DO 'traffic light' shopping

Weight loss starts in the store. Yes, this is true - if you have it in stock, you feel compelled to eat it. So buy according to the traffic light system: green for go, orange for caution and red for stop. A typical (basic) grocery list will look like this:

Green-coded foods - enjoy in varying quantities, every day: oats, fresh or frozen vegetables, fruit, grains, dried beans and lentils, rice, pasta, non-oily fresh, canned or frozen fish, white chicken meat without skin, herbs, spices, stock powders, fat-free dairy products, cold-pressed virgin olive oil, whole wheat bread.

Orange-coded foods - enjoy in moderate quantities, no more than four times a week: canned vegetables, oily fresh, frozen or canned fish (in brine), unsalted nuts, skinless chicken (dark meat), refined clarified canola or sunflower oil, 2% dairy products, soup powders, canned soups, fish paste and vegetable bread spreads, white bread, red meat.

Red-coded foods - enjoy in really small quantities, no more than once a week: canned fruit, full-fat and cream cheese, fish canned in oil, bacon, butter, cream, chicken with the skin, offal, cakes, confectionery, anything coated in crumbs or baiter and deep fried.

Gone fishing

Fish should not only be reserved for Fridays; it should be consumed at least four times a week. Gram for gram, fish offers the most beneficial nutrients with less harmful fat than any other animal protein foods. The oily fish varieties (salmon, sardines, mackerel, pilchards) are rich in Omega 3 and 6 oils, essential for:-

• Your brain: keeps the mind alert, brain tissue fluid levels high, regulates brain metabolism, improves neurotransmission and in short, enhances your mental functioning.

• Your looks: ensures optimal functioning of skin and nails, the formation of new skin cells and alleviates skin and nail problems.

• Your senses: maintains and protects - and may even improve-your eyes, your sense of taste and smell, your balance and hearing.

• Your heart, lung and cardiovascular systems: increases oxygen supply, boosts circulation, heals blood vessel damage, prevents arteriosclerosis and positively lowers blood pressure and cholesterol.

• Your uro-genital systems: ensures sex hormone production, reduces PMS,improves fertility, protects prostate and testes in men and improves urinary problems.

• Your nerves: protects the nervous system.

• Your immune system: supports and improves your immune system.

• Your muscles and skeleton: it is an anti-inflammatory agent and eases muscle aches and pains.

Oily fish contains on average 12 to 16 g of fat per 100 g portion. This does not mean you should avoid the oily varieties. On the contrary, study the list of benefits again and see how important it is to eat them regularly!

Non-oily varieties such as hake, sole, kingklip and tuna are low in kilojoules, tasty and versatile, they provide you with super-A protein without the risk of high fat consumption, These varieties contain on average 1 to 2 g of fat per 100-g portion, a real bargain if you're hungry and feel like a large portion of protein!

However, as is the case with all foods, the way in which you prepare fish will make the difference to the size of your dress. All varieties of fish, from the robust sardines to subtle hake, taste better if prepared simply: grilled with a light sauce of lemon and herbs. Those crispy coatings we love so much, only serve to mask their taste. Be honest, don't you eat fried fish because it is actually the batter you love so much? And guess what: its the oil-and-batter combination that loves your hips so much that it clings to them forever!

Chicken considerations

When it comes to enjoying lean animal protein, chicken is a great second choice after fish. The reason is the visibility of its fat, Most animal proteins have fat hidden in the flesh, whereas chicken has most of its fat concentrated in visible fat and of course in the skin. By removing the skin and visible fat from a chicken, you reduce the amount of fat you will be consuming by as much as half.

The question presented once a chicken is on the serving platter is "... white or dark meat?" Regardless of your personal taste preference, you might be interested to know that skinless white meat is the choice if you want to include very little fat in your meal. It contains around 4,5% fat, whereas the dark meat (skinless) contains 9,7% fat. On the other hand, if nutrients are what you are after, go for the dark meat. It contains about twice as much zinc, folate, and vitamin A as white does,

All this proves that when it comes to choosing your chicken, you have only a few simple and sensible choices to make. How to prepare it is a much harder decision to make. There are thousands of rich and tempting chicken recipes (remember the one roasted, skin and all, with chutney and mayonnaise?), so invest in a few low- fat chicken recipe books for your body's sake.

