Simple Healthy Eating Diet Plan to Lose Weight

Weight loss is a challenge for most of us. Constant cravings long for mouth-watering sugary food, chips pop up everywhere compelling you to eat them, and the office party finger licking food is something you simply can't ignore.

But over time, your body gradually starts responding to the unhealthy amount of food you eat and it does so in an undesirable way. Overeating gives you an uncomfortable sensation of fullness, and eating the wrong things makes you feel guilty. Extra weight creeps on, affecting your body confidence and hindering your self-esteem.

So you set yourself on a mission to find a weight loss solution. But, with so much conflicting information out there and extreme diets promoting amazing weight loss in record time, you end up more confused than ever about what the right food to eat is in order to keep your body nourished and at the same time lose weight.

The Canadian Food Guide 2019

Luckily, coming to the rescue, the Canadian government has done the job for you. The Canadian Food Guide is the most up to date nutritional advice issued to the public on healthy eating. These are their recommendations:

• Vegetables and fruits - 50% of your plate

• Protein - 25% of your plate

• Whole-grain foods - 25% of your plate

• Make water your drink of choice

The guidelines give advice on making healthy food choices that promote health and reduce the risk of obesity and nutrition-related chronic diseases. But it also opens the public’s eye to the truth about the food industry and their marketing, and advises you to read food labels.

Now, on a weight loss plan, you have to make sure you eat a healthy and nutritious diet, and you also have to reduce your caloric intake. The Canadian Food Guide achieves this by removing the sugar and fat in processed foods, soda and high-fat meat. It also ensures you feel full for longer by including whole grains and excluding refined ones.

Can you trust the Canadian advice?

Health Canada prepared the food guide based on their review of food and nutrition studies. Industry-commissioned reports were excluded from the review. Canada's first food guide, in 1942, acknowledged wartime food rationing, while endeavoring to prevent nutritional deficiencies and to improve the health of the population.

It wasn't until 1982 that, in addition to preventing nutrient deficiencies, the guide now was integrated with the goal of reducing chronic diseases and therefore encouraged to limit fat, sugar, salt, and alcohol.

The 2007 guide made the 'vegetables and fruit' food group the most prominent one over whole grains, encouraged regular physical activity, added specific information on using food labels and encouraged the reduction of trans and saturated fats.

In it's 2019 version, Health Canada stayed true to their original vision and did not meet with industry representatives to discuss the food guide. Therefore it is based on nutrition studies and science, not on the biased opinions of the industry and their stock levels.

Going where no one has gone before

You may already be aware of what and how much to eat. But then again, it can be tedious and confusing when it comes down to actually putting it into practice. The Canadian Food Guide, aside from recommending what foods make up a healthy and nutritious diet, gives you advice on what to eat when you are out, recipes, mindful eating and eating healthy on a budget. You can find all the information here.

This is a full guide that looks at all the aspects of what following a healthy lifestyle means and shows you how to actually do it:

• it makes you aware of how food marketing can influence your choices so you know what you are putting into your body.

• it gives you recipes you already know and love and which you can make with real ingredients you have at hand.

• it shows you how to make a healthier grocery shopping and decrease sugar intake without sugar substitutes.

So forget about buying whatever diet book you have in mind for after Christmas and head to the Canadian Food Guide website instead, it's got all you need to eat healthy and lose weight.

If you want to discover what emotion drives your overeating,

take my Type of Eater Quiz

and receive personalised tips based on your results.

Conclusion

The Canadian Food Guide is based on actual nutritional evidence, it excluded the food industry from having any input and it focuses on achieving and maintaining health. It doesn't just advice people on what to eat, it shows you how to do it and how to overcome common obstacles. In my opinion, it's without a doubt the most comprehensive and useful guide ever issued by any country.

Thanks to the internet, this amazing resource is available for anyone and everyone to use and obtain the knowledge to make an informed decision on their health. However, each and every country has a responsibility to its people and their health. It's not right to allow the food industry or the weight loss industry to educate us on nutrition because their only interest is to make us profitable consumers.