EATING LESS JUNK FOOD and more real food is one dietary change that can make a significant improvement in your nutrition and health.

It means eating fewer foods that have limited nutritional value, that are overprocessed or that contain inordinate amounts of fat, salt, sugar, refined white flour, artificial ingredients and chemical preservatives.

In their place, eat more real food — foods that aren’t overly processed and are close to their natural state, such as fruits, vegetables, whole grains, bran, legumes, plain diary products, olive oil, meat, fish and poultry.

Making such a change doesn’t require you to drive miles out of your way in search of organic produce in obscure health food stores. Real food is plentiful in any grocery store and most restaurants, if you know how to find it.

Make It Real
To eat more real foods:

• MAKE A CONCERTED EFFORT to reduce the amount of overprocessed and junk food you eat.
• ALWAYS CONSIDER THE QUALITY OF THE FOOD YOU EAT. Does it resemble anything your grandmother would have prepared?
• START READING FOOD LABELS WHEN YOU SHOP to help avoid buying processed food that’s more artificial than real. Most junk foods contain less than 5 percent of the recommended daily allowances (RDA) of any one of eight basic vitamins listed at the bottom of nutrition labels.

When reading the ingredient list, look to see if sugar, fat or salt are among the first three ingredients. If they are, the food has more of that ingredient than anything else, because ingredients are listed in descending order by weight.

Now look at the number of fat grams. For every 5 gm. of fat in a serving of a food, you’re eating the equivalent of one teaspoon of fat. So, if one serving of a frozen dinner has 23 gm. of fat, you’re eating the equivalent of four-and-a-half teaspoons of fat.

Next look at the amount of sugar listed on the food label. Four grams equals one teaspoon of sugar, so a soda with 44 gm. of sugar contains 11 teaspoons.

Most junk foods contain lots of sodium (salt), but an adult should consume no more than 2,400 mg. of it daily. Any food that contains more than 240 mg. of sodium per serving is considered high in salt.

• DON’T FRET ABOUT EATING MODERATELY PROCESSED FOODS as long as they contain more real ingredients than overprocessed ones.

  For example: Frozen Veggie Supreme Pizza that contains refined flour in the crust, but is covered with healthful, unadulterated vegetables, wouldn’t be a bad choice.

• AVOID FAST-FOOD RESTAURANTS because most of their products are deep-fried or very high in fat, salt and sugar. If you do order fast-food meals, do your homework by requesting and studying the nutritional guide available at most of these restaurants and choosing the most healthful foods.

  For example: Order salads with low-fat dressing or submarine sandwiches loaded with with lots of fresh vegetables.

• AVOID ALL DEEP-FRIED FOODS and those that contain hydrogenated vegetable oil or trans fat.
• AVOID ALMOST EVERYTHING SOLD IN VENDING MACHINES, including chips, crackers, pastries, cookies, candy and soda.
• EAT MORE FOODS THAT ARE CLOSER TO THEIR NATURAL STATE. That is, eat an orange instead of a powdered orange drink made with artificial flavor, coloring and an abundance of sugar.
• EAT FEWER HIGHLY REFINED GRAINS, such as white and bleached flour. Instead of rapidly digested carbohydrates (a bag of chocolate chip cookies) eat more whole-grain, slowly digested carbohydrates (homemade whole wheat fruit bars).
• DON’T TURN WHOLE FOODS INTO JUNK FOOD by topping them with fat-laden dressings or cheese sauces.

  For example, instead of drowning a green salad in bottled dressing, add a splash of olive oil and vinegar instead.

• PUT A VARIETY OF FRESH FRUIT AND VEGETABLES AT THE TOP OF YOUR SHOPPING LIST and buy as many of them as your family can reasonably eat in a week.

Finally, take it slow. Although you may be tempted to change your entire diet overnight, making gradual changes is more effective and likely to become a permanent part of your life.

By Barbara Floria, the editor of Vitality. For more information, visit the Web site for the Center for Science in the Public Interest at www.cspinet.org.

© Health Ink & Vitality. Information is the opinion of the sourced authors and organizations. Personal decisions regarding health, diet, and exercise should be made only after consultation with the reader's own medical advisers. This material may not be reproduced for redistribution without written permission from Health Ink & Vitality.