What is a balanced diet?
A balanced diet means eating a variety of foods in the right amounts: plenty of vegetables and fruit, starchy foods, protein foods such as pulses, fish, eggs and meat, some dairy or alternatives, and less of the foods high in fat, salt and sugar.
What it isn’t: a list of banned foods. A healthy diet is the one you can keep for years, which is why it should start from your own dishes rather than a menu imposed on you.
What does a balanced plate look like?
A balanced plate combines three groups: vegetables, a source of protein (meat, fish, eggs, pulses, tofu) and a starch (rice, pasta, potatoes, bread, couscous).
What changes with your goal is the share of each. To lose weight: generous vegetables, a full portion of protein and a smaller portion of starch. To build muscle: more protein and more starch. To keep a stable weight: a balanced share of each.
A healthy meal plan for the week
You don’t have to change everything at once. A healthy meal plan that lasts usually looks like this:
- Dishes you know, cooked differently if needed.
- Meals cooked ahead for the busy evenings.
- A dish your household won’t give up, kept in its place.
- The amounts for each meal, written before you shop.
Clean eating, without the rules
“Clean eating” usually means choosing mostly whole, minimally processed foods and cooking them yourself. Taken too far, it turns into a list of forbidden foods, which is hard to live with.
The useful part is simple: cook more of your own meals, from basic ingredients, in amounts that suit you.