Healthy Foodie Rule #8: Monitor Your Health

Even if you follow all the best health habits to the letter--and let's face it, who does?-- you can't control every variable. Genetics (family health history) plays a huge part in our fate, and those factors are totally out of our control.

Therefore, be sure to get regular checkups and all recommended screening tests for your age and gender. Pay attention to your body and don't ignore physical or emotional symptoms that you know aren't right.

I have personal experience to attest that even healthy foodies can have life-threatening health challenges well before old age. My father, grandfather and brother all have or had coronary artery disease -- a bad heart.  Those same genes reared their head, so to speak, on my own heart a few years ago and I've had to deal with it ever since.

Suffice it to say that we should never take our good health for granted.

Snacking is Good....If you "snack smart"

Healthy Foodie Rule #7: Snack Smart

I don't skip meals, and I don't skips snacks, either.

While not all nutritionists agree about the wisdom of snacking, I find it helps me keep from eating too much at mealtime.

The key, of course, is to choose your snacks wisely. Having healthful snacks at hand makes it far less likely you'll grab a coworker's cookies or hit the vending machines.

My top snack strategy is to make several days' worth of raw veggie and fruit snacks, put them in single serving zip-lock plastic bags and grab one when needed.

My baggies usually include slices of orange bell pepper, crispy-sweet sugar snap peas, and apple slices. A small tangerine (Clementine) is a good fruit choice, too. As summer approaches and apples become mealy, I'll find a substitute fruit such as a handful of cherries.

What else to snack?

I'm a huge fan of Trader Joe's peanut butter pretzels, the variety with "no salt on the pretzel." You still get salt in the PB itself, so you won't feel deprived of a salty snack. At the same time, you won't be overdoing the sodium. Joe's also has a multigrain corn chip that satisfies my urge for a savory crunch.

In the evenings I want something sweet, so I might go for a few squares of dark chocolate -- a favorite "everyday" chocolate is Lindt's Intense Orange. Stopping at 3-4 squares can be a challenge, though, so don't go there if your tendency is to eat the whole bar.

Otherwise, I like the single serving puddings you can find in the dairy case--Kozy Shack rice pudding or chocolate pudding are both quite good. And no temptation to eat too much, since it's portion controlled.

Other recommended snacks -- choose the ones you like best -- include a container of low-fat or fat-free, no sugar added yogurt; a handful of no-salt-added nuts; a small bowl of cereal with skim milk; crackers (or apple slices) with a smear of crunchy, natural peanut butter; one piece of string cheese, maybe with a half a pear.

Smart snacking can help keep your blood sugar level, your energy on an even keel, and minimize the danger of falling off the healthy foodie wagon!

Eat Fat to Lose Fat

It's a tough time of year, weight wise: we've evolved to store calories in winter, and if you're like me -- that's what your body is doing!
So I've been reiterating some of my guiding principles in recent posts. These are health/eating/activity "rules" that might be broken more often than not, but still are great ideas to keep in mind.

(See previous posts for what you've missed)

Healthy Foodie Rule #6: Eat Good Fats

Unless a physician tells you otherwise, there's no reason to avoid all types of fat. The ones from plant sources known as monounsaturated fatty acids (abbreviated as MUFA) should be part of the healthy foodie's diet. The fat in many types of fish is also good for us.

Conversely, we should minimize or avoid "bad" fats, which include those from animal sources--found mostly in meat, poultry and dairy products--as well as the largely man-made stuff known as trans fats that extends shelf life in a range of processed foods.

This posting is about what we should be eating, and less about what to avoid, so I'll make the avoidance part brief. For packaged foods, read labels. If the ingredient list includes the words "partially hydrogenated," put the thing back on the shelf and step away! Avoid fatty cuts of meat--or avoid meat/red meat altogether; remove all skin and visible fat before you eat meat, fish or poultry; choose fat-free or low-fat dairy products.