The decision whether or not to remove the skin should be determined by the method of cooking you are planning to follow. Since you will be eating according to the 'Have-a-life' eating plan, you might want to indulge in some crispy chicken now and again. For this purpose, and only this, you would leave the skin intact. It protects the bird from the heat, keeping the meat moist. Therefore, a bird with its skin must be prepared in a 'dry' way, such as grilling, roasting or barbecuing. Pierce the skin all over with a sharp instrument (toothpick or meat skewer) and roast raised, on a rack, so that the fat can be released and drip away. Cooking it in this way releases even more fat and gives it a crispier-than-usual skin - a pleasant bonus for your trouble.

Cooking a skinless chicken has the advantage of drastic fat reduction, but it can possibly become dry and stringy. Which will make you dump your diet faster than you can say: "Pass the gravy". However, poaching, boiling, cooking, stewing or making a casserole, are 'wet' cooking methods for which the skin's protection is not really required. If you cooked the chicken with its skin intact in this manner, the unnecessary (and unwanted) fat will simply leech out into the sauce, and invariably end up on your plate and in your body. There is no point in doing this, especially if you consider that you would never have eaten the fat on its own. So why eat it mixed with (or floating on top of) other juices and flavours? It will just end up floating around your thighs, somewhere under your skin. Your orange-peel skin, at that!

Making the most of meat

Meat only poses two possible threats, namely its visible fat and the fact that too much of any good thing is .... well, not much good. Eating too much meat means you are eating too much saturated fat, absorbing too many unwanted fat kilojoules and pushing your protein intake through the roof.

Enjoyed in moderation though, lean red meat (with all visible fat removed) is quite a bright star in the nutrient skies. It is rich in potassium, B vitamins, zinc and iron and an excellent source of protein. Served in small, lean portions with the addition of dietary fibre, red meat will enhance your health rather than harm it.

Fibre, as found in grains, dried beans and vegetables, helps to fight heart disease, digestive disorders and certain types of cancer. These foods, when served with meat, will assist your body in coping with the hidden fats in the meat. Fibre-rich foods will also help you feel satisfied faster and for longer - an excellent way in which to help you control your meat intake and so too, those unwanted fat kilojoules.

You can make some clever cuts in your meat consumption, and I am not referring to cutting it out. I mean buying and eating cuts that contain less of the hidden fats (often called the marble fat) and cholesterol-causing saturated fat. Be 'pound' wise and buy clever cuts. Those are the hind-quarter cuts such as fillet, rump, topside and leg of lamb. They contain the least hidden fats. However, even after the visible fat has been removed, you'd be surprised to know how much fat is hidden in what you deem 'pure' meat.

The cooking method also dictates how much fat you will eventually consume. Red meat actually loses weight during cooking or grilling on a rack, and depending on the period of time for which the meat is exposed to the heat, between 7 and 23% of the fat could drip away. That is provided of course you don't consume the pan drippings! With stews and casseroles, in which the fat becomes part of the sauce, no dripping away of fat takes place and it seeps into the cooking liquids. Those you end up eating by way of the gravy or a sauce. And needless to say, frying meat in fat or oil obviously adds even more fat (and unwanted) kilojoules to your unsuspecting body - rather a stupid thing to do if you want to be lean and healthy. So consider your cut and its cooking method with great care if you care about your weight.

Best of all course, is to go wild. it you enjoy red meat, 'have venison often. A very large serving of grilled game steak (300 g) will only add a humble 9,6 g of fat to your intake, whereas a similar serving of grilled beef steak (rump, fat removed) could add as much as 30 g of fat.

