Making Healthy Exchanges Work for You
You're ready now to begin a wonderful journey to better health. In the preceding pages, you've discovered the remarkable variety of good food available to you when you begin eating the Healthy Exchanges way. You've stocked your pantry and learned many of my food preparation "secrets" that will point you on the way to delicious success.
But before I let you go, I'd like to share a few tips that I've learned while traveling toward healthier eating habits. It took me a long time to learn how to eat smarter. In fact, I'm still working on it. But I am getting better. For years, I could inhale a five-course meal in five minutes flat--and still make room for a second helping of dessert!
Now I follow certain signposts on the road that help me stay on the right path. I hope these ideas will help point you in the right direction as well.
But before I let you go, I'd like to share a few tips that I've learned while traveling toward healthier eating habits. It took me a long time to learn how to eat smarter. In fact, I'm still working on it. But I am getting better. For years, I could inhale a five-course meal in five minutes flat--and still make room for a second helping of dessert!
Now I follow certain signposts on the road that help me stay on the right path. I hope these ideas will help point you in the right direction as well.
- Eat slowly so your brain has time to catch up with your tummy. Cut and chew each bite slowly. Try putting your fork down between bites. Stop eating as soon as you feel full. Crumple your napkin and throw it on top of your plate so you don't continue to eat when you are no longer hungry.
- Smaller plates may help you feel more satisfied by your good portions and limit the amount you can put on the plate.
- Watch portion size. If you are truly hungry, you can always add more food to your plate once you've finished your initial serving. But remember to count the additional food accordingly.
- Always eat at your dining-room or kitchen table. You deserve better than nibbling from an open refrigerator or over the sink. Make an attractive place setting, even if you're eating alone. Feed your eyes as well as your stomach. By always eating at a table, you will become much more aware of your true food intake. For some reason, many of us conveniently "forget" the food we swallow while standing over the stove or munching in the car or on the run.
- Avoid doing anything else while you are eating. If you read the paper or watch television while you eat, it's easy to consume too much food without realizing it, because you are concentrating on something else besides what you're eating. Then, when you look down at your plate and see that it's empty, you wonder where all the food went and why you still feel hungry.
Day by day, as you travel the path to good health, it will become easier to make the right choices, to eat smarter. But, don't ever fool yourself into thinking that you'll be able to put your eating habits on cruise control and forget about them. Making a commitment to eat good healthy food and sticking to it takes some effort. But with all the good-tasting recipes in this Healthy Exchanges cookbook, just think how well you're going to eat--and enjoy it--from now on!
Healthy Lean Bon Appetit!
