To think there is a poor understanding of a healthy diet?

[LivelyLemonQuoter]

I think most people think they know what a healthy diet looks like, but in reality they do not. I see so many comments on MN that demonstrate this.

The most common one is that fruit should be limited because of its sugar content. This is very bad advice. Sugar in fruit has little impact on our blood sugar levels. And most people in the UK do not eat enough fruit.

The other is concern over eating any carbs. Wholemeal bread and pasta is fine, carbs in pastry and doughnuts is not great though.

And most people need to eat more nuts. Nuts are very good for you and should be part of your regular diet.

Protein needs do go up with age, and it helps ward off sarcopenia, so it’s not all a con.

The RDA of 60g is on the low side in your 40s and beyond where 1-1.3g/kg is considered more appropriate.

It was slightly facetious, some of that does sound nice, the soup and bread for example. But I eat meat or fish most days. And snacks are crisps and chocolate.

Im perfectly healthy, do lots of exercise (21k steps today for example) and at 46 years old ive had maybe 3 sicks days since year 9 at school. Health is not just about what you eat. Food is a great source of joy in my life.

Bread is a UPF and not healthy at all, so you probably shouldn’t be preaching your “healthy diet” as though you’re somehow above everyone else 😬

I buy frozen blueberries frol ALDI and add them to cooking porridge. B and M do cheap packs of mixed seeds.

Wow interesting that oats were bad, were they whole oats?

Have you heard of orthorexia, OP? It's an eating disorder.

Supermarket bread yes. I make soda bread at home, takes literally 35 minutes, 5 mins to mix ingredients (no proving and no kneading), 30 mins to cook.

Real bread is made from simply flour, salt, water and yeast (not always added). Most supermarket bread is ultra processed and has emulsifiers added to make it more palatable, softer and to extend shelf life. Also things like palm oil and sugar.

120g of protein is a heck of a lot of meat.

50-60g is fine unless you're seriously working out.

In the west nearly everyone gets enough protein. You do not need to worry about protein.

Instant oats are not good, but rolled oats and oat bran are good. I eat mainly oat bran, takes about 3 mins cooked on the hob.

Where are your three pulses?

Is it a healthy diet or orthorexia?

OMG calm down Gillian McKeith

So you’re vegan.

A vegan diet is not the pinnacle of ideal health. It has some good elements, but is far too restrictive, limited and misses key nutrients like iron and B12 (and for me personally, is boring!)

For my dinner tonight I had a steak with potato wedges, asparagus, broccoli & pepper sauce. It was absolutely delicious and that kind of food makes me feel amazing.

I suspect that on the less healthy days steak cut chips feature.

I think that all sounds perfectly delicious. With variety every day. we must all have different tastes I guess.

No I am not vegan.

We just try as a household to eat as close to source and organic where possible.

Breakfast is porridge, home made museli or weetabix or eggs as we avoid processed cereals. A selection of fruit and our own home made yoghurt.
We have a breadmaker and I buy organic flour in bulk delivered to my door.
I make our own jam and want to expand into bottling and preserving more.

We've a couple of acres and have planted some fruit trees and shrubs, and this year will plant some staple vegetables to get us started.

We are pretty blessed we have the space to do these things. But I'm also very blessed that we live so rural that a takeaway is a rare treat and much less a temptation.
My city based family find it really hard because they drive past dozens of takeaways after a ling shift and often end up caving for an easier option rather than face up to an hour cooking.

How are you defining ‘healthy’? And based on what?

Sainsbury's Soft Multiseed Wholemeal, Taste the Difference

INGREDIENTS: Wholemeal Wheat Flour, Water, Mixed Seeds (14%) (Sunflower Seeds, Brown Linseed, Millet, Poppy Seeds), Wheat Gluten, Yeast, Sugar, Fermented Wheat Flour, Salt, Rapeseed Oil, Soya Flour, Spirit Vinegar, Malted Barley Flour, Malted Wheat Flour, Rye Flour, Palm Oil, Flour Treatment Agent: Ascorbic Acid.

This is better than the bread I make at home. I don't use that many different seeds and grains, and I stopped adding soya flour to mine as it made the texture weird.

Nah. I think most people know perfectly well what a healthy diet looks like. They choose against it for various reasons.

I think a bigger problem is people's idea of how many calories are in food vs how many calories they think they burn.

E.g. a fried of mine did a whole 60 minutes in the gym. Light jogging on treadmill and some light weights and some stretching. I did some cardiovascular intervals on treadmill, heavy weights and stretching. She then ate an entire tub of Ben and Jerry's icecream on the basis she burned this off at the gym. Ice cream = 1200 calories. Gym work out was about 300 calories at a push.

I think most have no idea the amount of exercise required to burn off excessive calories.

I'm not overweight, I know perfectly well what a healthy diet looks like, i just CHOOSE not to get my calories in the healthiest way sometimes. But I do eat the right amount of calories for my height and exercise level.

Where’s your meat and oily fish?

Bread is not healthy. It’s a cheap filler with very little nutritional content.

Oats are okay in moderation but read up on glyphosate poisoning from the oats being sprayed. I eat oats occasionally because I enjoy them but I wouldn’t eat regularly.

Rice (which I’m assuming you ate with your curry) is also polluted with arsenic. Again, you assume it’s healthy but it’s not really.

And this is the issue that it isn’t clear and pesticides and growing methods can make healthy produce quite unhealthy.

Fair, and individually those dishes are delicious I’m sure, but there’s no way I’d be able to maintain that kind of diet without craving something slightly less wholesome after a couple of days

‘Sugar in fruit has little impact on our blood sugar levels’

Yep, you’re not as knowledgeable as you think, OP. Ask any diabetic or woman with gestational diabetes. I was both of those and had to monitor my blood closely. Thankfully due to keto and having had my baby some time ago, my diabetes was reversed.