Something is shifting in the world of nutrition. Suddenly, people are changing their relationship with food and focusing on what they are eating and the effect it is having on their health and the way they feel instead of fads, says Elizabeth Peyton-Jones, food and health expert and author of Eat Yourself Young. Here’s how it’s happening right now
1. Know what you are putting into your body
The new healthy eating is about making sense of confusing information regarding diet, food and labels. It’s about learning to create dishes that are less complicated, addictive, fatty and compulsive. It’s about finding an everyday diet that you can follow for most of the time without getting into a binge/deprivation cycle.
2. Indulging is fine
There is a new interest in finding a general healthy eating plan that doesn’t make you feel as if you are going back to ground zero whenever you break it, or that you’re a loser who will never be able to manage your weight or health properly. The new eating regime is about finding principles to follow for life, and building in indulgences that won’t ever send you off on a guilt trip.
3. Prevention is better than cure
The new healthy eating is also about bringing health awareness to the table, taking control of our health and wellbeing and relying less on doctors, hospitals and medication. Instead of treating the symptoms we will be trying to avoid getting ill in the first place with a balanced and nutrient-rich diet.
4. Good health is for everyone
Consumers are starting to realise that the tools to good health and optimum weight are in your kitchen and on your plate. It is your choice – good health is not for a select few. Make good food a gift you give yourself every day because you want power, concentration, good self-esteem and a passion for life rather than exhaustion, illness, lack of focus and depression.
5. We are what we eat
The new army of health-conscious foodies now understand that the food we eat has profound consequences on our bodies (physical), attitudes (mental), and impacts on both our short and long term health. For example: if you have a headache, maybe your liver is congested and needs a light detox, or maybe you are dehydrated. Stomach pains normally occur because of a low grade inflammation or intolerance. Try and find the source and change your eating and drinking to help sort it out.
6. Ditching the sugar
We’re all at last cutting down on sugar as we begin fully to understand its detrimental effect on our health and weight. Not all sweet was created equal: sugar is complicated and made more so by scientists who have created synthesised sweet yet low calorie tastes, thus fooling us into believing there is no detrimental impact to the body.
7. Spicing it up
Herbs and spices have made a comeback having been downgraded over the years to a garnish or flavouring. Yet for thousands of years before they were used medicinally. As we come to understand the benefits of ginger, chilli, cinnamon, fennel, turmeric, basil, mint and parsley, we can learn to use the kitchen as a pharmacy to good health and a healthy weight.
Elizabeth’s bestselling book Eat Yourself Young: Take Years Off Your Looks with This Revolutionary New Eating Plan
(Quadrille, £12.99) has been updated and reprinted. Elizabeth Peyton-Jones’s website is epjhealth.com
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