Healthy eating is easy. You only need to follow to basic rules to achieve a healthy diet: variety and balance.

Basic rules for a healthy diet

Variety

We need over 40 nutrients to stay fit and healthy and the best way to ensure we get them all is by eating a wide range of foods. Variety is fundamental to a healthy diet. Confirm your diet is varied enough with this little experiment.

Write everything you ate yesterday.

Write down the different foods in each meal -ingredients in each recipe. If you had pasta with tomato sauce write pasta, tomato, onion, olive oil, garlic, basil, cheese, etc.

dd up the total number of foods that you ate and check your score. Discard duplicates; if you had olive oil in your tomato sauce and as dressing in a salad, count only once.

30 foods or more - That’s great! - Your diet is varied and your are making the most of your opportunities to get all the nutrients essential for good health.

20-30 foods – Not bad at all - Your diet is varied but you can do still better and maximize the chances of achieving that desired optimal nutrition.

Less than 20 different foods – Spice your life, please - You need to increase the range of foods you are eating to be sure of getting all key nutrients.

Balance

There is a second step to healthy eating. We need to eat food in the right proportions, and we need to be sure to include food from each food group.

Have you ever eaten so many sweets as a child that you got sick? Then you have first hand experience: too much sugar, too much salt, too much of anything will make you sick. It will not be obvious immediately; the accumulated effect of eating a little too much too many times is what will make you sick. Get the balance right from the beginning and be rewarded with plenty of stamina, well being, and a long healthy life.