Similarly, if you enjoy poultry, be game for game. Ostrich, pheasant and quail are ultra-lean and 300 g of roast game will only provide you with about 10,5 g of fat. On the other hand, if you roasted (with the skin intact) and consumed its domesticated counterpart the chicken, the exact same size of serving will happily lay in the region of 39 g of fat on your body.

Be cautioned, though; game and venison tend to be dry - as a result of their low fat content - so don't defeat the whole object by adding buffer, oil, bacon, lard or cream to the dish. Use wine, fruit and stocks instead to moisten the meat. As for a sauce or gravy, the stock of game or venison is delightfully robust in flavour. Reduce your cooking liquid by boiling it rapidly with garlic, aromatic peppercorns and herbs until richly brown and thickened to your liking. A wiser, leaner and more nourishing bet than a creamy sauce, for sure.

Don't inhibit your^- nutrients

There is no point in trying to follow a healthy diet if you are not aware of the fact that the absorption of certain nutrients can be inhibited. In other words, their assimilation and uptake by the body can be hindered by some or other bad food combination with nutrient inhibitors.

The nutrients most at risk are calcium and iron. Thus, try not to consume calcium-rich foods with alcohol, high-fibre cereals or red meats - they restrict the absorption of calcium. This means for example, that it is not wise to combine cheese and wine or cereal and milk. Serve wine with low-fat meat, chicken, fish, fruit and vegetable snacks and your cereal with fruit juice instead of milk. Vitamin D, however, aids the absorption of calcium. As sunlight is an excellent way to improve your vitamin D levels, serve lean, fruity milkshakes around your pool instead of fruit juices. That way your body will benefit fully from your clever combinations.

The absorption of iron is hampered by the simultaneous intake of tea, red wine and high-fibre cereals, so don't serve, say, iron-rich liver with whole wheat bread or brown rice, Rather serve it with potatoes or white rice. On the other hand, foods rich in vitamin C assist in the absorption of non-heam iron (iron derived from vegetables), so combine those foods for optimum nutrition. For instance, a salad made from iron-rich spinach, vitamin C-rich tomatoes and sweet peppers would be an excellent choice for super-A nutrient absorption without any threat of inhibitors.

How Fresh is Fresh? (Freezing the freshness)

`Freezing the freshness in'

Freezing is one of the most commonly used methods and its big advantage is that it gives the consumer a year-round availability of what might be a short-season crop. In general, after cooking, most frozen food has the same nutritional value as the identical cooked product using fresh produce. Vegetables are harvested while vitamin C levels are still high and the delay incurred between harvesting and blanching is so short that there are negligible changes in nutritional quality.

A recent report from Britain (the Chipping Campden Report), evaluated fresh versus canned versus frozen peas and came up with some interesting results. For example, it was found that frozen peas do not lose protein, fat, fibre or iron through processing, storage or final cooking. Canned peas are produced from less tender peas and naturally have a slightly higher protein and fibre content. Processing had no effect on zinc levels, but both frozen and canned storage reduced these by about 25%. As regards calcium, cooked frozen peas have a higher level than cooked fresh ones, but they have only about half as much potassium - although this is not a cause for concern since potassium is present in many foods and a deficiency of it is very rare.

What about the all-important vitamin C? Cooked frozen peas have a slightly lower content than cooked, freshly picked ones, but more than cooked, fresh 7-day-old peas. The report concluded that the vitamin C level of cooked frozen peas was about equivalent to cooked fresh 3- to 4-day-old peas, probably about the age they would be if you bought them from your local supermarket for supper the next day. In other words, you can assume that frozen peas are not only convenient but nutritionally as worthwhile as the fresh variety - if somewhat more expensive. If we apply roughly the same results to most frozen vegetables, we can see straight away that they do provide us with a very good out-of-season option.

What's in a can?

Itis probably because frozen fruit and vegetables are raw and canned produce is cooked during the canning process that you may be more likely to regard the former as 'fresh' and the latter as 'processed'. Yet it is interesting that the nutritional value of freshly cooked produce differs very little from the canned variety. This is mainly because with canning, although the cooking period may be a little longer than for home-cooked vegetables, the fact that all air is excluded carries enormous nutritional advantage over our domestic cooking pots. By heating, which destroys any micro-organisms, and excluding air, food is preserved without additives. Apart from the fact that you may simply prefer the taste of fresh vegetables, the only disadvantage of the canned variety is that you don't have any say over the amount of salt and/or sugar added in the canning process.

