What to Eat?
Choose a wide variety of nutrient dense foods.   Nutrient dense foods are rich in nutrients such as vitamins, minerals, protein, complex carbohydrates and fiber for the calories provided. 

A good place to start is with vegetables!  Include a vegetable salad with every lunch and dinner. Get in the habit of snacking on raw vegetables. Try one or two new vegetables or ones rarely eaten each week.  Regularly choosing lots of different vegetables provides a much wider variety of nutrients than if repeatedly eating the same few vegetables most of the time.

Serve fruit for breakfast. Enjoy fruit for snacks.  Fruit even makes a great dessert.

Eat a variety of grains, particularly whole grains.   Choose different grains and get creative with serving them.  For example, bulgur is wheat kernels that have been parboiled, dried and crushed.  It is available in a variety of textures from fine to coarse.   It is soft, but chewy and can be served in stew, as a salad such as tabouli or as a side dish.  Pearl barley is an ancient hardy grain that can be served in soups, as a cereal or as a side dish. Wheat berries are whole grains that have not been processed.  They can be used in bread recipes or served as a side dish.   These are just a few whole grains and there are many others.

Choose lean cuts of meat and then trim visible fat. Skinless chicken breasts and turkey breast are lean poultry choices.    Broil, grill, roast, poach or boil meat, poultry and fish instead of frying or preparing with added fat to keep the fat content low.

Select fish more often and look especially for those rich in omega 3 fatty acids such as salmon, trout and herring.

Choose dry beans or peas prepared without added fat as a main dish or part of a meal often. They are a great source of protein and fiber.   Examples are black beans, black-eyed peas,  chickpeas (garbanzo beans), kidney beans, lentils, lima beans, navy beans, pinto beans, soy beans, split peas, tofu (bean curd made from soy beans) and white beans.  

Nuts and seeds are rich in monounsaturated fats. But go easy on them because they are high in calories. 

Enjoy fat free milk as a beverage or use in recipes such as cream soup.  Fat free milk products, such as fat free yogurt, is wonderful for breakfast, a snack or used to dress a fruit salad.   Fat free cottage cheese mixed with sliced peaches or pineapple makes a nice salad.

Use vegetable oils such as olive and canola that provide unsaturated fats in cooking.  Reduce saturated fats, trans fat, partially hydrogenated fats and foods containing these fats.  

The American Heart Association1 offers these recommendations for making food choices:
·        Choose lean meats and poultry without skin and prepare them without  added saturated and trans fat.
·        Select fat-free, 1 percent fat and low-fat dairy products.
·        Cut back on foods containing partially hydrogenated vegetable oils to reduce trans fat in your diet.
·        Cut back on foods high in dietary cholesterol.  Aim to eat less than 300 milligrams of cholesterol each day.
·        Cut back on beverages and foods with added sugars.         
·        Choose and prepare foods with little or no salt.  Aim to eat less than 1,500 milligrams of sodium per day.
·        If you drink alcohol, drink in moderation.  That means one drink per day if you’re a woman and two drinks per day if you’re a man.
·        Follow the American Heart Association recommendations when you eat out, and keep an eye on your portion sizes.


Also, don’t smoke tobacco-and stay away from tobacco smoke.