It should be simple. It needs to be simple. Yet 52% of Americans believe doing their taxes is easier than figuring out how to eat healthfully.
Now maybe some people just have really easy taxes or 52% of their sample size were tax accountants. Either way, if people find it easier to settle how much money they owe the government then how to eat healthy on a daily basis, they will probably be grossly overweight. Our population is 69% overweight. Obesity costs the United States an estimated $147 billion dollars a year in medical expenses. What can be done to solve this quandary?
There are many theories, ideas, and correlations that have been provided to determine why the United States has become so overweight. We’re going to dive into three of those things you can do to improve your diet.
Prepared food has substantially more Calories than meals prepared at home, and people are poor judges of how many Calories are in the food.
Adult meals from fast food averaged 836 calories. The individuals underestimated how many Calories were in the food by 175. Restaurants can be even worse offenders. The average meal ordered during a study at 19 sit-down restaurant chains contained 1,128 Calories.
There is an interesting correlation with fast food and BMI level:
- Obese adults consume 13.2% of their total daily Calories from fast food.
- Normal and underweight adults consume 9.2% of their total daily Calories from fast food.
Without understanding how much energy you are actually consuming, it is really difficult to make accurate judgments on your daily Calorie intake. You can look up how many Calories are in many restaurants online. This will provide a guideline to how many calories and other nutrients are in the food. Understanding what you are eating is a key step to making conscious choices on what to eat. Lowering your consumption of food from restaurants will provide a more transparent view of your calorie intake.
Processed food can have far more salt, sugar, and fat than the non processed versions.
One frozen cheese pizza can have over 75% of your daily recommended sodium, fat, and calories. Check the nutrition information on the food you buy. You are often better off buying natural, unprocessed food. Even making your own versions of your favorite dishes will often be healthier than buying the original. There are countless easy recipes online that you can follow to make your own food. There are also inexpensive kitchen appliances that can cut your preparation time down substantially like crock pots and food processors. In addition it is typically far cheaper to prepare your own food rather than buying it from somewhere else. Unprocessed food is cheaper, healthier, and you have control over the ingredients.
Choose a fruit or vegetable you can use as a healthy snack.
Bringing a healthy snack can enable you to avoid the necessity of picking up processed or prepared food. There are a variety of healthy options that have a very low Calorie count:
- Medium Cucumber: 47 Calories
- Medium Tomato: 22 Calories
- 100 Snap Pea Pods: 140 Calories
- One Stalk of Celery: 6 Calories
- Medium Apple: 95 Calories
- Medium Carrot: 25 Calories
- Medium Bell Pepper: 24 Calories
There are countless other options. The easiest choice is the one you like the best.
Using fruits or vegetables as snacks can really help cut down on your total Calories. It would take 12 whole cucumbers to equal the same number of Calories in a McDonald’s Big Mac.
Making changes to your diet can be challenging. There are countless benefits to maintaining a healthy weight, even directly tangible ones like saving $1,429 annually on medical costs. Knowing how many Calories are in the food you get from restaurants is key to understanding how much energy you are consuming during the day. Processed food is usually less healthy than natural foods. Healthy snacks can help make you less dependent on restaurants.
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