Optimal Nutrition For Beginners

(This article is complementary material for Tutorial 1)

Why Do People Need Food?

Strictly speaking, people don't need food; we need nutrients. Biology needs to make a lot of chemicals and materials to keep you healthy, keep your body and brain chemistry balanced, provide enough energy under varied circumstances as you go about your daily life, repair any minor damage and maintain immunity to disease. When we are not immune, we call it illness.

Ordinary living causes constant micro damage to cells of the body and we are constantly repaired. When we are not repaired, we call it ageing.

Almost all of the material, the 'building blocks' out of which you are made, and the energy to keep your body and mind functioning, has to be extracted from nutrients that are (hopefully) in the food you eat. Some nutrients we get from other sources, such as light (Vitamin D) and some are made in the body through processes (some hormones, vitamins, amino acids, fats and sugars). But most of your fuel for energy and your building materials (proteins) for repair and maintenance are delivered via your digestive system.

Why Healthy Eating Can Be a Pain in the Ass

Deciding what is a 'healthy diet' can be hard work, because when you start taking an interest in nutrition you will find yourself overwhelmed by charts of vitamins and minerals, GI and GL lists, BMI calculators, Calorie counters, theories of nutrition that range from the ridiculous to the sublime, food labels full of things like phenylmethylpyrozoronamidomethansulphonate, and people trying to sell you expensive supplements. Even if all the information out there were true, there's way too much of it to take in and it's easy to lose interest when you see so many contradictions.

On top of that, no single recommended diet can be "one-size-fits-all". No diet is perfect for everyone under all circumstances. We need different nutrients for times of hard physical work, mental calculation, damage repair, and so on. People have individual likes and dislikes, needs and wants, allergies and genetic tendencies.

Optimal Nutrition Made Easy

This is a method to work out your own personal optimal diet, taking into account your lifestyle and environmental factors. we've given example diets for various circumstances. You don't need to weigh anything and you don't need to count any calories. All you have to do is ask yourself some questions as we go along, and add up the numbers at the end.

We have chosen ONLY foods already proven to have beneficial effects. You can either trust us and get on with it, or if you want to see the science behind these choices you can explore the files section further; this document is just a simple guide for those who want to eat healthily without needing to spend hours and days looking stuff up in charts.

Your Food Area

First organise your food area –usually the kitchen. If you live alone or with other healthy eaters this is easy, if not it can be all too easy to nibble other people's junk –so get yourself a special space for your own food; your own cupboard or section of the fridge, a box with your name on it, depending on your circumstances. If you can do a week's shopping at a time your space should be big enough to hold a week's shopping, if not it can be smaller.

What Does FOOD Mean?

In the popular media, anything you swallow counts as 'food', including cardboard, accidental insects, or sawdust. There are three categories of 'food':

1. Things that contain no nutrients your body can use, and have ingredients harmful to health, for example industrial chemicals, drugs, dangerous additives and toxins produced in processing, cardboard.
2. Things that contain some nutrients that your body can use, but are also harmful to health, for example accidental insects, processed foods, soda drinks, corn products, burgers, sausages, sugar.
3. Things that contain nutrients that your body can use and are good for your health, for example fruits, vegetables, nuts, fish, unprocessed meats, eggs, oats.

Optimal nutrition means choosing to eat mostly or only from the third category.

What Does FRESH Mean?

'Fresh fruit & veg' means fruit & vegetables looking like they did on the tree or plant -NOT frozen or in tins.

Fresh fish means either a whole or filleted dead fish –NOT battered or breadcrumbed.

Fresh pork means pork steaks, chops or joints –NOT pork products such as sausages, bacon or pies.

Fresh chicken means a dead chicken, not chicken-shaped lumps in breadcrumbs.

Fresh cheese means either cottage cheese or cheese made in a press, with no processing apart from the addition of rennet, not plastic-wrapped cheese slices