Fresh from the sea

Fish is another popular frozen food and for many city and country dwellers who fancy something marine on the menu the frozen variety is really the only practical choice. Those who live near fishing ports and harbours (or have keen fisherfolk in the family) are lucky indeed as they will have the chance to enjoy that almost sweet, seaweedy flavour that is the hallmark of truly fresh fish. For the rest of us, frozen fish from one of the big producers is a very acceptable alternative. The fish is caught out at sea and either frozen almost instantly on the fishing vessel itself, or else packed on ice and frozen as soon as it is landed. In this way, optimum nutritional content is maintained and flavour impairment kept to a minimum.

If you are lucky enough to buy fresh fish, check whether it really is fresh, or has been shipped in a frozen state and then defrosted to be laid out on a slab in the supermarket. There's no major difference if you are going to eat it straight away, but if you intend to refreeze it for later use, you would do better to buy commercially frozen fish instead. Not only will the flavour and texture be better, but you will avoid the risk of deterioration attached to freezing, thawing and then refreezingfood.

As with vegetables, most of us would probably like to buy our fish fresh but if you have to settle for frozen, as a bonus you'll be getting consistently high quality. In the case of fresh fish, quality may be erratic, all the more so the further away you are from the maindistribution centres.

Combat Heart Disease

The danger of heart disease can and should be combatted on a daily basis in every home in South Africa - in fact, only in this way can we hope to lower our tragically high CHD statistics. Here are some tips for preventing the development of two of the major offenders - high blood cholesterol levels and hypertension - that you can put into practice in your own kitchen:

To cut back on saturated fats:

1. Choose poultry, fish and lean cuts of meat more often and remove the skin and trim the fat from meat.
2. Drink skim or 2% milk rather than the full-cream version. Eat low-fat cheese instead of hard cheese such as Cheddar.
3. Use tub margarines and/or vegetable oils (sunflower, olive oil) that are high in unsaturated fat instead of butter, lard and hard margarine - which are all high in saturated fat.
4. Cut down on commercially prepared and processed foods made with saturated fats and oils (such as biscuits, pies and pastries).

To cut down on dietary cholesterol:

• Eat less organ meat such as liver, brains and kidneys.
• Eat fewer egg yolks and try substituting two egg whites for each whole egg in recipes.

To increase complex carbohydrates:

• Eat more whole grain breads and cereals, pasta, rice and legumes (dried peas and beans).
• Eat fruit and vegetables more often.

To lose weight:

• Eat fewer kilojoules daily (cutting back on fat will really help).
• Burn up extra kilojoules by exercising regularly.

To reduce your total salt intake:

Remove the salt cellar from the table.

• Gradually reduce and/or omit salt in cooking (see below).
• Avoid foods with a high sodium content - the major culprits are canned, processed and convenience foods, such as bacon, sausages, salami, potato crisps, salted nuts, salty biscuits, powdered soups, gravy powders, stock cubes, sauces and dressings.
• Read food labels and avoid foods with added salt/sodium.

To cut back on alcohol:

• Choose low alcohol wines or beer.
• Dilute white wine with mineral or soda water.

Cutting salt out of cooking

You can get used to cooking with very little or no added salt by:

• Using garlic, dry mustard, peppers, onions, mushrooms and tomatoes to add flavour to meat and vegetable dishes in place of salt.
• Adding a little wine to casseroles and stews. The alcohol willevaporate during cooking, but the flavour remains.
• Adding sliced lemon or lemon juice to white meats and fish.
• Using herbs (such as basil, origanum, sage and thyme) and spices (such as cardamon, cinnamon, cumin and nutmeg) for flavour.

