Managing Your Life by Eating Right by Leslie Grace - HTML preview

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Chapter 3:

What Is an Ideal Diet?

 

Summary

Eating right is essential. You need to know what the ideal diet is for that.

What Is an Ideal Diet?

Actually speaking, no one can put a finger on what an ideal diet exactly is. Now, if you were to ask someone what a healthy diet is, that could be easily answered. But to know about an ideal diet, you need to see the individual itself. Ideal diets are much related to the kind of lifestyle the person leads, their age, their gender, their level of physical activity during the day and even their geographical region and climate.

The first thing that must be answered here is the level of calories that any person must take. This, of course, varies from person to person, mainly depending on their level of physical activity. The following chart shows different kinds of people, characterized by various things, and the amount of calories that they need during the day, which would constitute an ideal diet for them.

People and Lifestyle

Required Calories per Day

Men leading a sedentary life

2,300

Men involved in high physical activity

3,200

Women leading a sedentary life

2,000

Women involved in high physical activity

2,500

Pregnant women

2,500

Lactating women

3,000

Infants up to a year-old

50, for each pound of body weight

Children between 1 and 10 years

1,000 – 2,000

Teenage boys

2,000 – 2,500

Teenage girls

1,500 – 2,000

 

Ideal diet depends from person to person, but there are some similarities that apply to every person:-

  • The diet should have enough carbohydrates, but not an excess  of it. Excess of carbohydrates can cause buildup of glucose in the body.
  • Foods fried in oil must be minimally used. There should be just one serving of a fried food per day, if at all.
  • Green veggies must be a part of the meal. The general rule is that foods with better colors are more nutritious, though there are some exceptions both ways. i.e., There are foods with no colors that are nutritious (example, cabbage) and foods with colors that aren't (there's a whole long list of them).
  • Lean meats should be preferred. It is very harmful to have a meal that is laden with non-vegetarian foods but isn't balanced with vegetables.
  • Cooking should be just enough and must retain the natural flavors of the foods. Though spices make the foods taste better, they also destroy some nutrients and hence they should be used stingily.
  • Synthetic materials should be completely avoided.