This post is all about clean eating for beginners. I find that most people have the following two issues.
- Do you want to begin eating clean and healthy food but don’t know where to start?
- Or, are you plagued by overwhelming information telling you what new health fad you need to follow?
It is so much that most of us give up before we even start. Or, we make changes we think are better only to still feel like crap and find out they are no better than our other choices.
With so much mixed information and different diets to follow, knowing where to start can be confusing and overwhelming.
In this article, I will break down 3 simple steps to clean eating for beginners, tips for success in the process, and why fad diets rarely work.
Please read and share with your friends, there is so much great info here that will help you better understand what real food is and how you can begin to incorporate more of it into your diet.
1. Keep It Simple
We tend to overcomplicate things. We make even the simplest things very difficult by thinking we need lots of money and time and new fancy gadgets in order to accomplish a goal.
This can be exhausting, as we quickly feel overwhelmed and are that much more likely to give up before we even start.
Changing our eating habits is probably one of the hardest things to do, because everywhere we go there are temptations to eat junk.
Pro Tip: I specifically pick a smaller grocery store because I know I won’t be inundated with junk food everywhere I turn.
Even for those of us who seem to have more willpower, temptation will get us in our weak moments.
So, step one is to keep it simple. When you first begin to clean eating, pick one meal to swap out, or one junk food snack to swap out for something better.
One step at a time is always the best way to make a change. And I always follow the rule of eating what makes me feel good. For example, if I eat something and feel bloated after, I remember that and remove it or eat it sparingly.
Here are some food swap examples: Instead of a bag of chips for a snack, grab carrots and hummus or apples and peanut butter. If you are craving salt, add some salt. If you are craving sweet pick fruit which is packed with natural sweeteners.
Massive change doesn’t happen overnight, this is a marathon not a sprint. So pick one thing at a time to change while you dive deeper on this journey to improved health and better eating.
2. Eat Real Food
Clean food is real food. Not processed or fried food. When you are beginning this journey it can feel hard to find clean food options when you are used to convenience.
This slogan is not mine. I must give credit where credit is due. Kim Brockway from Veritas Fitness coined this and the second I read it I absolutely loved it. Eat. Real. Food.
So simple yet so powerful. When you are confused about what a healthy option would be, pick the real food.
What is real food? The food that came from the ground or a tree, not the food that was made in a factory.
Most processed foods are not real foods. Examples of junk would be chips, candy, fruit snacks, packaged meals, packaged snacks, and anything else with an ingredient list full of things you cannot pronounce.
While many would argue that it is easier to just grab the packaged snack off the shelf, I would say it is a habit issue. Those packaged foods are not only full of bad stuff, but they also have very little nutritional value, leading to you still being hungry even after eating the whole bag.
Have you ever noticed that? Remember Lay’s Chips slogan? You can’t have just one.
Literally, you can’t, you want the whole darn bag. The reason why is because you eat it and your body is still craving something to fill that nutritional void, so you keep wanting more but it never gets filled.
When you eat real food, your nutritional needs are more likely to be met and you will crave less and eat less because your body is satisfied.
3. Read Ingredient Labels
Reading ingredient labels is daunting at first because it will seem like a foreign language. To keep it simple, the things you aren’t familiar with you probably shouldn’t be eating. It’s that easy.
As you go through this process and want to learn more about beginning to eat clean, you will naturally wonder what is in the food you have been eating.
I have a whole post uncovering bad ingredients in food that you can read to learn even more. For the sake of simplicity though we will just cover the basics.
Look for less than 5 ingredients
That is not a hard fast rule, but a general one. Fewer ingredients mean it’s closer to real food than manufactured food.
Organic
There is always a lot of debate whether organic is worth it or not. I personally choose to believe that organic foods are held to a higher standard than conventional as much of my research has supported this.
If something is organic, you can trust that it was not intentionally sprayed with chemicals like glyphosate (round up) or other fertilizers that damage the nutritional value and add harmful chemicals to the vegetable or fruit.
Real versions of ingredients rather than over-processed substitutes
An example of this would be choosing cane sugar over high fructose corn syrup or avocado oil over vegetable/canola oils (soybean, etc.).
You want the food you eat to resemble its natural state as much as possible.
High fructose corn syrup is a highly processed form of sugar that can spike your blood sugar in a way that no fruit by itself probably can. That is not a good thing.
Vegetable oils are also highly processed and used in virtually every packaged food, so this will probably be one of last things you tackle, as it will feel like an uphill battle. If you are curious about seed oils you can read my post on what are seed oils and why you should know about them.
Again, keep it simple. Make small changes to real food, not packaged if possible, and watch the changes unfold.
Why Fad Diets Rarely Work
Every new year there are a ton of people promoting this diet and this cleanse.
Ever tried that new diet because someone on Instagram ranted and raved about how it worked for them but it was a total flop for you? It’s exhausting to watch and even worse to attempt and feel crummy or feel no change!
Everyone is different. Period. Seriously though, the more research that comes out about nutrition and health the more we see that everybody is different and everyone has different nutritional needs.
That’s why low carb works for one person and low fat for another. So, when you are beginning, how do you know which clean eating option is good for you?
That is the tricky part. I am not an expert in this, but I like to follow the eat real food motto I mentioned above.
If you focus the majority of your diet on real, clean foods, you will notice changes. Less processed food and more real, organic, close to home-grown food the better off we are.
So, Where Do I Start?
Keep it simple, eat real food, and learn how to read ingredient labels. Change one small thing at a time and see how it goes.
If you want to delve further there are lots of great resources.
Caseymeans.com and drmarkhyman.com are great places to start. Dr. Hyman has an app called Function where you can pay $500 and get blood work done twice a year that covers over 100 lab tests and markers for nearly all facets of your nutrition and health.
If you are ready to truly take charge of your own health, you need to check out Dr. Hyman’s function health.
Dr. Hyman also has a 10-day detox/reset that is a great place to start. I love that it is only 10 days, plus days of reintroducing. This seems less daunting to me than say 30 days or 6 months, especially if you have a lot to switch up.
I hope you’ve found this informational and helpful. Please comment below with any questions or suggestions as I’m always looking to improve and give you more of what will help the most.
