Healthy Eating For Your Heart
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5 Steps to a Healthy Heart
By eating a balanced diet, drinking alcohol with moderation and increasing your levels of physical activity, you can maintain a healthy body and heart”
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Look at the label
Processed foods now have to have a list of main ingredients. Many foods also show nutritional information. However, this information is often in a form that is difficult to understand. The 'ready reckoner' guide to food labelling shown on the next page may help. It shows what is a lot or a little in a portion of food.
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Guide to food labelling
For ready meals and foods you eat in large amounts, look at the amount per serving. For snacks, and foods you eat in small amounts, look at the 'per 100g' information. Work out from the table whether there is a lot or a little of each nutrient in the food. Remember - the most important nutrient to look for is fat.
The daily guidelines on the next page are a very rough guide to the recommended daily amounts of calories and nutrients for an average man or woman. You can use this information to help you make sense of food labels. For example, if a ready-made meal contains 50g of fat, you know that it has over half the recommended amount of fat for the day.
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What's a lot and a little?
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10g of sugars
20g of fat
5g of saturates
3g of fibre
0.5g of sodium | 2g of sugars
3g of fat
1g of saturates
0.5g of fibre
0.1g of sodium |
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Daily guidelines
|
Energy = 2,500kcal
Sugars = 70g
Fat = 95g
of which saturates = 30g
Fibre = 20g
Sodium = 2.5g | Energy = 2,000kcal
Sugars = 50g
Fat = 70g
of which saturates = 20g
Fibre = 16g
Sodium = 2g |
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Healthy Eating
Too much saturated fat from red meat, biscuits, cakes, chips and dairy products can clog up your arteries and put a strain on your heart. However, eating fish, poultry and vegetables etc can help.
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Did You Know?
- Eating at least 5 portions of fruit and vegetables a day will reduce the risk of coronary heart disease
- Reducing the total amount of fat you eat will reduce the amount of fats in your blood.
- Eating oily fish regularly can help reduce the risk of coronary heart disease.
- Reducing the amount of salt you eat will also keep your blood pressure down.
- Too much alcohol can damage the heart muscle.
