Mediterranean Diet

The Mediterranean diet is encouraged by the traditional dietary patterns of Greece, Southern Italy, and Spain^. This diet include proportionally high consumption of olive oil, legumes, seeds, fruits, and vegetables, quite high consumption of fish, reasonable consumption of cheese and yogurt, moderate wine consumption, and low consumption of meat and meat products.

This diet is rich in monounsaturated fat and fibre.

The moderate consumption of red wine contributes to good health because it contains antioxidant.

 Although a big group of these foods contain high level of salt (links to high blood pressure) the diet has beneficial health effect, which is reflected by the high life expectancy in these countries.

Addition to the diet the life style; culture and physical activity, labour is very important.

The Mediterranean diet appears to be better than low –fat diet, it decreases the risk of cardiovascular disease by 30% more, lowers the cholesterol level and blood pressure.

Compare your diet to the Mediterranean diet:

Content of Mediterranean diet	Your  diet
Olive oil Seeds Nuts Legumes Fruits Vegetables Fish Cheese Wine Meat Meat products

How you  should improve your  diet eating more:

6 Steps To Make Your Cholesterol Level Lower Naturally

By Joseph E. Smith 

The increasing number of people with high cholesterol issues, along with the side effects of its medications, has begged an answer to the question "How to reduce cholesterol naturally?". Unsurprisingly, your lifestyle plays a vital role in increasing and decreasing cholesterol levels. Altering the way you live in certain ways can help you lower your cholesterol naturally, without the use of medications and prescriptions. Even if medication is necessary, a healthy lifestyle enhances the effect of your medication to reduce cholesterol faster and maintain its level.

Here are 6 steps to follow:

STEP 1 - Cut Down On Your Body Fat

Having extra fat in your body is just not recommended for cholesterol patients. Carrying even just a little excess weight can contribute detrimentally to your cholesterol health. Even a small decrease of 5 to 10 pounds of excess weight can have significant effects.

The very first aspect of losing weight is to honestly analyze your eating habits and daily routine. If you eat when you are frustrated or bored, try to divert your mind and take a walk instead. If your lunch and breakfast consist of fast food, strike it off from your lifestyle and pack something healthier from home. Watching television does not mean munching on potato chips, but instead you can try munching on carrot sticks.

Try to include more physical activity into your daily routine such as taking the stairs instead of the elevator.

STEP 2 - Eat Healthy Food

If you have been on an unhealthy diet for years, making a few changes in your diet can drastically reduce your cholesterol level. After all, cholesterol levels are substantially dependent on what you do and do not eat.

Healthy fats: the saturated fat found in red meat or dairy products can increase your cholesterol level by increasing the bad cholesterol in your body. It is recommended that you should not take in more than 10% of your daily calories from saturated fat. This is why you should choose low-fat dairy products and leaner cuts of meat. You can also switch to olive, canola and peanut oils for cooking.

STEP 3 - Avoid Trans Fats

Trans fat can be found in fried foods and many store-bought products such as crackers, cookies and snack cakes. Do not believe the labels on the packaging that claim the product is 'trans fat-free' as they might only be half truths. Instead, you can choose to look at the ingredients list and determine if those ingredients are high in cholesterol or not.

STEP 4 - Do Not Exceed The Daily Cholesterol Limit

A normal person can take up to 300 mg of cholesterol per day. If you have a heart disease or other cardiovascular problems you should only take less than 200 mg. Cholesterol levels are highly concentrated in foods such as egg yolk, cheese, processed meat, shrimps etc. Try to avoid such high cholesterol foods to keep within the recommended boundaries.

STEP 5 - Eat More Fruits And Vegetables

Fruits and vegetables are rich in fibre which helps you to increase your metabolism rate and cuts down fat. Fibre also prevents the build up of cholesterol particles in your arteries. However, one must remember that dried fruit tends to have more calories than fresh fruit. Also, try to include more vegetables in your diet on a daily basis.

STEP 6 - Increase Your Physical Activities

Exercise always plays a vital role in general fitness and reducing your cholesterol level naturally. Exercising does not mean that you need to force yourself into high-intensity workouts. Simple moderate workouts done frequently can help you drastically. Choose exercises that keep your heart functioning faster like jogging, running, swimming and cycling.

High cholesterol increases the risk of cardiovascular diseases and heart attacks. Medications are certainly available to help you reduce your cholesterol levels but if you try to alter your lifestyle with these steps, you will be surprised with the results. This way you can stay away from all those terrible side effects that medicines can cause.

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Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/expert/Joseph_E._Smith/1122120

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Health and diet

by Ms H    Judit Hadnagy

The food choices we make can have an important impact on our health. Understanding the link between diet and health drives  you to  change your lifestyle, food shopping and food preparation. What is available on the shelf will also have an impact on the choices you make, thereby affecting your wellbeing.  Unfortunately your diet greatly manipulated by the food industry, here is a list of examples; fortification and enrichment of cereal grains with vitamins, calcium and sugar, increased production of unsaturated vegetable oils and margarine, -hydrogenated fat, as substitutions for lard and butter- lowered cholesterol content foods, reduced sugar content foods, lower sodium foods, decreased portion sizes in pre-packaged foods for use in weight loss and increased calcium levels to prevent osteoporosis. Even more substances are added to food to preserve it and enhance its taste and appearance –food additives-. These additives must be assessed for safety before they are used in food. To inform consumers, each additive is allocated a unique number, called as E number, which is used in Europe for all approved additives. 

Do you check the list of ingredients when you pick up the food from the shelf?  

Studies have indicated that nutritional factors do contribute to the development of some diseases like cancer, atherosclerosis, bone disease, arthritis, and dementia. The diet could influence all of these disease states. The patterns in our food consumption have changed and will continue to change. Here are some examples. Decreased consumption of saturated fats, salt and sugar advised due to benefit of cardiovascular health. Increased intake of fish /fish oil, seeds and nuts is recommended because of the numerous effects of omega-3 fatty acids including they lower the risk of coronary heart disease and perform improvement in cholesterol level. Fish oil has also been recommended for disease states including arthritis, cancer, and diseases of the immune system. Eating healthily doesn’t have to be complicated or tedious!  Make sure you get all the nutrients you need and maintain a healthy weight. Good diet is about not eating too much of some things – like saturated fat, sugar and salt – while getting enough of others – like fibre, protein, vitamins and minerals. Research shows that people who eat plenty of fruit and vegetables are less likely to develop heart disease and certain cancers.

About the food labels

Information on the back of a pack is compulsory that gives details about the ingredients, nutritional composition, known allergens, ‘best before’ or ‘use-by’ dates and the weight of the product. The ingredients are listed in order, starting with the highest-quantity ingredient first, down to the lowest- quantity ingredient last. So, if you find sugar at the top of the list, the food is likely to be high in sugar.

The traffic light system for ‘front of pack’ labelling has been around for a while now which is an easy way to check at a glance how healthy a food is. The labels show how many calories are in the food or drink and are also colour coded to show whether the food is low (green), medium (amber) or high (red) in fat, saturated fat, sugar and salt. The information on the front of the pack also tells you how the portion of the food contributes to the Reference Intake (RI) of an adult. Try to choose foods with more greens and ambers and fewer reds.