Part A: Food Selection

Be sure to consult your physician before making changes to your diet. It’s time to make a change, perhaps you want to lose weight, build muscle, or improve your diet. First things first we want to build healthy habits so that our goals make us, well healthier, not just bigger or smaller.

Choosing healthy foods is going to provide you with a ton of health benefits, food choice is one of the biggest diet factores to your overall health. Here is an idea for what foods should make up the core of your daily food intake.

What should you be eating?;

  1. Lean proteins
    1. Turkey, eggs, fish, chicken, etc.
    2. Don’t have to be completely fat free, still have lean beef, salmon etc.
    3. You should stay away from highly processed meats like; bacon, sausage, etc.
    4. Plant based proteins are fine as well like tofu and beans.
  2. Healthy Carbs
    1. Veggies, fruits, whole grains; all kinds, yes including bread!
    2. Limit the amount of sodas, juices, cakes, cookies, chips, anything highly processed and jam packed with sugar.
  3. Healthy Fats
    1. Monounsaturated fats like; nuts, natural nut butters, olive oil, etc.
    2. Try to use less animal fat laden foods and trans fats like; fast foods, lard, some salad dressings, etc.

Now that you have an idea of what foods you should be eating, don’t stress. Chips and cookies are not off the table completely, you do not have to eat only healthy foods all the time. Eating healthy foods only all the time would be my nightmare and unsustainable for most of us. What you should be aiming for is having the main staples of your diet be healthy foods, and don’t be afraid to use spices and sauces modestly to keep things tasting good. For example if you were to take a photo of everything you ate and drank 80% or more of the photos would be of nutrient dense foods.

 

Part B: Meal Structure and Planning

i) Meals

Now that you’re eating mostly healthy foods we want to add some structure to your diet. This can have lots of benefits like saving money, limiting food waste, reducing meal time choice anxiety, and helps to make sure each meal is giving us what we need.

So what should most of your meals look like? The core of each meal should start with your protein source. This is super important for your muscles, satiety, and all kinds of other things. The protein sources should be about the size of your fist, if it’s not exact don’t sweat it, you don’t have to cut off the corner of your steak because it was 3cm bigger than your hand.

 Next you should add a serving of veggies, this can be anywhere from one serving about the size of your fist again, to 3x the size of your fist depending on how much you want and like to eat veggies. If you don’t like veggies, come on now, give it a try they are super good for you find a few that aren’t too bad. It’s not a big deal how you prepare your veggies, you just don’t want them coated in things like oil or butter. 

Now you can (but don’t have to) add whole grains, fruit, and/or healthy fats to your meals. Any kind of whole grain is fine, anything you’d like, fruits are best if they are fresh, and healthy fats can be whatever you decide, be sure to keep in mind your cooking oil. You decide the amount of these by preference and hunger/energy levels. If you’re feeling very hungry add some extra carbs or fats.

Keep in mind every meal doesn’t have to fit this structure. Some meals can have just protein and veggies, some can have just healthy carbs and veggies, or healthy carbs and proteins. I like to follow the 3-5 ingredient meal structure most of the time, which means when I plan my meals I ensure my plate is filled with single ingredient whole foods. An example of this would be: Lean ground beef, broccoli, green beans, air fried sweet potato fries. After that meal is decided I’ll add spices or sauces to give it the flavour I want.

 

ii) Snacks

You can have snacks! Don’t have them just because you’re bored though, try to only snack when you are actually hungry but don’t have the time for a full meal. You should also try to keep them healthy too (they don’t always need to be healthy though). Snacks that are protein based like protein bars or turkey jerky are going to be excellent because they will keep you full longer until you have time for your next meal. Snacks that are treats can be fun and great with a movie or for dessert but they won’t make you feel full for long so aren’t a great choice for regular snacks.

 

iii) Planning

This is a great time to talk about planning, it is a small part but can make a big difference when it comes to diet adherence. It is an excellent idea to sit down before you go to the grocery store and make a shopping list with the foods and approximate amounts of what you plan to eat over the week. Not only will this help reduce your grocery bill by staving off impulse buys but also increase your likelihood of eating healthy foods because you wont have as much unhealthy food in your house, not many people are impulse buying broccoli it’s usually unhealthy snacks.

Following these guidelines is going to be a really awesome start to improving your diet. Remember to speak with your health care provider before making changes to your diet.