With global concern being raised over the present state of the world’s diet, people tend to develop a keen interest in diets that develop healthy living. DASH diet is one of such diets with huge potential to positively affect the health of the world’s growing population. It has remained top of the best diets for a number of years. Medical experts are of the opinion that the DASH diet is highly effective in keeping people’s health perpetually strong. Doctors of the National Institute of Health have scored the DASH diet 3.3 points out of a possible 5 in the category for weight loss and 4.5 points in the category for health usefulness.
What Is The DASH Diet
DASH, an acronym for Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension stands for a special style of a diet designed to deduce the effect of blood pressure in hypertensive people.
Although the above is not the only use of this style of diet, it was the singular reason why it was designed. It was until much later that scientists began to find out that there is more to the diet than just controlling blood pressure. It in fact revolves around a number of crucial problems, including Weight normalization, Cholesterol level Reduction, and prevention of heart failure.
The diet specifically balances a number of components(Calcium, vegetable fiber, protein, etc.) necessary to keep the brain and other key organs in the body functioning optimally.
The diet is not just the deal for perfect health, but also for the level of convenience it presents to followers. There is often no need to monitor and calculate each component, all you need is to eat certain products that will be recommended and reduce the intake of salt and you are good to go. The recommended dishes always revolve around fruits, grain products, dairy products, protein-containing food, and vegetables.
A major feature that stands the DASH diet out from other diet plans is that it supports use by people who have to control their diets throughout their lives. You don’t need to stay hungry after all. Not when you have easy access to a number of diverse and tasty dishes. All you need is to learn and stick to a few basic rules, and you are on the pathway to success.
Basic Rules:
The quantity of food may seem important, but it is not just about it, quality is more important. Here are some recommended principles to be adhered to:
- Drink up to 2 liters of fluid every day
- Eat 5 times daily, with the weight of each serving not surpassing 215 g (8.80 oz).
- The daily intake of calories should stay between 2,000 and 2500 kcal.
- Don’t take sweets more than 5 times a week.
- Let your meals contain more cereals, beans, seeds, vegetables, and lean meats.
- Like a plague, avoid alcohol and soda intake.
- You can have snacks when hungry, but keep them below 8 per day and only take a bite when you are very hungry.
- Avoid alcohol and tobacco.
- Reduce your daily salt intake to about 2-3 teaspoonful.
- Include whole wheat bread in your diet.
- Your diet should exclude smoked or fatty foods, pricked, canned fish, pastry, and meat.
What You Can Eat:
The DASH diet is of the principle of setting your mind on your goals when forming a diet plan. If you want to lose fat for instance, then you should include fewer calories in your menu. This means that you have to reduce servings.
Your daily diet may contain the following products:
- Cereals: No less than 7 servings per day (each serving = one loaf of bread, ½ cup of cooked pasta, ½ cup of porridge.)
- Fruit: Not more than 5 servings per day ( each serving = 1 fruit, ¼ cup of dried fruit, ½ cup of juice.)
- Vegetables: 5 servings per day ( each serving = ½ cup of boiled vegetables.)
- Non-fat dairy products: 2-3 servings every day ( each serving = 50 g of cheese or 0.15 liters of milk.)
- Seeds, beans, nuts: 5 servings per week ( each serving = 40 g.)
- Animal and Vegetable fats: 3 servings per day (each serving = 1 teaspoonful of olive oil.)
- Sweet Dishes: No more than 5 times in a week ( one teaspoonful of honey or jam.)
- Fluids: 2 liters per day
- Protein: 0.2 kg of lean meat or eggs
What To Avoid
Of course, you know by now that all unhealthy goods are typical no.
- Fast food and chips
- Alcohol
- Smoked and canned food
- Fatty meat
- Candies and sweets
- Soda
Conclusion
The DASH diet is beneficial in many ways, for its safety, ease, and usefulness. They will help you get better and reduce any excess weight.
This diet gives your body the necessary amount of microelements and that it needs to remain in perfect shape. It is a nice way to shed weight without really experiencing hunger. You don’t have to get your body much stressed.