Getting the most from healthy fruits and vegetables
Tony Robinson

Fruits and vegetables are among the healthiest of all foods, and
the great variety of these foods at the local grocery store
makes it easier than every to enjoy great meals and snacks
anytime the mood strikes you.

The latest food guidelines recommend that adults eat from five
to nine servings of fruits and vegetables every day. While that
may seem like a lot, it is an important goal to strive for, and
a very reachable one.

A serving of a fruit or vegetable is equal to:

1 medium sized vegetable or fruit (such as an apple,
orange or banana) 2 small fruits (such as kiwi fruit or
plums)  cup of fresh, frozen or canned fruits or
vegetables  cup of 100% fruit juice  cup of
dried fruit 1 cup of green salad

Eating a diet that is rich in fruits and vegetables is a great
way to start a healthier lifestyle. Diets high in fruits and
vegetables have been shown to reduce the risk of heart disease,
diabetes, stroke and even some kinds of cancer. Diets high in
fruits and vegetables are also important in maintaining a
healthy weight.

Since different varieties of fruits and vegetables contain
different types and levels of nutrients, it is important to each
a good variety of fruits and vegetables. Eating a good
combination of yellow, orange, red and green fruits and
vegetables is a great way to ensure adequate levels of nutrition.

Fruits and vegetables are also an important source of fiber. One
way to maximize the amount of fiber you get from fruits and
vegetables is to eat the entire fruit and vegetable including
the edible peel. Eating fruits and vegetables whole, instead of
simply drinking fruit juice, is the best way to enjoy the fiber
these foods have to offer. Orange juice may be very healthy, but
it does not contain the same amount of fiber as a whole orange.

Getting sufficient fiber in the diet offers a great many health
benefits, including aiding in digestion, lowering levels of
cholesterol in the blood, reducing the risk of heart disease and
stroke, and reducing the chances of some forms of cancer. In
addition, fiber is though to play an important role in
controlling levels of blood sugar in diabetics. Fiber also helps
dieters feel full while limiting the number of calories you
consume.

Many people wonder if canned and frozen fruits and vegetables
are as healthy and nutritious as the fresh varieties. The simple
answer to this question is yes. Canned and frozen fruits and
vegetables contain just as many vitamins and minerals as their
fresh counterparts, so it is fine to replace fresh fruits and
vegetables with canned and frozen varieties when fresh ones are
not available.

Fresh fruits and vegetables are often less expensive, however,
especially when they are in season. In addition, local farmers
markets and produce stands are often great sources of the
freshest, most delicious fruits and vegetables at some excellent
prices.

How vegetables and fruits are prepared is just as important as
how they are chosen. It is important to rinse fresh fruit and
vegetables thoroughly under clean running water. This step is
important in order to remove any dirt, pesticide residue or
bacterial contamination. The outermost leaves of lettuce and
cabbage should be removed, and the outside of root vegetables
like carrots and potatoes should be removed, especially if you
plan to consume the skins of those vegetables. Vegetables and
fruits should be washed right before they are used in order to
keep them as fresh as possible.

The best ways to cook vegetables in order to maintain their
freshness are to boil, microwave or steam the veggies until they
are tender and crisp. It is best to use as little water as
possible when cooking vegetables. That is because overcooking
can destroy some of the valuable vitamins and minerals the
vegetables contain.

About the author:

Tony Robinson is a Company CEO, webmaster husband and dad. In
his busy lifestyle he has placed importance on health and
fitness. Visit http://www.eat-healthily.com for good eating tips
and techniques to assist you maintain a healthy lifestyle.

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Fruit for Breakfast The Secret to a Healthy Life
Robb Ksiazek

Do you want more energy? How about more of the vitamins, minerals and enzymes that your body craves? Try eating fruit for breakfast! Fresh fruit apples, grapefruit, strawberries, cherries, oranges, kiwi, melon, and grapes all count. In fact, any fruit works and there are so many to choose from. Eating fruit for breakfast will get you on the road to having a healthier body right away without having to pump a lot of iron at the gym or take sketchy supplements.

