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Instructions: Pick one goal each week that you feel confident you can modify in your diet for years to come.
Share your goal with those close to you and put a note of your goal on your refrigerator so you are more likely to succeed.
- Eat smaller meals throughout the day
- Eat a snack during the time you are without food the longest during your waking hours
- Eat small meals every 2.5 or 4 hours throughout the day
- Plan 3 meals and 2 or 3 snacks distributed throughout the day, every 2.5 to 4 hours
- If eating less than 3 meals, eat an additional meal
- Introduce breakfast by drinking milk, fruit or vegetable juice
- Add an additional food to breakfast
- Eat cereal for bedtime snack instead of a high fat snack food
- Prepare extra for meals so leftovers are on hand
- Plan time for preparing a nutritious lunch or snack for hard to get away times
- Slightly decrease portion sizes of your largest meals
Eat more fibre
- Eat 100% whole wheat instead of white bread
- Add beans or steamed or raw vegetables to any meal
- Eat a green salad every day
- Eat fresh fruit for dessert or a snack
- Eat oatmeal or other higher fibre cereal for breakfast
- Stock up on frozen vegetables and fruits so they are always available
- Add raw spinach leaves to salad for more nutrients
- Add a vegetable to a meal: breakfast, lunch, or dinner
- Add vegetables to omelettes, pizza, sandwiches, stir frys, and other recipes
- If you find it hard to eat vegetables consider vegetable juice
- Purchase pre-cut veggies and salad mixes for convenience
- Eat 5 servings of fruits and vegetables daily; keep a tally of servings eaten
Eat lower/healthier fat foods
- Substitute meat with fish high in omega-3 fatty acids
- Instead of spreading butter or margarine on bread, dip 100% whole wheat bread in the equivalent amount of olive oil
- Substitute other saturated fats for polyunsaturated fats or polyunsaturated fats for monounsaturated fats
- Eat ice milk, sherbet, or non-fat frozen yogurt instead of ice cream
- Choose lower fat salad dressings (low fat, no fat) or olive oil and lemon
- Substitute plain yogurt for sour cream
- Substitute plain yogurt for mayonnaise in your chicken or tuna salad
- Decrease sandwich spread or salad dressing by progressively adding plain yogurt
- Eat lower fat cuts of meat (See meat exchanges)
- Choose milk with lower fat (2%, 1%, 1/2%, Skim or non-fat)
- Choose lower fat cheese (mozzarella, low fat cheese)
- Eat whole grain cereal with milk for bedtime snack instead of traditional snack food
- Plan to eat healthfully 6 days a week and only eat sweets and higher fat foods one day a week
Appetite control
- Eat a snack before lunch or dinner to reduce the tendency to overeat
- Keep a food journal of the quantities of all food eaten
- Rate appetite after each meal or snack: 1) Very Hungry, 2) Hungry, 3) Satisfied, 4) Full, 5) Very Full
- Eat just until comfortable (rating of 3), leave food on plate if necessary
- Check your diet periodically using computer diet analysis software
- Weigh food and serve pre-determined portion before sitting down to eat
- Limit the number of times you eat out at restaurants
- Eat before being around processed snack foods (e.g: party, shopping, etc.)
- Agree to do extra exercise if you eat more than you had planned using a caloric expenditure and calorie content database or table
Planning
- Write weekly menu with accompanying shopping list
- Keep shopping list
- Prepare foods the evening before and refrigerate for the next day
