People often think they are doing something healthy for themselves by switching their white bread for whole wheat bread. Although whole wheat certainly is a better option than white, whole wheat bread can still be preventing you from losing that unwanted weight.
People often think they are doing something healthy for themselves by switching their white bread for whole wheat bread. Although whole wheat certainly is a better option than white, whole wheat bread can still be preventing you from losing that unwanted weight.
Most people who know me will be quick to tell you that I’m not a big fan of any bread or bread type products. Actually, I think most people could feel a thousand times better if they stopped eating so much bread every single day. Toast for breakfast, sandwich for lunch, bread basket at dinner, many of us could feed a small village with the amount of bread I see some people consuming in one day.
No, I am not saying to never have bread ever again, hey, its life, and you gotta enjoy it, right? What I ‘m saying is that several servings of some kind of bread type product every day is making thousands of people gain weight, preventing them from losing their unwanted weight and worst of all, bringing about mostly avoidable diseases like Type 2 diabetes and heart disease.
I rarely eat bread at all and I really don’t even miss it. I guess I have just come to enjoy all the other delicious food that I eat each day that I don’t even feel bread is missing from my meal plans.
1. When you think of breakfast, don’t automatically think toast, bagels, or a roll. A couple of hard boiled eggs over sliced tomatoes is delicious. You can also make a quick batch of oatmeal and add walnuts and berries. How about cottage cheese and pineapple? The breakfast options are endless.
2. Pack snack foods and take them with you to work. In less than 2 minutes, you can grab some tahini, a nut butter, raw almonds, rice crackers an apple or banana and baby carrots all in a bag and be out the door. Taking these food items to work with you will help you stay away from pies, bagels or donuts. (Don’t get me started on donuts). Slap some tahini on an apple and munch away at that, you will soon discover there are many healthier snacks than all those wheat flour based products so many of us rely on as quick convenience snacks and foods.
3. Don’t depend on sandwiches as lunch every day. How about some salmon, broccoli and brown rice? Leftover chicken from last night and a sweet potato? Imagine that lunch is another version of dinner and not just a mid day sandwich inhaling contest.
4. Make the bread basket a once-in-while experience, and have it with lots of olive oil, sea salt, olives and sun dried tomatoes. You really do not need to be serving a bread basket for dinner at home if you are offering healthy carbohydrate choices like salad, cooked vegetables, brown rice, millet, or quinoa.
5. Oh, and how could I forget? Don’t think that eating “100% whole wheat” is any better. It is still refined flour, maybe just not bleached, and a huge contributor to weight gain.
Start to think outside the “bread box” today for healthy alternatives to your daily bread intake. What one thing can you do today to get started?
Yes, I am the bread-lover but I do admit that when I eat less bread I feel a lot better. These words sounds so familiar to me, Eric 🙂