A few tips on healthy eating

If you enjoy eating, but want to get in shape and improve your overall vitality, then, as most people know, you need to start a thoughtfully prepared well-balanced meal plan. In a perfect world, this needs to contain 5 standard portions of grains, fruit and vegetables daily and embrace the right proportion of food types.

Some reduced carbohydrate diet tips:
* Use low carb chocolate for cookies and muffins. If you have gone to the trouble of converting your most popular chocolate chip cookie or chocolate muffins recipe using soy flour, you really don't want to mix in those high carbohydrate sugar-rich chocolate. Chop up a reduced carbohydrate chocolate bar into tiny pieces and use that in its place.

* Know what is in your food Watch out for the food label that boasts to be 'low carb' - check the real nutritional information on the reverse of the can or package. Some are only slightly decreased and in some instances still higher than a competitors normal brand. Also, beware of 'low sugar' and 'low fat' labels - 'low sugar' doesn't always mean 'low carb' - often the carbs are exactly the same.

Brassicas, Super foods that aid Dieting
(includes Arugula, Celery, Mustard greens and Chinese cabbage)
Known as cruciferous vegetables, these are jam-packed with vitamins (including vitamin c and folate), minerals (including potassium and selenium), fibre, chlorophyll and antioxidents.

Amongst many health giving properties, the vitamins and nutrients in these are believed by nutritionalists to reduce the risk of cancer.