Eat Your Veggies (AND Fruits!)
If you've been following for a bit, you might remember the Keys to Better Health, and along with getting up and moving and drinking enough water, one of the top most important things you can do for yourself is eat some actual vegetables.
I personally love vegetables but I also, like many of you, don't always get enough (I may or may not have been putting off writing about this one!)
So...how can you get more vegetables into your diet?
Add some in at breakfast. There are NO rules about what kinds of foods to eat in the morning. The typical American breakfast doesn't include many veggies, but they're a staple in many cultures around the world. Throwing some spinach, mushrooms, or tomatoes (technically a fruit, I know) in with some eggs, or adding spinach or kale to a smoothie, is an easy way to check off some of those servings right off the bat.
Start lunch or dinner with a salad. First, let me say you don't need to ever eat a salad to "eat healthy" so if you are totally anti-lettuce, skip to the next point. For all of you who are open to salads, having one at the beginning of the meal ensures you get some of that powerful plant goodness in, no matter what the rest of the meal looks like.
Keep it simple (I am all about keeping it simple!) If you don't like salad, but you also hate actually cooking, you can still get your vegetables in! I'm a huge fan of the Steam-in-the-Bag frozen vegetables. You can get almost any vegetable in that form, they're frequently on sale, you can even get them seasoned or sauced, and they take less time to cook than pasta or chicken nuggets.
Snack! Most of us are doing it anyway, so use your snacks to help you get in an extra serving or two of fruits and vegetables. Carrot sticks, celery with peanut butter, bell peppers (plain or with hummus), cucumber slices, apples with peanut butter, grapes, oranges... Fruits & vegetables are easy to take along if you're on the go because they come with a built-in container and they're often naturally portioned out.
Do we really need to eat vegetables?
I think we're all adults here, but now that mommy's not forcing you to eat your veggies, some of y'all are slacking (90% of you, according to the CDC.) YES YOU NEED TO EAT VEGETABLES.
They keep your digestive system moving thanks to fiber, they help you stay hydrated, they contain powerful antioxidants that reduce the risk of countless diseases, and they have important vitamins and minerals to keep your body functioning properly. (More specifics here.)
And yes, you should, for the most part, actually eat them in their whole food form. Although multivitamins and greens supplements are popular and easy, they're not better than nature. Consuming vitamins and minerals in their natural states via less-processed fruits and vegetables often improves our ability to actually absorb them.
But, Justine, I don't like vegetables...
If you think you don't like vegetables, I would challenge you to consider whether you actually just don't like the vegetables you've tried, in the way that they've been prepared.
Maybe you, like me, grew up thinking Brussels sprouts were little cabbages that floated around in a boiling pot of water when, in reality, they are incredible, crispy, and delicious when roasted with bacon and balsamic vinegar. Perhaps steamed is too boring and veggie-like, and you actually prefer your vegetables seasoned, then sautéed or roasted.
Different methods of cooking and combining different foods and spices can actually impact how much of the vitamins and minerals you absorb, so try those vegetables again, and in a few different ways, before you swear them off!
Need some inspiration? Check out this guide from Precision Nutrition.
What about fruit? Isn't it bad?
I eat way more fruits than vegetables. Fruit has gotten a bad rap recently because of "sugar," but saying fruit is somehow unhealthy for you because it has more natural sugars than vegetables is just plain wrong.
The type of sugar in fruit is fructose. This is not the same as "high-fructose corn syrup," but fructose is a component of high-fructose corn syrup, as well as in honey, agave syrup, table sugar, and other sweeteners.
Consuming fructose from fruit is different than consuming fructose from foods or drinks where it is added (i.e., soda, candy).
When you eat actual fruit, you're consuming not just the fructose, but also water, fiber, vitamins, and minerals.
While you can easily go over the recommended amount of fructose with one soda or Frappuccino, it would take A LOT of actual fruit to hit that mark -- and thanks to the water and fiber of the fruit, it's unlikely your stomach would allow you to eat that many apples at once!
The bottom line...
Before you start in on another trendy diet or cut calories or spend money on expensive supplements, take a look at what you're actually eating. If your intake is light on whole fruits and vegetables, THAT'S where you should start.
