5 New Year Resolutions To Give Your Diet A Healthy Makeover

January 6, 2015

It’s a great time to take up fitness and inculcate healthy eating habits in your life. But if you’re too busy for a major lifestyle change, promise yourself that you’ll take baby steps to eat better this year. While you’re always told to eat the right food at the right time, that’s hardly ever enough. Refer to our list of resolutions, which will help you make small changes to your diet and shed pounds with little effort

1. No Soda In The Refrigerator

If it’s in your refrigerator, you’ll drink it. So keep soda out of sight. A single can contains 10 teaspoons of sugar. Excessive intake of these drinks is the culprit behind obesity and diabetes among Americans. High in sugar, sodium and caffeine, they also cause excessive dehydration. Their phosphorus content slows down digestion and degrades the body’s ability to absorb nutrients, especially calcium. Diet drinks are even worse, as they contain the sugar substitute aspartame, which is linked to health problems like seizures, multiple sclerosis, emotional disorders and even brain tumors. So this year, store healthy juices or make your own Watermelon Refresher or Greentini.

2. Add A Touch Of Superfood

If you’re finding it hard to lunch on superfoods like kale or quinoa, trick yourself into eating them. So go ahead, place avocado in your sandwich, or sprinkle your pasta or salad with flax seeds, hemp seeds or chia seeds. Add camu berry in your fro-yo or pudding, or make a gluten-free side dish of amaranth. A small amount of superfood will enrich your diet in a big way.

3. Keep Away From Packaged Foods

No matter how convenient it is to eat or store, keep away from processed or packaged foods. Full of preservatives and sodium, it dehydrates the body and spikes the blood pressure. On the other hand, a diet low in sodium decreases keeps the heart happy, and prevents weight gain and water retention. Snack on fresh fruit or crisp veggies, instead of chips and cookies.

4. Eat Less, Eat Often

Skipping meals is not doing you, or your metabolism any good. Leaving long gaps between meals leads to binge eating and mindless snacking. Having small, controlled portions of food at regular intervals helps in lowering cholesterol, enhances energy levels, and keeps metabolism alive. Make it a point to eat six small meals, with no more than four hours between any two meals of the day.

5. Add Color To The Plate

If you’ve been eating unhealthy as of last year, chances are, you are not adding enough color to your plate. Think about it—you have probably been eating only whites such as pasta, bread and rice. Adding color automatically revs up the nutrition quotient of your meal. That’s because different nutrients impart different colors to food. Blueberries get the blue from anthocyanins, that help in cognitive development, and carrots get the orange from carotene, which is great for the eyes. Cancer-protecting lycopenes cause tomatoes and watermelons to appear red. Go ahead, pick a rainbow of colors.