1. Take advantage of the season’s fresh, local vegetables. Use parsnips and leeks to make warming soups by cooking them with an onion, carrot and any other vegetables you like. You can also bake these root vegetables with olive oil in a hot oven until tender.
2. Don’t avoid all fats. If you’ve been on a fat-free diet for some time, you may be deficient in the essential fatty acids. Our bodies can’t make these, so we have to eat them to keep healthy. Essential fats are found in oily fish, nuts, seeds and avocados.
3. Feeling bloated? Keep a food diary of what you eat to see if you can link your bloating to certain foods. Food intolerances and irritable bowel symptoms can be difficult to pinpoint sometimes, but keeping a record of your symptoms and what you have eaten may help identify a pattern.
4. Watch the salt content in processed foods. There can be a lot of hidden salt in ready meals and breakfast cereals, which can cause water retention and eventually lead to high blood pressure. Check labels carefully and make sure you don’t eat more than the recommended 6g a day. And eat a banana each day! They contain potassium which can help flush out the excess sodium from salt from your body.
5. Live bio-yoghurt contains probiotic bacteria which are thought to help improve the body’s resistance to infection by supporting the part of the immune system that is in your gut. Probiotic bacteria also produce natural anti-viral substances in the body. So, adding some of this yoghurt to your diet sounds like a good idea at this time of year.
