Losing weight can be incredibly difficult in our society. Let’s face it, most of our jobs are sedentary and few of us have managed to get into a good workout routine. While you shouldn’t give up on exercise, there are other ways to lose weight and live a healthier life.
For example, swapping out inherently unhealthy foods for healthy substitutes can help you significantly reduce the amount of fat and sugar in your diet. More importantly, these healthy foods can help you live a longer, happier, healthier life.
We’re here to provide you with some easy examples. Keep reading for four healthy food substitutions.
1. Dairy-Free Products
Most people, whether they’re aware of it or not, have some level of lactose intolerance. That’s because saturated fats that are commonly found in excess in dairy products, cause inflammation. In addition, these fats can quickly add to your waistline.
Fortunately, there is a wide variety of dairy substitutes for things like milk, cheese, ice cream, and butter. For example, switch your dairy milk or creamer out for soy milk, oat milk, almond milk, or cashew milk. You can also find dairy-free icecreams that are equally delicious.
2. Whole Grains
One of the fastest ways to increase your body fat is by consuming too many simple carbohydrates. These include things like white bread, white pasta, white rice, donuts, cookies, candy, etc.
This is because our body doesn’t know what to do with all of that immediate energy. When we consume a high level of simple carbs (which is essentially sugar), our body releases insulin. Then, this energy is stored for later by being converted into fat.
Instead, consume complex carbohydrates that digest slowly. These healthy substitutes include whole-grain bread, whole-wheat pasta, brown rice, oats, etc. Then, your body can use this energy over time, rather than being forced to find a solution immediately.
3. Healthy Spreads
Next, let’s talk about finding healthy substitutes for things we spread on sandwiches. For example, mayo makes meat and cheese sandwiches far better. However, mayo isn’t exactly a health food.
Fortunately, you can find a healthy substitute for mayo, like Miracle Whip. You can also try hummus, avocado, pesto, and more.
Another unhealthy spread we tend to overindulge in is peanut butter. However, you can substitute almond butter as a tasty alternative that’s healthier for you. And if you’re not sure what your options are, you can see more almond butters here
4. Salt and Sugar Substitutes
Finally, let’s discuss salt and sugar. We already spoke about the negative effects of too much sugar in your diet. If you have a demanding sweet tooth, however, you can use a healthy sugar substitute like Stevia to sweeten your foods. Or, if you drink a lot of sugary sugar, consider swapping to a healthier alternative like sparkling watermelon water.
Stevia is made from the leaves of the stevia plant. It’s much sweeter than table sugar and has far fewer calories. This means you need less sweetener and can avoid excess calories.
Lastly, we recommend using a healthy salt substitute. Too much sodium in your diet can lead to heart complications, high blood pressure, and more.
Instead of salt, try low-sodium substitutes like garlic powder, nutritional yeast, pepper, etc. Experiment with different seasonings to find what you like best.
Looking for More Healthy Substitutes and Other Fitness Hacks?
As you can see, learning how to be healthier can be as simple as finding healthy substitutes for foods that are high in fat, sugar, and salt. Though it may be difficult to embrace these changes at first, you can learn to love your new diet, especially as you start shedding unwanted weight.
And if you want more health and fitness advice, stick around and read through some of our other blog articles. Our website is full of health tips and life hacks created to help people like you thrive in the modern world.