Simple ways to make healthy eating work for you

Photo by JJ Jordan/Unsplash | Illustration by Lara Intong

Cooking is key to successfully embracing healthy eating. It can be a little tough at first but thankfully, there are things you can do to take you in the right direction. Here are a few tricks you can do to make sure you eat better.

1. Eat greens chilled

Crisp vegetables seem bigger and take up more space, but vegetables that are chilled appear smaller. With this, you can fit more greens on your plate. And you don’t have to worry too much about calories since vegetables are naturally low in calories.

2. Tenderize meat with papaya

When you need to tenderize meat, you would normally use a pressure cooker, but cooking in high temperatures for a long period can cause food to lose their nutrients. One thing you can do is use raw papaya to tenderize it. Papaya contains an enzyme called papain that breaks down protein. All you need to do is peel the skin off a green papaya, mix in some seasoning, and grind it together. It’ll create a sort of paste that you put on your meat when you need to cook it. Depending on the meat and cut, it’ll activate in around 30 minutes to two hours.

3. Get smaller plates

One way you can practice portion control is to use smaller plates. According to Food Psychology, there’s a tendency to overeat with a larger plate because it makes food appear smaller. The white spaces would make you believe that you’re eating less when the portion doesn’t really change. Smaller plates lessen the chances of leftovers because you wouldn’t feel the need to compensate for the space.

4. Measure with your hand

Portion control and the right ratio of food groups is an essential part of healthy eating, but it’s easy to get it wrong. Just visually proportioning it can mislead you into putting more than you need. Aside from changing plates, you can roughly estimate the portions you need using your hands. According to Livestrong, you can use the palm of your hand to measure your protein, your fist to measure vegetables, your cupped hand to measure carbs, and your thumb to measure fat. This is a suggested proportion for a regular person who isn’t actively training, so you can be a little flexible on this one.

5. Make your own seasoning for instant noodles

Everyone craves instant noodles once in a while but unfortunately, one pack can contain at least 32 percent of your daily sodium needs. One way to have your noodles without all that sodium is to ditch the packaged seasoning and make it yourself (or find healthier alternatives). You can change it up by putting garlic, soy sauce, or herbs instead.