What Is Clean Eating Anyway?

The Skinny on Clean Eating

Clean eating is not only the most healthy eating plan on planet earth, it’s also the easiest to follow. We’re going to dedicate the month of November to educating you about the benefits of clean eating and how to make it part of your permanent weight loss solution. We’re even posting a clean eating challenge, but here’s the thing…As you’re learning, keep this in mind: The healthiest foods have the least ingredients. The ideal number of ingredients is one. This means fresh fruit, fresh vegetables, organic and free-range beef, poultry, and fresh fish. We understand that sometimes this isn’t possible, but the more we educate you, the easier it will become to choose healthy and clean foods.

What Will Clean Eating Do For You?

The full list of benefits of clean eating would take pages to document, but just to get you started, here are a few of the many benefits of clean eating:

Your complexion will improve
Weight loss will become effortless. You’ll find that clean eating contributes to quick weight loss and complete health and lifestyle changes
Your digestive processes and overall health will improve. Your body produces toxins when it’s trying to digest the ingredients in highly processed foods. The more you choose whole foods and clean eating, the less toxins will be present in your body.
Your clarity will improve
Your energy levels will improve
Your sleep patterns and the amount of true rest you experience will improve

I’d say these are definitely enough to get us started! Now, let me also say this…We all have different weight loss and health journeys and it is impossible to provide a blanket diet that will be exactly what everyone reading this page needs. Some of you may be suffering with fibromyalgia, others with gluten allergies or dairy intolerance. I strongly encourage you to make an appointment to come in to Svelte MD to receive one-on-one consultation and a plan tailored to fit your specific needs. If that’s not possible, then please use the following information as a guideline for your health and fitness education and not as medical advice. We always recommend a visit to your nutritionist or weight loss expert for personal assessment.

Baby Steps to Clean Eating

Step 1: Increase your vegetable intake. You can do this by purchasing raw, fresh vegetables and choosing them as snacks and including them with each meal. Some people just can’t eat raw vegetables. For those individuals, I recommend investing in a juicer. Just think, in about 10 minutes time you could drink an entire day’s worth of fruit and vegetables. A quick and delicious juicing recipe could include one apple, 5 stalks kale, spinach, 3 carrots, 1 celery stalk and a small knob of ginger. Delicious and highly nutritious! That’s a way to jump start your morning!

Step 2: Increase your fruit intake. We’re talking whole, fresh fruit, not processed fruit cups, canned fruits or fruit juices. Real fruit only!

Step 3: If you are not cutting out dairy, I suggest you always stick with organic. This goes for all milk, yogurt, cheese, and especially ice creams.

Step 4: If you eat seafood, always purchase it fresh and stay away from farm-raised. Farm-raised contains antibiotics because of the environment they are raised in. You don’t want that.

Step 5: If you eat meat and eggs, choose organic and free range above grain fed whenever possible.

Step 6: No fast food, packaged food or canned food allowed. Also, stay away from everything that’s deep-fried in oil.

Step 7: Watch out for refined sugars and sweeteners: Stay away from aspartame, Splenda, white sugar, corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup or cane juice. Try stevia, a zero calorie, plant based sweetener.

What’s On The Clean-Eating Yes List?

As you’re learning about clean eating, you’ll start to recognize healthy alternatives. Wrestling with a sweet tooth? Add a spoonful of honey to your morning tea. Trying to cut out noodles and white rice but want something to put your chicken and broccoli on? Quinoa or brown rice are the right alternative. Here’s a list of things you can use to substitute the unhealthy foods you’re trying to remove from your diet:

Replace margarine with organic, no-salt added nut butters
Replace syrup with raw honey
Replace sugar with stevia
Replace canned or frozen with fresh
Choose organic whenever possible
Replace candy bars with organic dark chocolate
Replace vegetable oil with coconut oil
Replace white rice with Quinoa, brown rice

The Never Eat (Not Clean) List

Artificial Sweeteners
Bacon
Canola Oil
Corn Syrup
Deli meat that contains nitrates
Fried Foods
Margarine
Non BPA-free canned goods
Processed Mayonnaise
Refined white sugar
Regular table salt
Vegetable or Hydrogenated Oils
White flour, breads, pasta

Learn to Listen to Your Body’s Signals

Have you ever stopped frequenting a gas station after noticing a connection with your car knocking and the fuel purchased there? Well, your body sends signals that are loud and clear as well, although we often ignore them. Do you feel tired, bloated, achey or constipated after eating certain foods, such as gluten, dairy, eggs, soy or certain fruits or vegetables. A little bit of investigative work and you can easily discover which foods trigger toxic reactions in your body. Remove all questionable foods from your diet for a few days. Then, slowly introduce them back, one at a time to see if your symptoms return. If so, you’ve found your culprit. Remove it from your diet.

These are some guidelines to help you get started with clean eating. Continue to follow our blog for information on your new, healthy lifestyle! Are you ready to discover a new you?