Get Over It! 6 Simple Tips To Help Curb Your Junk Food Habit

Please bear with me for a sec while I rant about our food system.  Bottom line, it needs to be scrapped much like health care or I should say “sick care”.  I realize my talking about how food in the US is super crappy might be getting a little old, but we really need to wake up guys!

Michael Moss’s book “Salt, Sugar and Fat” How the food giants hooked us and an article in the New York Times based on the book, outlines some crazy and almost unbelievable facts.

Where we are today:

• One out of three adults and one in 5 kids are considered clinically obese
• 24 million Americans have type 2 diabetes
• 79 million have pre-diabetes
• 8 million have gout
• Obesity has been cited as a contributing factor to approximately 100,000–400,000 deaths in the United States per year
• Obesity has increased health care use and expenditures costing us an estimated $117 billion per year

Long story short, sugary, salty, fatty foods are not good for us in the quantities that we consume them.

However, reasons why our diabetes, obesity and hypertension numbers are spiraling out of control isn’t just an epidemic of poor willpower.  Moss found found the following…

A conscious effort in labs, marketing meetings and grocery-store aisles to:

• Get people hooked on foods that are convenient and inexpensive
• Create foods with “the bliss point” to produce the greatest amount of crave
• Avoid creating foods with “sensory-specific satiety.”  I.e. big, distinct flavors to overwhelm the brain, which keeps you from wanting more.

Products like Coca-Cola or Doritos are formulated just right to pique your taste buds enough to be interesting, but don’t have a distinct, overriding single flavor that tells the brain to stop eating.  One of the reasons you can’t eat just one.

And since the 1980’s pretty much every processed food is developed in this way.  No wonder we’re fat!“

If you want to learn more about the specifics, read the book or article.  I’m still not sure if I’m going to read the complete book.  Not because it isn’t good or that I don’t respect and thank Michael Moss for his work, but because I think I’m going to get too cranked up and aggravated.  Gotta keep my stress in control.

So what can we do?

The future isn’t as grim as it may seem.  We all make our choices 3 times a day or more.  Add these 6 simple strategies to your lifestyle and you’ll not only feel better and  get rid of your cravings, but you’ll probably lose some weight too.

6 Tips to help reduce Sugar and Salt cravings

1.) Eat Regularly something like three meals and two snacks or five small meals a day. For many people, if they don’t eat on a schedule, their blood sugar levels drop, they feel like eating their arm off and are more likely to crave sweet sugary or salty snacks.

2.) Choose Whole Foods – That’s right JERF it baby!   The closer a food is to its original form, the less processed sugar and salt it will contain. Food in its natural form, including fruits and vegetables, usually don’t create metabolic problems for a normal body, especially when consumed in variety.

3.) Try To Incorporate Protein and Good Fats Into Each Meal This will help control blood sugar levels.

4.) Add Spices Coriander, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and cardamom will naturally sweeten your foods and reduce cravings.

5.) Move Your Body Exercise, dance or do some yoga. Whatever you enjoy will help reduce tension, boost your energy and decrease your need for a sugar lift.

6.) Get enough sleep – When we are tired we often use sugar for energy to counteract the exhaustion.

What do you think about these?  Doable right?  Please share this post with as many people you care about as possible.  We can all cure this health care crisis, one person at a time.