Can anyone recommend a decent book about nutrition please?

[TilleeFloss]

After years of dieting/not dieting, I really feel like I've lost sight of what a healthy diet is. My relationship with food is a mess and I really feel I need to re-calibrate and look at my thinking around food. I swing between feast and famine time and again.

Anyhoo, part of this needs to be learning what a healthy diet actually is, not a diet for weight loss itself, but a diet which creates a healthy body and mind.

I've done WW and low carb before and one of the things which knocks me is eating weird foods. For example, on weight watchers I ended up eating tonnes of low fat yoghurts which I didn't even like. I know these are full of sweeteners/sugars and chemical fillers. On low carb I end up eating a very restricted diet of mainly roasted slabs of meat, with perhaps some weirdy stuff made with almond flour .

So I'd like to avoid processed food I think, but WHAT IS A HEALTHY DIET??

Patrick Holford is good.

If you avoid refined carbs - sugar and white flour in the main, eat whole grains, plenty of green leaves, fruit and veg and good quality protein you'll do fine.

Fill up on homemade soup at lunchtime if it's practical. Put plenty of salad in sandwiches/on the side of your plate. Cut down on carbs with your evening meal - have veg and salad instead.

Try reading The Slow Down Diet by Marc David. Not really a diet, more of an approach. When it comes down to actual healthy eating guidelines though, it also recommends avoiding (not banning) white/starchy carbs, processed food and sugar and ensuring you get plenty of good quality protein, good fat and wholefood carbs and of course veg.

There's a group of us following this sort of approach (mindful eating and nourishing choices - enjoying great food and not dieting) on the Eating Better thread in Food here - I'd recommend reading through the first one to get a good idea of where its all coming from

I like Eat Yourself Young.

thank you, I'll look at these.

Sleepwhenidie, can you link to the thread please? I can't find it.

Hi - Eating Better

To be honest I would say there isn't one.
They are ALL biased in one way or another. I have just lost 5 stone and in that time have probably read about 15 of the most popular books that have been written about nutrition/weight loss/health over the last 5-10 years.

Some are low carb based and presented as fact.
Some are plant based and presented as fact.
Some are about the evils of sugar.
Some are about the benefits are high protein including meat and dairy.
Some are about the benefits of vegetarian/veganism.

All quote proper research that they feel illustrates their 'truth'.

I'm a HCP myself with an academic background and find it a minefield.

I'd be interested to read an unbiased book myself! I'm not a fan of Patrick Holford.

It is a minefield itchy, you are right, for every theory about any kind of diet you can find another arguing against it . There are hugely biased studies depending on who is funding them too.

Most nutritionists are pretty united on their general view of sugar and processed food and HFCS/transfats but that's about it. The Slow Down Diet doesn't go much beyond that, it very much emphasises that no food is inherently good or bad and should be banned and that we should also always listen to what our own body is telling us about particular food - if kale, currently the 'healthiest' thing you can eat - gives you stomach cramps and a rash then clearly it isn't that healthy for you and you should avoid it . That sometimes, we really do need a piece of cake, not for its nutritional value but for what it does for us emotionally (not to be confused with consistent emotional eating). Also, don't ever assume that just because a certain way of eating - vegetarianism for example - works well for you at one stage of your life, it will continue to do so.

not a fan of Patrick Holford - that's interesting.

For me it's shopping the outside of supermarkets! (Crap is usually in he middle)
So fish, meat, veg, fruit. Some dairy. Eggs. Nuts. I try to keep it as natural as possibly. Although sometimes only a slab of chocolate cake will do so I eat it, then carry on as normal