A study published in the "New England Journal of Medicine" in February 2009 revealed that what you eat isn't important for losing weight -- it's all about the calories. Participants in the study were told to reduce their calories, and they were tested with a variety of diets that eliminated different macronutrients. The results showed that when participants reduced how much they ate -- no matter what they ate -- they reduced their waistlines by an average of 2 inches at the end of the two-year study period. Thus, eating healthier to get the variety of nutrients you need is as simple as watching your portion size and eating well, but in moderation.
Eating Well
Sometimes, you might feel that nutritionists send you on an endless wild goose chase, from food pyramids to calorie counters to body mass indexes. Nutrition expert and author Michael Pollan has a simple solution of how to eat well. "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants," he says. By "food," Pollan refers to simple, whole foods that have been around for hundreds of years -- things like tomatoes, apple, potatoes, rice and bananas. He is not talking about sugary fluorescent cereals or star-shaped chicken nuggets.
Eating Better Quality
Choosing quality over quantity can help you easily reduce the number of calories you take in. Paying closer attention to the fewer foods you do eat can ensure that you're getting more micronutrients -- which Americans are generally deficient in -- and fewer macronutrients -- which we generally get too much of. Pollan notes that investing in delicious but more expensive organic food, for example, can help you turn your meals into flavorful extravaganzas full of color and taste, meaning you'll might just feel more satisfied from a midsize portion of goat-cheese-and-arugula salad topped with pine nuts than you would have consuming a plateful of boring pasta with meat sauce in your earlier days.
Cutting Out Sugary Drinks
Two easy ways to eliminate empty calories from your diet is to eat more nutritious and satisfying foods like whole grains, fruits and vegetables, and to cut out sugary drinks from your diet. The Harvard School of Public Health notes that sugared soda, plus fruit drinks and juice, can give you several additional calories a day that you hardly notice. According to research cited by Harvard, those who drink soda or other sugary drinks are more likely to gain weight than those who don't. Try drinking water flavored with a slice of lemon instead.
Cut Out Junk Food
Nearly 40 percent of calories consumed by kids under 18 come from nutritionally poor, highly processed foods. According to a late 2010 report on the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, just six foods -- soda, sugary fruit drinks, grain desserts, dairy desserts, pizza and whole milk -- made up half of these calories. Do yourself and/or your kids a favor and get these highly processed foods out of the "normal foods" category and into the "occasional treat" category. Switch to low-fat milk. Bring healthier whole-grain snack options and meals into your home by checking out local farmer's markets for reasonably priced seasonal natural foods.
Avoid Fad Diets
The Harvard School of Public Health also reports that though they may work in the short-term, strange or extreme diets are bound to fail eventually. You can eat almost anything you want in moderation, as long as the basis of your diet is a healthy mix of different species of whole grains, fruits and vegetables, especially leafy veggies as noted by Pollan.
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