Just as important as knowing what to avoid, is knowing which foods you should eat. To lose weight healthfully and keep the weight off, you need a dietary pattern that you can follow your whole life. You need to eat foods that give you all of your essential nutrients without leaving you hungry, and you need foods that provide you with strength, energy and creativity. The types of foods that can do this are whole foods. What exactly are whole foods? These are foods that are closest to their natural form, similar to the ones our ancestors ate. For example, fruits, vegetables, beans, nuts and seeds, are whole foods. They aren't packaged in a box. They don't come with a nutritional label. They don't contain additives or preservatives, and they don't include a long list of ingredients. Whole foods are bursting with natural flavors, so you never have to feel deprived and there are many different whole foods from which to choose. You can combine and pair them in a limitless number of recipes to match your tastes and preferences. Abundance of studies concur that eating a whole food's dietary pattern is the safest way to manage your weight. Eating whole foods isn't a diet per se, it's a lifelong framework from which foods you should eat and which ones you should avoid. There isn't a set meal plan you have to follow, and you don't have to count calories. When you eat whole foods, you can know that with every bite, you're feeding your body the most nutritious foods on earth. The reason whole foods help with weight loss is that when they enter our body, they have a very different effect than processed foods. Unlike processed foods, whole foods naturally control your portions. They do this because they're low in calories per volume and high in nutrients. You can eat a lot of food for not a lot of calories. You can keep eating until you're satisfied. They're also high in fiber, which adds bulk and keeps you full. Whole foods also contain natural amounts of fat, sugar and salt. They don't override your appetite hormones, and drive you to eat past the point of feeling full. Another advantage of whole foods is that they regulate your weight set point in a healthy range. If you recall, the biggest culprits and driving up set point are saturated fat in refined carbohydrates. Saturated fats are found mostly in animal and dairy products, such as beef, pork, cheese and butter, as well as in processed, baked, and fried foods. Refined carbohydrates include processed grains that have been stripped of their natural fiber and vitamins as well as sugars, muffins, many breads, cereals, pasta and deserts, are examples of products with refined carbohydrates. On the other hand, plant-based whole foods with minimal lean meats and low-fat dairy, allow you to consume different types of fat and carbohydrates. They provide healthy fats such as mono and polyunsaturated fats, and high quality carbohydrates, such as whole grains, vegetables and legumes. As a result, by eating whole foods that are mostly plant-based, you won't ratchet up your set point. The higher-quality of fats, carbohydrates and proteins in whole foods also prevent and even reverse many diseases ranging from diabetes to heart disease and cancer. Plant based whole foods contain health promoting chemicals found only in plants called phytonutrients. These include antioxidants and anti-inflammatory compounds, as well as ones I can turn on good genes and turn off our bad genes. The fiber in many plant-based whole foods also feeds our good gut bacteria. By reducing oxidative damage and inflammation, populating our gut with diverse good bacteria and controlling how we express our genes, whole foods keep us healthy and living longer. A whole food, mostly plant-based diet, includes some of these. This week's challenge is to eat whole foods as much as possible.
