A calmer approach to eating
We recommend a real food diet, eating from all food groups – fat, carb and protein – but we help people change their habits in terms of eating the right amount of each thing, not overeating, and learning that sometimes they’ll slip, and that’s fine, as long as their diet is good over the long-term. It’s a calmer approach to healthy eating for always, rather than a fad fix for a while until the next hair-brained regime appears.
So many people are afraid to drink whole milk, yet it’s only 3.9% fat – a high fat food is one of 17.5% or more. By having full fat foods, as they occur naturally, you’ll not only enjoy better taste but benefit from getting more of the fat soluble vitamins. Plus there’s added horror in reduced fat foods because when manufacturers create them they often add lots of sugar to make up for lost taste.
Carbs are good
As for carbohydrates, there is absolutely nothing wrong with eating them in moderation or an amount which is right for your activity level. It’s not carbs that make us fat, it’s overeating. We were designed to use carbs; whole grains are beneficial to health, they give us fibre and a good dose of B vitamins. Using carbs for exercise is what was meant to be, not stressing the body by driving it into ketosis by shunning carbohydrate.
You know how fat was bad for a while but now it’s coming back into favour? The same will happen with carbs again, just like it did in the 1990s for a couple of decades. These things go in fad cycles while they damage people’s mental health around food, and potentially their physical health too.
Portion size matters
We always state portion size for carbs on our plans, because they are notoriously easy to overeat, learning to reduce the amount of carbs you eat is very important, but cutting them altogether is not our policy.
You can use your hand as a portion size measure, about 2-3 fists of carbs each day is right for general daily activity.
Why a real food diet eating from all food groups works better in the long term
Diets that recommend very low fat, or low/no carbs will help people to lose weight, of course they will because it’s just cutting calories. But they won’t teach a person how to manage long-term, i.e. for the rest of their life, so when faced with carbs or fatty foods the person won’t have learned how to moderate, and will likely have super-large-cravings too. There will always be a handful of hardy individuals who can maintain such a regime for a long time but you’ll often find that when the next diet craze comes along they’ll switch to that.
By eating from all food groups and learning to eat only what you need you’ll be able to enjoy a varied diet packed with nutrients. You’re more likely to find suitable food choices wherever you go and you don’t have to stress any minutiae or count macros or tap what you’ve eaten into your phone. Stressing the numbers and breakdowns is no way to live and is a set up for long term failure, you can’r rely on technology and fads to drive your eating, you need to get back in touch with nature and your own body and feelings.
Healthy meal recipes
When you type ‘healthy meal recipes’ into google nowadays your search can be flooded with recipes posing as ‘healthy’ but in fact are full of artificial sweeteners and products substituting for real food. You can find hundreds of real healthy meal recipes on our recipe page and why not check out fantastic range of real food diet plans while you are there!
Rise above the crazy regimes. Eat less but better. Be active every day.
“Variety is what I would recommend; as variety is the spice of life in food, as in exercise. Change it up but don’t overdo it.”
Martina Navratilova
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