Six tips to help you build a healthy diet

Building a healthy diet isn't as restrictive as many people imagine. To build a healthy diet, the essential steps are to eat more foods derived from plants such as vegetables, fruits, whole grains and legumes, and limit the intake of highly processed foods.

Eat various kinds of food

Different kinds of food offer different kinds of nutrients. So it is necessary to eat a wide assortment of foods. In addition, consuming various kinds of food helps you reduce the exposure to any pesticides or toxic materials that may be present in a particular food.

Eat whole foods

That means eating oats and blueberries rather than a blueberry muffin. When you eat packaged foods, only buy brands that contain "real food" ingredients which refers to ingredients you easily recognize, pronounce, and would use to make a "from scratch" version in your own kitchen.

Take notice of portion sizes

You can eat as much broccoli and spinach as you want. However, for higher-calorie foods, it is necessary to control the portion. Portion sizes have increased over the years, and not watching your portion sizes can cause you to overeat. You may want to start measuring your food just to get an idea of what the portion size should look like. It may also help to use smaller plates so it will still seem like you are eating the same amount of food.

Make fruits and vegetables accessible

Keep plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables around for when you might be hungry. You can slice up fruit and vegetables and leave it in the fridge for when you may be looking for something to eat. It will be just as accessible as a bag of chips when you want a snack.

Reduce refined grains and foods with added sugar

White bread, pasta and many snacks always contain refined carbohydrates that have little or no dietary fiber at all. What's worse, they have been stripped of many nutrients. Therefore, before eating, you'd better take a good look at the food labels to make sure whether there is wheat flour on the ingredients list. Besides, you should eat fewer foods with added sugar, such as soda and candy because they can produce empty calories that will induce gained weight.

Change the way to protein intake

The key to ensuring you eat high-quality protein is to try different types, rather than relying on red meat and whole milk dairy products which are high in saturated fat. Trying different healthy protein sources such as fish, beans, nuts, seeds, peas, tofu, chicken, and soy products will open up new options for healthy mealtimes.