Reading Labels at Supermarket

We' recommend you take the following steps when purchasing products to go in your supermarket trolley:

The information on the front of the product is designed to attract your attention and encourage you to buy it. Ignore it and turn to the back

1. Most foods will give the nutrition information per 100 g. This is handy to compare with other foods, but may not be the amount of each serving. Check the serving size so you know how much you will actually eat.

2. Check the fat content. Aim for 5 g of fat per 100 g or less.

3. Check the Ingredients List for the types of fats present. If you see things like 'trans fats' or 'partially hydrogenated vegetable oil', it may be a good product to avoid.

4. Check the carbohydrate total. Of that, how much is total sugars? Identify the various forms of sugar in the Ingredients List; 5 g of sugar per 100 g is the maximum - try for less. Remember that 5 g of sugar is about 1 teaspoon.

5. Look at the fibre content. Foods with about 3-5 g of fibre per 100 g are ideal.

6. Check sodium levels. Aim for 150 mg or less per 100 g.

7. Look at the Ingredients List for additives and preservatives. If you are concerned with these
or have a sensitivity to them, check their numbers in the box on the following page.

Additives

Sadly, convenience foods have become a staple part of the modern diet. Food additives are common in most convenience foods like biscuits, canned goods, soups, ready-made meals, frozen foods, ice cream, breads, dairy foods, cereals - you name it. An additive is regarded as any ingredient not normally eaten as a food by itself or normally found as a natural ingredient of food. Additives can be used for preserving, adding colour or flavour to a product, and also help the manufacturer process ingredients.

It is now a legal requirement in most developed countries for all ingredients and additives to be listed according to weight. However, if the manufacturer did not add the additive (it may have been added before they received the ingredient), then they are not required to list it. How scary is that? It means that even though you have a list of ingredients on the label, they may not necessarily be all of the ingredients in that food.

A lot of additives have numbers as well as a name. The manufacturer may choose to list the name or number of the additive and is not required to list both. It may be a good idea to get to know what the different numbers mean so you can easily identify what they are. Below is a list of the most common food additives, some of which are known to cause adverse reactions, with symptoms such as hyperactivity, upset stomach, suspected carcinogens and nausea to name a few. Some are even carcinogenic in test animals, depending on dosage.

Healthy Dietary Food Portion Serving Sizes Guides (Grains, Vegetables & Fruits)

Fruits and vegetables

Fruits and vegetables form the next layer of the pyramid. Both provide important vitamins, minerals, and fiber. Green leafy vegetables and vitamin C rich fruits had the greatest effect on anti heart disease.

Most of the news in nutrition research is about the health benefits of a group of nutrients concentrated in vegetables and fruits called antioxidants. These nutrients help minimize the normal wear and tear that comes from living and can reduce the risk of cancer and stroke as well as heart disease.

Fruits (2 to 4 servings)

Breakfast is a good place to begin building up fruit servings. You may already start your day with a glass of juice. Add a midmorning snack of fruit and have some for dessert at lunch or dinner, and you've made your goal of three to four servings a day.

Make at least one serving each day a citrus fruit. Orange and grapefruit juice are standard options, but don't forget about the many varieties of oranges (navel, temple, Valencia, blood, and mandarin) and grapefruits (Ruby Red, white, and pink) that are available, as well as tangerines, tangelos, kumquats, and Ugh fruit, which are also considered citrus fruits. When possible, select fresh fruit in season. Instead, choosing oranges and grapefruit in winter and berries in spring, means there's a better chance that the fruit was grown locally and will end up tasting juicy and fresh.

Canned or frozen fruit can be a good substitute when a recipe or your appetite demands an out of season fruit. Be sure to reach for ones packed without added sugar.

Experiment with new fruits that you haven't tried before - figs, guava, star fruit, or prickly pears, for example.

