It’s not about weight – it’s about health.  If our body is over or underweight it will not be functioning at its highest level and this is especially important in the current times.

First, be aware of what you are putting into your body. 



Treat yourself occasionally, but try to avoid refined products (i.e chocolate, sweets, crisps etc.). This may seem impossible but eating is habitual. When your body is receiving the correct nutrients from food the chemical cravings will be a thing of the past (this normally takes about 2/3 weeks to conquer).



Seasonal food is best because you know it is more likely to be fresh and always cook foods from scratch so you know what’s in them.



Second, make sure you have lunch.



It’s so easy to skip, particularly if you’re busy at work or you’re confined to the office. It’s all about organisation. Perhaps you could cook yourself an extra portion of dinner the night before, or cook a big batch of soup, curry or stew at the weekend that you can freeze in batches. The key is to make sure it has plenty of ingredients like lots of chunky veg and lean protein (i.e turkey, venison, fish or beans). Without this you’ll be starving and come the afternoon you’re be suffering from the 3 o’clock slump and reaching for the biscuits!



If this does happen it means you’re running out of fuel, so this is the time you should eat fruit to give yourself a surge of quick fix energy!  Fruit should ideally be eaten at least an hour away from other foods because it digests quicker than other food groups. We’re so used to eating fruit after a meal, just to finish with something sweet.  All it then does is sit on top of the other food and ferments, therefore giving us toxins that we definitely don’t need. If you must have fruit at mealtimes have it before a meal so it digests first. The only exception I make is if you eat fruit with yoghurt – say a granola in the morning (the alkalinity of the yoghurt counteracts the acidity of the fruit).



Now if you’re really hungry and you’re looking for a snack try an oatcake, rice cake, or cracker spread with a cream cheese or nut butter (it’s the fat content in the protein spreads that will switch your brain off to say it’s eaten) otherwise you’ll eat copious amounts of plain crackers and still be hungry.



Finally, the evening meal. 



Be careful of portion sizes, after all, the odds are you won’t be as active in the evening as you have been all day. As a general rule, try a heaped serving spoon size of protein (i.e. meat, poultry, pulses, fish, eggs or cheese), complex carbohydrate (i.e. potatoes, pasta, rice, bread) and carbohydrate (i.e. vegetables). Above all make sure you cook with lots of herbs or spice as if you don’t have foods with flavour, your taste buds will get very bored, very quickly.

 

And most importantly drink at least eight glasses of water a day (ideally bottled or filtered is best). 



Don’t forget for every normal tea or coffee you drink you must drink a glass of water to compensate because they act as diuretics which dehydrate the system. You may be unaware that for every pound of fat burned, 22 ounces of water is produced. It’s extremely important to flush this water away as it’s full of the by products of fat digestion. This fluid can be retained in the tissues of the ankles, hands and feet.