Healthy Eating

Eating a healthy diet is important to maintain health and boost your immunity. Information and advice on how to achieve a healthy diet is available from:

NHS

British Heart Foundation

British Dietetic Association

NHS Better Life 

In addition here are some useful tips :

1.Plan meals in advance

Try and plan your meals and snacks a week ahead. This will help ensure you have the right ingredients to prepare your meals. When doing your shopping make a list of the food items you need to buy.

2.Set meal times

Where possible try and maintain a routine. Setting meal times will help keep you and your family from snacking on less healthy foods.

3.Try and cook from scratch more

Try out our  recipes where you cook from scratch and rely less on convenience foods and take-aways. Check out some delicious and simple recipes from British Dietetic Association and NHS Better Life.

4.Keep healthy snacks around

Boredom can increase snacking. It is ok to snack if you are hungry, but try to ensure you choose healthier snacks where possible, examples include:

• Vegetable sticks with dips, such as hummus or cream cheese
• Mixed nuts/seeds
• Fruit (try to avoid eating dried fruit in between meals, as it is high in sugar and can increase risk of tooth decay)
• Crackers / breadsticks
• Plain yoghurt with fruit
• Hardboiled egg
• Plain popcorn
• Rice cakes
• Half a bagel or slice of toast with low fat cream cheese

5.Consider taking a Vitamin D supplement

The government advises that all adults and children over 4 years old take 10 micrograms of vitamin D a day during autumn and winter. This is because you may not make enough vitamin D from limited sunlight in the UK between October and April. Vitamin D helps keep your bones, teeth and muscles healthy.

Vitamin D is found only in a small number of foods – oily fish (for example, salmon, sardines, mackerel), red meat, liver and liver products, egg yolk and foods that have been fortified with vitamin D such as breakfast cereals and some margarine and butter.

You should take a daily supplement containing 10 micrograms of vitamin D all year round if:

• you are not often outdoors, for example you live in a care home, or due to lack of mobility are unable to get out and about
• you have dark skin, for example you have an African, African Caribbean or South Asian background
• you usually wear clothes that cover up most of your skin when you are outdoors.

If you are not sure about safely taking a vitamin D supplement, please talk to you doctor.