Eat healthy: the rules of a healthy and balanced diet!

Why should you eat "healthy and balanced"? Simply to satisfy 100% of our nutritional needs! Varying one's diet is the only way to bring all the elements necessary for the maintenance and proper functioning of the body. Reminder of some golden rules to have a healthy and complete diet.

Eat pasta with every meal or pizza every night, and you're likely to have some fiber, mineral or vitamin deficiencies! To balance your diet, just know how to compose your meals. Follow this guide to eating healthy and balanced, it's not that complicated ...

Structuring a healthy and balanced meal

Eating is above all filling up with energy in the form of lipids and carbohydrates ... but not only! The body also needs protein for making cells, fiber for intestinal transit, minerals and vitamins for growth and vitality. But no food concentrates all these nutrients at once! We must play the complementarity between different families to meet all our nutritional needs. Thus, a balanced meal should be composed with:

A portion of meat, fish or egg as a source of protein and iron (or a plant equivalent such as pulses, cereals or soya);
A dish of starchy foods, pulses or bread as a source of complex carbohydrates, fiber and minerals;
Vegetables and fruits with at least one crudity for fiber, vitamins and minerals;
A dairy product for calcium intake;
A fatty substance for essential fatty acids and certain vitamins;
Without forgetting the water , essential for the hydration and the complementary contribution of minerals.
In practice...
In America, all these foods are traditionally divided into an entrée, a main course, possibly cheese and a dessert. Here are some examples of balanced meals:


Endive salad in vinaigrette 
(raw vegetables + oil)

Lemon Tabbouleh 
(small portion of starch + oil)

Fillet of sea bream with tagliatelle 
(protein + starch + butter)

Roast pork and ratatouille 
(protein + vegetables + oil)

Yoghourt with fruits 
(dairy product + sugar)

Cheese and bread 
(dairy product + small portion of starchy foods)

Water


Learn to trick!
To make sure you do not make a mistake in the composition of the meal, first choose a product that you want at the moment, among the different food groups: for example, roast chicken. Then add it to the other food groups: for example, add a portion of rice for starchy foods, a green salad for raw vegetables and a dairy for dessert. 
With couscous or paella, the dish brings together all the food groups at once: meat, starchy foods and vegetables! So, how to do ? Just look for the missing element, that is to say a dairy and a fruit. Another example is quiche lorraine, which includes ham, eggs, milk, flour (starchy foods) and fresh cream. To accompany it, you just have to add an entree of raw vegetables and a fruit for dessert, rather than cheese that would make the meal overall too fat!

Balance over time
But the balance of food is not only on a dish, or even a meal! It takes place on a whole day, even on the week. If you eat too much or too little at one meal, you can very well restore balance to the next meal. So, the balance of food: do not make a fuss! Remember that eating is above all a pleasure and a way to ensure good health!