With so many fruitfully delicious options to choose from, you'll never have to eat the same fruit twice in a week. Use these guidelines to determine serving sizes for fruits:

One whole fruit (a medium apple, banana, peach, or orange; or a small pear)

i. 1/2 grapefruit to Melon wedge (1/4 medium cantaloupe or 1/8 medium honeydew)

ii. 3/4a cup juice

iii. 1/2 cup mandarin or clementine orange sections

iv. 1/2 cup cut-up fresh fruit

v. 1/2 cup cooked or canned fruit

vi. 1/2 cup frozen fruit

vii. 1/4cup dried fruit

viii. 5 large strawberries or 7 medium strawberries

ix. 1/2 cup raspberries, blueberries, or blackberries

x. 11 large cherries

xi. 12 grapes

xii. 11/2 medium plums

xiii. 2 medium apricots or clementines

xiv. 1/8 medium avocado (but beware of its high fat content!)

xv. 7 melon balls (or %z cup melon)

xvi. 1/2 cup fruit salad (made without mayonnaise)

xvii. 1/2 medium mango

xviii. 1/4 medium papaya

xix. 1 large kiwi fruit

xx. 4 canned apricot halves, drained 14 canned cherries, drained

xxi. 11/2 canned peach halves, drained 2 canned pear halves, drained

xxii. 21/2 canned pineapple slices, drained 3 canned plums, drained

xxiii. 9 dried apricot halves

xxiv. 5 prunes

Vegetables (3 to 5 servings)

If it weren't for French-fried potatoes and tomato sauce on pizza and pasta, many people wouldn't get any vegetables at all. Too bad, because vegetables are mostly water, so they're a great way for dieters to expand their meals. Vegetables are a great source of vitamin C, foliate, beta carotene, minerals, and fiber - and practically no fat.

Use these guidelines to determine serving sizes for vegetables:

i. 1/2 cup vegetables, cooked or chopped raw

ii. 1 cup leafy raw vegetables, such as lettuce or spinach

iii. 1 medium tomato or 5 cherry tomatoes

iv. Seven to eight 21/2-inch carrot or celery sticks

v. 3 broccoli florets

vi. 1/3 medium cucumber

vii. 10 medium green onions

viii. 13 medium radishes

ix. 9 snow or sugar peas

x. 6 slices summer squash (yellow or zucchini)

xi. 1 cup mixed green salad

xii. 1/2 cup cole slaw or potato salad

xiii. 1/2 cup leafy cooked greens, such as kale, Swiss chard, or spinach v

xiv. 2 spears broccoli

xv. 1 medium whole green or red pepper, or 8 rings

xvi. 1 artichoke

xvii. 6 asparagus spears

xviii. 2 whole beets, about 2 inches in diameter

xix. 4 medium Brussels sprouts

xx. 1 medium ear of corn

xxi. 7 medium mushrooms

xxii. 8 okra pods

xxiii. 1 medium whole onion or 6 pearl onions

xxiv. 1 medium whole turnip

xxv. 10 French fries

xxvi. 1 medium baked potato

xxvii. 3/4 cup sweet potato

xxviii. 1/2 cup tomato or spaghetti sauce

xxix. 1/4 cup tomato paste

xxx. 1/2 cup cooked dry beans (if not counted as a meat alternate)

xxxi. 3/4 cup vegetable juice

xxxii. 1 cup bean soup

xxxiii. 1 cup vegetable soup

Some vegetables are "starchy" and calorie dense; others are mostly water. If you're watching your weight, limit your starchy vegetables to one or two servings per day, and make the remainder of your veggie servings nonstarchy.

Nonstarchy Vegetables	Starchy Vegetables
Asparagus	Beets
Broccoli	Cassava (yuca)
Brussels sprouts	Corn
Cabbage	Lima Beans
Cauliflower	Peas
Celery	Potatoes
Chicory	Pumpkin
Cucumbers	Rutabaga
Eggplant	Sweet Potatoes
Escarole	Taro
Green beans	Turnips
Greens (such as collard, kale, mustard and turnip)	Winter squash
Lettuce	Yams
Mushrooms
Okra
Peppers
Radishes
Sprouts

Grains (6 to 11 servings)

Grains form the foundation of eating healthfully; they're low in fat and provide essential vitamins, minerals, and fiber. This group is the source of complex carbohydrates in your diet. But eating too many calories without getting beneficial nutrients is also common.

