some tips below:

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