Healthy diet plan for office workers | Diet plan for office goers | Tips to improve health at work

Tips to improve health at work: You should walk for 6 minutes for every hour of sitting; include carbs in your diet.

It’s all about low-carb, low-calorie and high-protein food these days, if you want to remain fit. The year 2018 has seen people getting increasingly conscious about not just what they eat but also what goes into making their food. People have also adopted tough food habits like a ketogenic diet, which includes avoiding all kinds of sugar and starch. This has also led to the rapid increase of healthy food chains, which mention the ingredients being put and the calories being consumed.

To follow a healthy diet, remember that in-taking the right quantity of fat like cheese or butter — is actually good for your health. Yes, you read it right, eating the right kind of fat is also necessary. Eating healthy does not mean eating green. Non-vegetarian enthusiasts should continue eating chicken, fish and even red meat.

If your New Year resolution is to change your eating habits, Purva Gulyani, accredited practising dietitian, who has also worked at Fortis Hospitals, has some tips for you:

1. How many meals should we eat in a day?

We should learn to listen to our hunger cues and eat mindfully. Unfortunately, in today's era we get so caught up in work and other pressures that we are not very aware of our body needs. Hence, it is great to start with making a regular eating pattern and aim for 3 main meals and 2 small healthy snacks.

2. How many cups of tea and coffee should we consume? Should we include milk in our daily diet as well?

Moderation is the key to good health — 3 to 4 cups of tea/coffee of every day is the ideal amount for healthy adults. We go wrong when we load hot beverages with 2-3 tea spoon of sugar, full cream milk and have some biscuits or cookies or some savory snacks with it every time. If you can control these things, please go ahead and enjoy your favourite cuppa.

And yes, adding milk to the daily diet helps us meet the daily calcium and protein requirement.

3. Should we eat fruits and salad every day? if so, what kind of fruits and salad and in what quantity?

5 serves of vegetables and 2 serves of fruits every day is the standard recommendation. This should include one serve of vegetable that is half-cooked and one cup raw of veggies. As for fruits, consume one medium size fruit like apple, pear and banana every day. These are a brilliant source of micronutrients and antioxidants, that we pay so much money in the artificial supplements form.

Fruits and veggies are loaded with soluble fiber that helps us prevent and manage diabetes, high blood pressure and many other chronic diseases.

Business Standard