Australian Guide To Healthy EatingAustralia’s eating food pyramid is not in the shape of a pyramid style of eating but is now incorporated into a plate style with the different food groups shown as slices. Let’s take a look at this Australian plate and see if we can grab ourselves a slice.
Australian Guide To Healthy Eating: Cereals and GrainsThe Australian food guide recommends almost double the daily intake of cereal type foods (up to 24 slices of bread for men) than the former food plan. Now that’s a lot of bread. The cereal category would be breads, grains, cereals, pastas, rice and noodles.The only problem I see with this way of eating is they do not say that these cereals and breads are to be whole grains. In fact it states that some of these grain type cereal foods can be refined flour products. It is highly suggested by nutritional experts that if you eat lots of grains and cereals they should be whole and never refined. Refined flours do not have the minerals and nutritional values present in them as the whole grains do.
Australian Guide To Healthy Eating: Vegetables and LegumesNext on the Australia’s food guide is the vegetable and legume group. Rather than group fruit with vegetables they have opted to group legumes with the vegetable group, which is fine. This group starts with 2 servings for toddlers and up to five servings for teenagers and adults.An example would be up to five baked potatoes for teenagers and adults in a 24-hour period, or five servings of ½ cup of cooked vegetables or five servings of ½ cup of beans. Again, it does not state eating the vegetables in the raw form, which is vital for good health. In fact, half of our daily vegetables that we eat should be consumed raw to ensure we are receiving adequate minerals and vitamins. Greens are essential for a healthy diet and we should consume at least one serving of raw greens daily.
Australian Guide To Healthy Eating: Fruit and JuicesNext on the food list is the fruit and fruit juices category. This category lists up to 3 servings for growing teenagers and 2 servings for adults, which is an ok amount, but you can never eat too much whole fruit, its impossible.Fruit juices are another thing altogether. Make sure when you drink fruit juice that there is no added sugars of any kind, otherwise you may as well be ingesting soda pops. In addition, juice made from concentrate is not that healthy. It is always better to juice your own fruits and vegetables from home using your own juicer. This category talks about receiving part of your fruit servings from canned fruits. Canned fruits? That is a big no-no, especially if you have sugar related issues, are overweight, or just want to be healthy. Fruit should always be eaten whole, raw and on an empty stomach.
Australian Guide To Healthy Eating: DairyNext on the list are the dairy products. The dairy products list was all right. They even listed using soy milk as part of the daily allowance of dairy. Growing teenagers are to consume up to 3 servings of dairy and adults 2 servings of dairy. Dairy products considered are dry milk, soy milk, custard, yogurt, evaporated milk, and cheeses.Australian Guide To Eating Healthy: Meats, Eggs, NutsFinally, last on the Australian food guide is the meats, eggs and nuts group and appropriately so. But nuts should not even be listed in this category.Nut fats are a totally different kind of fat than animal fats and therefore can be eaten more abundantly than meats – nut fats are good for you. Servings in this group for adults and teenagers are only 1 serving a day. I must add that nuts and seeds are exceptionally good for you and can be eaten whenever one likes and they should be taken out of the meats group altogether. One thing I really do like about the Australian food guide is they do say to drink lots and lots of water throughout the day. For more information about the Australian’s guide to healthy eating click on the resources below. Sources: http://healthyeatingclub.com/info/articles/food-guides/aust-guide-he.htm
http://www.seesaw.org.au/images/Guide%20to%20healthy%20eating.jpg
Top of Australian Guide to Healthy Eating Return to Healthy Eating Guidelines Home to Healthy Eating
|
