Healthy food, what does it consist of?
Dr. Antonio Escribano is also a specialist in Physical Education and Sports Medicine, and professor of Physiology, Nutrition and Sports at the University of Navarra.
He has coordinated the nutrition area in more than twenty football teams in Spain and Europe; and he is a member of the Nutrition and Healthy Habits Commission of the Spanish Olympic Committee.
He is also the medical manager of the nutrition area of the Spanish Basketball and Football Federations and has given more than 300 conferences at different national and international scientific events, in addition to participating in radio and television programs to address health issues.
Antonio Escribano has published this year the book «Learn to eat and control your weight» (Ed.Espasa). This is his contribution to EFEsalud to collaborate with a correct diet.
Healthy food, what does it consist of?
by Antonio Escribano
In our environment, the relationship between “food” and “health”, although it seems strange, is quite recent. In previous times, our ancestors simply ate “what they could”, without entering into discrimination of any kind and, of course, without relating food to anything more than a survival strategy and not as a determinant of present and future health.
Therefore, it is necessary to raise the need to acquire knowledge and receive information about food and nutrition. In short: “Learn to Eat”. In this way we will be able to decide with solvency on the two key and transcendent aspects of our food management and in this way direct it towards improving our health: what we eat and in what quantity.
In these two aspects it is possible to practically summarize what a healthy diet is, the first being the one that requires what could be learning and the second an adaptation or small effort, and both together an attention and “being aware” of as many other things in our life.
The complementarity of food
Nutrients are provided by all the foods, not existing a complete food, and if a complementarity between all of them. Precisely this makes it necessary to consciously and premeditatedly ingest a variety and combination of them that in a balanced way provide everything you need.
Regardless of the purely energetic function, food has a “functional” capacity, that is, it must provide something more so that when consumed, improvements are caused in certain functions and in our body in general, even acting as preventive and sometimes as treatment of different diseases.
Today we know that we are born with a certain genetic endowment, which we call a “genome” and that it could be a kind of “hardware” in our genetic inheritance, but at the same time we have an “epigenome”, as a “software” that in a certain way mode is modifiable and can largely determine the expression of present and future diseases.
And we also know that one of the circumstances that intervenes in the positive or negative modification of that epigenome is the diet that we carry out in our lives.
seven food groups
Foods are classified as energetic, plastic and regulatory, and based on these properties we classify them into seven groups: 1.- Dairy (milk, cheese, yogurt), 2.- Meat, fish, eggs, 3.- Potatoes, legumes, fruits dried, 4.- vegetables, 5.- Fruits, 6.- Cereals and sugars and 7.- Oils and fats.
A healthy and healthy diet must first combine several foods from each of the 7 groups in a certain sequence and simple organization that establishes the “qualitative” key of food.
Once the qualitative component has been structured, we must bear in mind the second aspect: the amount we eat. And at this point we must impose a word above all: moderation. The human being works better and lives longer when he eats small amounts.
Gastronomy has been and is essential in our physiological and cultural evolution. The way of preparing food can and should be varied and we must include all our knowledge and skills in the kitchen. The entire range of flavors that provides the gastronomic and culinary richness that we want to apply is perfectly compatible if we play with the quantities and qualities as we have described.
Anxiety should not be channeled towards food
Finally, we must be careful with our habits and tendencies and we must frequently analyze and reconsider them. It is important to learn not to channel anxiety and boredom into food. Try to eat slowly and learn to “taste” food. We must also know how to dose our “exceptions”. Be very careful with the alcohol and condiments that we apply to our dishes and be very moderate in both aspects.
If we add adequate rest and a little more than an hour of physical activity to all that has been said, we will have completed a perfect healthy circle that our body will appreciate in the short, medium and fundamentally in the long term.
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