It's true that croissants, donuts, cookies, muffins, cake, and other high fat and sugar items are in this group because they can fit into a healthy diet - just not everyday and probably not more than once a week if you're trying to lose weight. Because they provide more calories than nutrients, keep them to a minimum. The healthier choice is anything whole grain in a reasonable portion.

Make sure that at least three of your grain servings each day are whole grains - whole-wheat bread or cereal, for example. Use the ingredient labels to find the products with whole grains: You want whole wheat or other whole grain to be the first ingredient. Sugar, oil, and fats should be last on the list, if they appear at all.

Serving sizes for grains include the following:

a) 4-inch pima bread (white or wheat)

b) 1/16 of a two-layer cake

c) 2 to 3 large crackers (graham cracker square size)

d) 1/2 cup cooked cereal, pasta, or rice

e) 3 rice or popcorn cakes

f) 12 tortilla chips

g) 3 medium hard breadsticks, about 43/n inches long

h) One 7-inch flour or corn tortilla

i) 2 corn taco shells

j) Nine 3-ring pretzels or 2 pretzel rods

k) 1/5 of a 10-inch angel food cake

l) 9 animal crackers

m) 1 slice of bread

n) Half a hamburger or hot dog bun

o) Half an English muffin or a 21/2-inch bagel

p) 1 small roll, biscuit, or muffin (about 1 ounce each)

q) 1 ounce ready-to-eat cereal V 5 to 6 small crackers (saltine size)

r) 2 cups air-popped popcorn

Remember, some of the foods in the various groups may be higher in fat or added sugars than others, so when you're watching calories, focus on the lower-fat options that contain less added sugar.

Fiber comes from the grains group, the fruit and vegetable group, legumes in the meat group and from nuts. Essentially, fiber is a carbohydrate that can't be digested. A healthy diet has 25 to 35 grams each day. High-fiber diets are associated with less heart disease and diabetes.

Filling up with fiber, Fiber is Good for your Health

Looking for quick and easy ways to add fiber to your diet? Try some of these delicious tips:

For a side dish, have 1/2 cup of any one of the following: lentils (5 grams), cooked dried beans (7 grams), cooked whole grains, such as wheat berries (2 grams) or cracked wheat (3 grams). Mix it with '/2 cup of one of these vegetables: peas (3 grams), green beans (2 grams), or spinach (1 gram).

Make an opened-face sandwich with a sliced tomato (1 gram) and a slice of whole grain toast (2 grams). Top it with 1 ounce of low-fat mozzarella.

Select your cereals wisely. You have tons of high-fiber cereals to choose from now some offering up to 10 grams per serving. Look for cereals that provide at least 2 grams of fiber per serving.

Reach for fiber-rich fruits and think of them as ingredients, not just as snacks - especially a pear (4 grams), an apple (3 grams), a couple of figs (3 grams), 1 cup of strawberries (3 grams), or a banana (2 grams). Add them to salads, cereal, and yogurt or use them as a topping for pancakes and waffles.

Make short-grain brown rice a staple (4 grams of fiber per cup). It has a rich, nutty flavor and tastes much better than the long grain variety. If you can't find it at your local supermarket, check health food stores or Asian supermarkets.

Sneak vegetables in wherever you can - pizza, soups, stir-fries, rice, sandwiches, and pasta dishes. The sky's the limit!

A surprising source of soluble fiber is reduced-fat foods. The guar gum that many reduced-fat foods contain in place of fats is soluble fiber. Caution: This doesn't give you license to replace fresh produce and whole grain products with faux fats, but they do contribute a marginal amount of healthful fiber. For example, one piece of a brandname fat-free chocolate loaf cake contains 1 gram of fiber, as does one fat-free oatmeal cookie, a full-fat one contains only 1/2 gram. Surprisingly, even 2 tablespoons of fat-free ranch dressing has1/2 gram of fiber.