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Incorporating Healthy Foods into Your Family's Diet

Here is a situation where doublethink helps. While of course you are aware of which foods are more or less "healthy," it's best to try not to think of them as being good or bad, cure-alls or disasters. We should all learn which kinds of foods do a more efficient job of keeping us strong and healthy, but we shouldn't be slaves to the calorie chart or nutrition update. Even before our food nourishes us, it pleases us. That said, you can skew your family's diet toward more of the "better for you, harder working" foods, while offering them fewer of the empty calorie options. Learn ways to prepare these 'better for you" foods so that you look forward to them. Think about nudging your taste buds a bit along a continuum, so that the foods you enjoy are more likely to coincide with the foods that do your body the most good.

One cookbook has the clever subtitle putting vegetables at the center of the plate. Don't focus on what you are denying yourself and your family. Take pleasure in an expanded range of delicious foods. The odds are that , once you have gotten used to your adapted diet, you will feel physically better, and the old foods will seem heavy, greasy, salty; lacking in taste.

There are two approaches to working this shift: the "hide the vegetables in the meatloaf" school, and the "glory in the greens" option. You can easily go for both. Check out your regular recipes. Experiment with reducing the amounts of sugar and salt. Substitute lower-fat versions of dairy products and meats. Many adjustments will go unnoticed, or will enhance the flavor. And read, and heed, the nutrition information on food labels. You may be shocked and dismayed by what you find, but you will be able to make more informed decisions.

Discuss nutrition with your kids, but keep it age-appropriate and fun. Talk about how some foods help them to be fast, strong, and smart. Don't label anything "good' or "bad," "allowed" or "forbidden." Just change the amounts and frequencies. When eating away from home, try to stay away from the places that are overloaded with overloaded food, and, wherever you are, help your kids make healthy choices. Don't forget to lead by example.

Lastly, don't harp on any of this. You may amass a good deal of knowledge about what is good for you and what is not, but when you are actually sitting down to a meal, do everyone a favor: relax and enjoy each other and the food.

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