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Nutrition Made Easy For Busy People

Five-a-day, easier than you think!

It’s really easy to get disheartened when you read another study about just how important getting our five-a-day really is. This latest study http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-12002299 estimates that around 33,000 lives could be saved in the UK alone if people followed government dietary guidelines.

We all know it’s a good idea of course, but keeping fruit and vegetable intake up over more than a couple of days can prove challenging, especially when you’re working or travelling. So, what’s the solution? Here are a few tips to make it easier.

  1. Spread your intake throughout the day, you’ll find it much easier to keep up the numbers that way. At breakfast alone, you can easily get up to three-a-day by adding blueberries and/or chopped apple to your cereal or porridge and having a fruit smoothie or vegetable juice. If you make your own, you can add in a few different options and this can really boost your intake right at the start of the day.
  2. Snack on a piece of fruit. Apples and satsumas take hardly any room in your handbag or backpack, so make a point of popping one or two in for your mid-morning and afternoon snack.
  3. Make sure you’re not just focusing on fruit: vegetables are really important too and contain different vitamins and minerals to fruit, so you need to make sure you’re getting plenty of these, as well.
  4. If you’re having a sandwich at lunchtime, add in some raw salad vegetables to boost your intake: tomato, onion, spinach, rocket, avocado. Or simply get yourself a mixed salad.
  5. In this cold weather, soups are a great way of mixing up lots of vegetables without feeling that you’re overdoing it. If you don’t feel like making your own, lots of places, such as Pret, do a tasty range of healthy soups at lunchtime.
  6. Fresh herbs count too, and adding these into your salads or casseroles will add flavour as well as nutritional benefit. Parsley, for example, is an excellent source of vitamin C
  7. At dinner time, swap your potato for a tasty root vegetable, such as parsnip or sweet potato. They’re just as satisfying and will help you up your quota.