Best Five Foods For Daily Weight Control

Eating your way into a healthier life does not need to be difficult, expensive, painful, or boring.

American society is a landscape of Entertainment Foods – fast food and fun junk foods that have little substance or nutritional value, yet pack in the calories and the expense. A super-duper-value meal may cost less than $5.00, but an adult usually needs to eat two or three of these "meals" in order to feel half-full.

The following five foods taste good, satisfy hunger, and do not need to be expensive. If taken together and eaten every day, they can help the human body avoid many diseases and conditions - perhaps even Alzheimer's - live longer in a healthier status, and avoid weight gain or produce weight loss.

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) and Traditional Korean Medicine (TKM) have recommended these types of aromatic plants in the daily diet for millennia. The oils in these food plants produce the fragrance that accompanies them, while providing health benefits.

Onions, garlic, and hot peppers can increase health in a number of ways. Studies show evidence to support that onions eaten regularly can reduce the symptoms of asthma, but also reduce the risk of stomach cancer. Many people have believed that onions lead to stomach upset, but such is not the case, except for a few people – it is not the norm.

Together with garlic and hot peppers, onions help to reduce blood pressure and “bad” cholesterol levels as well. The oils from these aromatic plants fill in spaces in the body’s cell walls where viruses would inject proteins, so the oils help prevent viral attacks.

Remember Eddy’s Red Pepper Ice Cream? I loved it: peanuts rolled in hot red ground pepper and put into vanilla ice cream - just warm enough to be interesting. Hot chocolate drinks can be prepared with 1 to 3 different varies of ground dry hot peppers as well for a delicious cup of spiced cocoa that is not too hot.

A little hot red pepper is great in coffee drinks, too. Again, they are just spicy enough to be interesting and different.

Nuts are a traditional snack food, so they are different and fun to eat. They can also be added into mealtime dishes - in salads, ground into meat loaf, as garnishes, and in other ways.

Health and nutrition practitioners recommend nuts such as almonds, cashews, and English or black walnuts for their fiber content. This fiber slows down the digestive process so that after eating, you do not become hungry again as quickly. Vending machines aften offer nuts as snacks, so that would be a better choice over many of the other snack items, but they may contain more salt than you want to eat. However, if you reduce and maintian daily salt content to health levels, one slight overdose of salt will not be harmful (Just don’t drink two carbonated sodas afterwards to quench the thirst).

Beans offer a good source of fiber as well and are available in countless varieties. Beans look a little like nuts -- Are they related? Yes.

The Mayo Clinic has found that almonds and red beans are especially healthy. In summary:

The almond contains more calcium than any other nut, while all nuts are a good source of protein and fiber in the diet. Almonds also contain substantial quantities of iron, magnesium, riboflavin. A handful of almonds, around 25, will offer half of the human body's need for vitamin E as well.

As with all foods, moderation is key and portion sizes must be reasonable (no eating a whole can or jar in one sitting). Almonds provide monounsaturated fat that is healthy for the heat and lowering "bad" cholesterol levels in the blood, but too much of that fat daily will not help the body. Purchasing almonds in the shell and cracking them for a serving will help slow down a desire to eat too many in a serving.

Red beans can include products labeled "red beans" at the grocery, but also encompass dark red kidney beans that have a lot of flavor. All of these beans provide elements such as copper, iron, magnesium, potassium, and the B-vitamin thiamin.

Besides their fiber and protein content, like nuts, these beans have little fat and can help prevent conditions of the cardiovascular system as well as some forms of cancer.

You may hear “whole grains” all over the TV, radio, and Internet, but the redundance is not hype. This is a serivce announcement that you can believe.

You may not have not tried this category of grain foods yet, but you might like to do so. If you change to whole grains you will be happy with the increased flavor and substantial heft to the food products containing them – they are more filling than off-the-shelf white breads.

Studies show that eating white bread in childhood is connected with adult diabetes (Type II), and that’s a strong reason to make the switch to whole grains. Another plus is the fact that research points to the ability of whole grains to reduce belly fat storage.

A type of fake whole wheat bread is on the market these days, however, so be aware of that gimmick. This is white bread with additional coloring and Splenda® artificial sweetener added, but consumers don’t realize this until reading the fine print; if you’re allergic to Splenda®, you especially don’t need to try it this product. I am allergic to the artificial sweetener and a friend in another state is allergic to such a degree that it sent him to the emergency room with life threatening symptoms. Beware of phoney “whole grain” products and read labels closely.

Among grains other than wheat, refined white rice and white-flour pastas are unhealthy since they have lost up to 90% or more of any nutritional value they once possessed after industrial refining. Brown rice, whole oats, and quinoa are much healthier overall.

Leafy green vegetables have been recommended in healthy diets in the US for many decades. Among farming communities and home gardeners, these vegetables have been a mainstay. Even during The Great Depression and World War II, home cooks prepared wilted lettuce with a vinegar dressing, with or without a little bacon for flavor. Cabbages and spinach were also grown and served and provided excellent health benefits.

Leafy green vegetables contain high levels of folate and the vitamins A and C that can prevent certain types of cancer. It is found that one cup of dark leafy greens eaten every day can prevent Type II diabetes and high blood pressure. Leafy greens include several types of lettuce; mustard, collard, and turnip greens; kale, spinach, and chard.

What’s a crucifer? – In the realm of foods and diets, crucifers are vegetables with cross-shaped leaves or florets. Examples are watercress, broccoli, cauliflower, and broccoflower. The latter is a cross (hybrid) between cauliflower and broccoli that is even healthier for you than either of the two single vegetables alone - and quite tasty besides.

The Mayo Clinic advises that spinach may boost the human body's immune system. Its vitamins A and C are likely responsible for that. However, spinach also contains significant levels of B-6, iron, magnesium, and riboflavin.

Do you not like yogurt? – It comes in flavors that you might try to find that you enjoy. Avoid artificial flavors, however, or add fresh fruit to plain yogurt.

Plain yogurt can also be used as a healthier alternative to sour cream in a variety of dishes; non-fat sour cream usually contains corn syrup, replacing fat flavor with flavor from a substance that can cause health problems on its own. Plain yogurt is a better option.

Daily yogurt ingestion can aid digestion with active cultures it contains, without resorting to expensive yogurt brands advertised by celebrities on television. Read labels and choose yogurts that contain vitamin D, which will help prevent bone conditions like osteoporosis. There is evidence at AboutYogurt.com for the presence of significant protein in yogurts, for their cancer-fighting ability, and for their ability to boost the human immune system.