Why nutritious food is needed for the body?

Alice Twain

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Eating and cooking for 40 years. 16h

Why nutritious food is needed for the body?

Let me make something clear, all food is nutritious. What is not nutritious is not food. A stone chip isn’t nutritious, an electric cable is not nutritious, a piece of wood is not nutritious. None of these things are nutritious, and none is food.

Food contains calories, proteins, carbs, vitamins, minerals and fibers. All of these are can be described as “nutrients” (I am extending the word also to calories, which are a measure of energy, and to fibers which can’t actually be assimilated but are nonetheless essential in our diet). So this is a food that contains nutrients:

And this is also a food that contains nutrients:

Now, it is important to eat food because without food we starve and die, and that’s clear. And all foods are nutritious, as I said, but they are not all made the same. That American chain-style pizza is loads of calories from essentially carbs, fats and a few proteins, while the soup has less calories, some carbs, some proteins, loads of fibers, some minerals, and some vitamins. So the pizza is unbalanced, the soup is less so.

What we need isn’t to just eat food, it’s to eat balanced food, with just enough calories, a balance of carbs, fats, and proteins (carbs and fats are mainly for energy, proteins are literally the bricks that build our body, but can also provide extra calories, aka energy, in case of need), and vitamins, minerals, and fibers for health. We need them all, and we also need fun that is tasty and fun, and companionship while eating because eating is a social experience.

So you need to eat BALANCED food, not just nutritious (all food is nutritious, as I said). It means eating about everything. Ideally, you should eat every day:

• 3–4 portions of complex carbs (bread, pasta, rice, potatoes, etc.);
• 2–3 portions of proteins (meat, fish, eggs, dairy, beans and other pulses, nuts and seeds);
• at least 5 portions of fruits and vegetables;
• 1–3 teaspons of added sugar (including the sugar you find in sodas and other foods, but not including the sugar naturally present in fruit or vegetables).

A portion is the size of your closed fist.

Distribute the food over as many meals and snacks as you want (but preferably have at least a couple of meals or a large meal and lots of snacks, do not cram everything in one massive meal). Now, if you like pizza or burgers or other forms of fast food, this doesn’t mean that you can’t have them ever! Indeed, one of the worst mistakes done by those who strive to eat healthy is to avoid these foods altogether. Have one or two weekly meals like that, but balance them out with meals rich in fruits and vegetables on the rest of the day, or even better, get smaller portions of fast food and balance it out with fruits and vegetables in the same meal.

For instance, instead of having this plus a dessert from the same chain, you may bring home the burger, partner it with a big salad, a piece of fruit, and a medium beer (which is healthier than drinking soda).

This is suprisingly a fairly healthy meal, with the burger providing most of the calories, but a ton of fibers from the salad and the fruit and far less of the total sugars.

But what happens if you stick to eating fatty, greasy, sugary food with not enough fruits and vegetables? You may not starve, but you are way more likely to become obese, and at the same time malnourished (so you eat enough calories, but not enough of the rest), which will also kill you much faster, and make you live much worse.