Overhaul your diet

Transform your life, starting with a new healthy meal plan.

Are you serious about transforming your life and becoming a healthier and more vibrant you? A healthy diet is the perfect place to start. A diet bereft of nutritious, natural foods leaves your immunity weakened, dampens your energy levels, and affects the way you deal with stress and the way you think and feel.

In today’s fast-paced life we often skip meals or go for fast, packaged food as an easy option. Here are some simple ways to incorporate healthy eating into your daily life so you can feel the positive results in six weeks.

Breakfast

• Eat breakfast! Skipping the first and most vital meal of the day will lead to those dreaded mid-morning energy slumps, leaving you craving coffee and sugary carbohydrate foods.
• Ideal breakfast A desirable way to start the day is with some fibre-rich oats – natural or Bircher muesli or porridge with a combination of mixed nuts, seeds, yoghurt and some fresh or dried fruit.
• Not hungry? If you’re not hungry in the morning, try a light fruit salad with yoghurt, or spelt toast with hummus, avocado or almond butter. You can have something more substantial later.
• Wake up feeling ravenous? Try a more hearty, protein-rich breakfast such as scrambled or poached eggs with avocado on rye toast, an omelette with baby spinach, or baked beans and grilled tomato on wholegrain toast.
• Early gym-goer? You will benefit from having a protein-rich smoothie after training, which will supply the raw materials needed for repair and recovery. Try adding skim milk, protein powder, frozen banana or berries, LSA or chia seeds, and some yoghurt.
• Avoiding gluten and dairy? Eat gluten-free toast or muesli, or puffed brown rice, buckwheat, or amaranth, with almond, rice or soy milk, topped with fruit, nuts and seeds.

Lunch

• A healthy lunch containing protein will help prevent the afternoon munchies and stop you from overeating at dinner.
• If you don’t have anything in the cupboard, an easy, healthy lunch is a salad sandwich with some protein (boiled egg, leftover lamb or roast chicken, turkey, tinned tuna, or low-fat cheese) or a salmon and green leafy salad with a little crumbled low-fat fetta. Roast vegies, nuts, seeds and legumes (chickpeas and lentils) make a great addition to salads. Leftovers are handy for lunch the next day, so make a little extra at night.

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• No time to prepare something or tend to buy your lunch? Choose healthy options such as sushi or rice paper rolls with a miso soup; wraps with lots of salad and some low-fat protein (hold the mayo); or healthy salads (without creamy dressings).
• If you’re tempted by a greasier meal, opt for a stir-fry with vegies and steamed rice; or a healthy burger with lots of salad on a wholegrain bun (hold the mayo and chips).

Dinner

If you’re home late and need a quick and healthy dinner that’s not too heavy, try whipping up a vegetable frittata or omelette with a salad; soup with crusty wholegrain bread; toasted tortilla filled with a little crumbled low-fat fetta and choice of healthy fillings; or a miso soup with seaweed, tofu and vegies.

• Feel like takeaway? For the occasional takeaway, try options such as grilled fish or roast chicken (without skin) with salad; Thai or Vietnamese stir-fry with lots of fresh vegies and steamed rice, or sushi with miso soup. Healthy, homemade pizzas and burgers are always easy too.
• On a budget? Try making curries or lentil dahls with brown rice, chicken skewers with salad, fish cakes with steamed vegies and oven-baked
• sweet potato chips.
• Starving? If your tummy’s rumbling and you feel like something more substantial for dinner, try roast lamb with steamed vegies and roast pumpkin, fresh pesto salmon pasta with a green salad, or a tuna steak with steamed greens and mash.
• Picky eaters? For those who just feel like picking, make up a mezze plate with some hummus, babaghanoush or tzatziki, with flat bread and oven-baked falafels.

snacks to have on hand

• Trail mix: raw and unsalted nuts and seeds, dried fruit
• Fresh fruit
• Hummus with vegie sticks or crackers
• Tub of yoghurt
• Rice cakes topped with low-fat cottage cheese, tomato and avocado

Drinks

• Drink at least one to one-and-a-half litres of water every day.
• Fresh juices, especially vegie juices, are good for your health, but they’re a concentrated source of natural sugars so don’t overdo them. Try diluting.
• Black tea contains caffeine so stick to one or two cups a day. Try herbal teas instead.
• Sip antioxidant-rich green tea.
• Coffee can overstimulate the nervous system, so try to limit your intake to one a day.
• It’s fine to have a few alcoholic drinks a week. Red wine is best.

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