OK, enough of what not to do. Here are some of the fats we CAN and SHOULD eat. Of course, fat of all kind has more calories by weight than do the other food groups (proteins and carbohydrates), so if weight control is an issue, be careful not to overdo.

AVOCADO not only tastes marvelous, it also is a very healthful food.

NUTS of all kinds are loaded with MUFA and satisfy hunger longer than many other snacks; add nuts to cereal and/or salads for a MUFA boost.

OLIVE OIL as well as CANOLA OIL are great for you. The lauded Mediterranean diet is based on cooking with olive oil -- and eating it on bread (instead of butter or margarine) and salads, among other uses. Olive oil is our go-to oil for dipping and for salad dressings, while I usually cook with canola or peanut oil thanks to their higher smoke point. 

Fatty fish such as salmon also constitutes good fat.

Being healthier in 2014: here's how

Just adhere to these Healthy Foodie Principles, as much as you can.
The ones I've covered so far (details in previous posts, below), are:
1. Eat at home and cook your own food
2. Eat 9 servings of fruits and veggies daily (not as hard as it sounds)
3. Exercise 45-60 minutes (almost) every day
4. No supermarket or fast-food meat (it's really, really bad for us)

Next........

Healthy Foodie Rule #5: MINMIZE LIQUID CALORIES

I try to limit beverages to these (in order of amount consumed):

Water, tea, wine, coffee, cocktails--and a very occasional soda.

Plain water, whether bottled or tap, should be every healthy foodie's main beverage. If you drink alcohol -- as I often do, having wine with dinner -- be sure to drink one glass of water for each glass of wine or other alcoholic beverage.

Tea is my morning caffeine drink of choice -- I make a large pot with loose-leaf black tea every day. Many studies conclude that both tea and coffee can, or even should, be part of a healthful diet, with green tea having the most beneficial substances.

As you probably know, wine and especially red wine has been shown to have health benefits, although consuming more than a drink or two a day of any alcohol should be avoided.

The drinks I actively avoid are those that add nothing but empty calories to my daily tally--or the vitamins in them are overwhelmed by the sugar and/or fat they contain. This means no soda -- I minimize diet sodas to a couple of times a week -- and no fruit juices. Not to mention no milkshakes or obscenely caloric coffee drinks.

It's not that hard to stick to water when you're thirsty and simple coffee or tea when you need a caffeine boost. My strategy is to save as many of the liquid calories as possible for something I can sink my teeth into.

More useful foodie rules to live by

Here's my next installment (see prior posts for Healthy Foodie Rules #1-3)

Healthy Foodie Rule #4: NO SUPERMARKET OR FAST-FOOD MEAT

If you have watched "Food, Inc." or "Fresh," and/or read Michael Pollan's Omnivore's Dilemma or some of his other books, you know that our nation's industrial food system is terribly unhealthful and environmentally irresponsible. One of the worst offenders is how we raise, slaughter, distribute and consume meat -- not just beef and pork, but also poultry and seafood.

Unless you're vegetarian, it's almost impossible to opt out completely from the industrial meat system. For instance, when eating out you're highly likely to be served meat, poultry or fish that was inhumanely raised, fed ingredients that the animals don't naturally consume, handled in ways that promote dangerous food-borne illnesses and/or farmed (in the case of much seafood). It's daunting, when you think about it.

My response has been twofold. One, I try never to eat fast-food meat of any kind, including stuff I used to order occasionally such as an Arby's roast beef sandwich or a grilled chicken sandwich at one of the fast-food joints that seem to be your only choice sometimes. Frankly, this has not been hard since I have never been a fan of fast food. (One guilty exception: when I'm in North Carolina, I indulge in Bojangle's fried chicken. But this doesn't happen more than two meals in a year....)

Second, I will not buy meat or poultry at the supermarket, and I'm also very careful about where I buy fish.

When possible, I buy meat and poultry from local farmers who raise their animals naturally and handle their products with extreme care.

It's very hard to be 100% pure even in these halfway measures, but it's a step in the right direction.