Why diet on fruit for breakfast you ask? Well, to make it simple, fruit in its raw form is exactly what your body needs for energy. It is easy to digest and the sugar from fruit (glucose) is in the form that your body can easily turn into energy. Instead of your body putting a lot of energy towards digestion and turning the food into a useable form of fuel, it is already in an easily digestible form. The energy goes straight to you. Eating nothing but fruit until lunchtime however much you want, is a sure fire way to lose weight and become more healthy, almost immediately.

How about a glass of juice is that the same as eating an orange? Not really and here is why. Most juice that you purchase at the grocery store is pasteurized. This means that it is heated to a high temperature to kill any bacteria and make the shelf life longer. During this process of heating, many of the wonderful enzymes in the juice are destroyed. Not to mention that many juices are filled with preservatives and sweeteners and are made from concentrates not the same as eating a fresh orange to your stomach or body! Youre better off with the real thing!

Try making a smoothie here is a recipe that I find very refreshing.

• 5 to 6 fresh strawberries
• 1/3 fresh cantaloupe
• 1/2 cup of fresh pineapple
• 1 fresh kiwi (peeled)
• About 1 cup of orange juice not from concentrate

Blend all ingredients until smooth and then enjoy! Making these delicious treats are a healthy way to start the day, improve your health, and lose weight!

If youre not sure about eating fruit for breakfast try it and see how wonderful you feel. If you arent convinced, eat a normal breakfast eggs, pancakes, or a bowl of cereal and see how you feel after eating fruit for a week. It will probably shock you with how tired and lethargic this food makes you feel in the mornings. So, get your metabolism started the right way in the morning enjoy a bowl of fresh fruit and start to feel better the old-fashioned way! Bon Appetite!

About the Author

Robb Ksiazek is a successful author and publisher for the informative Body-Mass-Index-4U.com. He believes in simple solutions in the quest for a fulfilled life through mind, body, and soul.

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Do you know how to use the five a day rule for healthy eating?
Zaak OConan

The five a day rule is one of the most important rules to healthy eating. The five a day rule refers to the government’s recommendation that everyone eat at least five servings a day of fruits and vegetables. At first blush, five a day seems like a reasonable goal, but most people fail to eat sufficient amounts of these important foods.

It is important to remember the many advantages of fruits and vegetables when applying the five a day rule to your own diet. For one thing, fruits and vegetables taste great, contain fewer calories than many other foods and are full of many important vitamins and minerals. In addition, fruits and vegetables are colorful and beautiful, making them great garnishes and salad toppings.

In addition, fruits and vegetables are easy to prepare, even for the busiest individual. In most cases, fresh fruits require no preparation at all, other than a quick wash and perhaps peeling.

The five a day recommendation equates to roughly two cups of fruit and two and a half cups of vegetables every day, based on the average 2,000 calorie diet. This is not a difficult goal to reach, but it is important to keep the five a day goal in mind when grocery shopping, cooking and planning meals.

One great way to get started toward a five a day lifestyle is with a delicious serving of 100% fruit juice every morning. Apple juice, grapefruit juice and orange juice are all excellent choices for both taste and nutrition.

Fruits and vegetables can also be used as garnishes for other foods. Who doesn’t enjoy a sliced strawberry or banana with their morning cereal? And fruits and vegetables make great snacks as well. Whether you keep a couple of apples at your desk or a selection of carrot and celery sticks in the fridge, having fruits and vegetables readily at hand is a big part of the battle.

Of course variety is extremely important when making any change to your diet, and many dietary changes fail due to boredom. Constantly trying new varieties of fruits and vegetables is a great way to keep yourself interested in your new healthier way of eating. If you’ve never had kiwi fruit or asparagus, for instance, why not give it a try?

Combining attractive colors, shapes and sizes of fruits is another way to provide attractive and interesting meals for yourself and your family. Combining white grapes, red peppers and pineapple chunks can provide a delicious and attractive salad.

It is important to provide constant variety when implementing the five a day plan, particularly if you are cooking for a family. Try making some interesting new dishes, such as veggie pizza, made with fresh vegetables and whole wheat pizza crust, a fresh vegetable wrap, vegetable stir fry or pasta with fresh vegetables.

For those who think they are too busy to incorporate five servings of fruits and vegetables a day into their diet, there is help available. The many ready to eat, prepackaged salad kits on the market make it easier than ever to create a healthy salad on the go. Just keep a bottle of your favorite low fat or nonfat salad dressing on hand and you can enjoy a healthy salad anywhere and anytime.

Even fast food restaurants have made it easier than every to eat healthy, with every major chain now offering at least a few healthy menu items. In addition, most grocery chains offer fresh salad bars where you can create your own healthy lunch even if you’re pressed for time.

When creating your five a day healthy lifestyle, remember that fruits and vegetables make great snacks. An apple, orange or banana provides both great taste and excellent nutrition. In addition, the natural sugars contained in fruits do not provide the sugar high/sugar crash scenario all parents are familiar with.

Topping meals and salads with additional fruits and vegetables is a great way to enhance your new five a day lifestyle. Strips of green and red peppers, broccoli florets, sliced carrots and cucumbers are all great additions to pasta and potato salads. And of course carrots, spinach, apple slices, orange slices, nectarines, pineapples and raisins are all great additions to any salad.

In addition, adding fresh fruits to foods you already eat is a great way to make such foods part of your new lifestyle. Adding berries, bananas or oranges to cereal and yogurt is a great way to make sure you meet your five a day goal every day.
About the Author

Zaak O’Conan discovers and presents useful information on how to enhance and/or repair your life, body and relationships. You’ll find his other articles on eating better and other ways how to improve your life at http://your-health-center.com

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There are a lot of juice recipes for weiight loss available today. It’s mostly just a matter of finding one that you find easy to make and you like the taste of it. This is a tried and true method for weight loss and if you go about it in the right way, you can have success too.

It’s really easy, when you are desperate to lose weight, to get caught up in one fad diet after another. Some of these fad diets may actually help you lose some weight, but you do have to ask yourself two very important questions before you decide to give it a try:

1. Is the weight loss solely the result of water weight loss? If so, you will most likely just gain back any weight you lose. What you really want to do is find diets that will help you lose unwanted body fat and not just lose pounds of water weight.

2. Is the diet something that you can reasonably expect to stay on for a lifetime? Now, this can be a little tricky because sometimes a short term diet can still be a good thing if you use it as a springboard to healthier habits and don’t expect it to be the answer to your weight loss prayers.

Juice recipes for weiight loss can actually be good for you for your lifetime. Alone, it won’t be enough to lose hundreds of pounds, for most people, but it can be a great addition to a healthy eating plan and a strong workout regimen.

Combining the benefits of a juicing diet with these other two components can really help you achieve all your weight loss goals.

Here is just one of many juice diet recipes. If you are really interested you can find many other recipes. To get the most out of your diet you may want to consider investing in a juicer so you can get the freshest juice possible:

This recipe makes 4 servings:

1 cup strawberries, sliced
1 1/2 orange juice
1 whole mango, peeled and cut
2 kiwi peeled and cut
1 to tablespoons of honey
1/2 seltzer

Mix the ingredients together (except the seltzer) on puree until smooth. Pour into a glass and stir in seltzer. Serve over ice if desired.

There are a few “tools” that will make this a little easier to accomplish. Of course one of the most important things is a good quality blender.

Next, having a juicer so you can have fresh juice to use in all your recipes would be nice. And don’t just get stuck on the idea of fruit juices, vegetable juice can work great too and it will also give you that much more variety.

This is just one of many recipes you can find, or create, that will help your weight loss goals along. Since many people don’t get enough fresh fruits and vegetables in their daily diet, this is an excellent way to introduce more healthy foods into your diet on a daily basis.

Look online, in your local library or book store, or even get creative and come up with your own recipes. There are almost unlimited options when looking for juice recipes for weiight loss. You can lose weight, eat more healthy and never get bored, how neat is that?

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