Guacamole with a few tortilla chips. Homemade kale chips. Salt-free or low-salt nuts, like almonds or peanuts. Be aware of your portions since nuts are calorically dense, and it's easy to overindulge without realizing.
Think of these not as “healthy junk foods,” but “less unhealthy” junk foods. They're not as bad as some of the other options out there, but they're still bad. ... If You Have To Eat Junk Food, What Are The Least Unhealthy...
Chronic stress also causes many people to reach for fatty foods and sweets. Scientists believe these cravings are triggered when the body produces too much cortisol—a stress hormone. Restrictive diets also can set up cravings for off–limits food.
“The most common trigger foods are highly palatable foods filled with sugar, salt and unhealthy fats,” says Lena Beal, M.S., RD, LD, a therapeutic dietitian at Piedmont's Fuqua Heart Center. “This includes soft drinks, chips, cakes, cookies and pies. The more you eat, the more you'll want.”
Eat natural diuretic foods: These foods flush out bloat and provide you with a host of health benefits, such as antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals. My favorites are celery, lemon, bell peppers, garlic, onions, watermelon, cucumber, grapes, ginger, berries, and asparagus.
Where do food cravings come from? Many research studies suggest that mental imagery may be a key component of food cravings — when people crave a specific food, they have vivid images of that food. Results of one study showed that the strength of participants' cravings was linked to how vividly they imagined the food.
You may feel hungry frequently if your diet lacks protein, fiber, or fat, all of which promote fullness and reduce appetite. Extreme hunger is also a sign of inadequate sleep and chronic stress. Additionally, certain medications and illnesses are known to cause frequent hunger.
Cutting out junk food is not the cure-all for every mental illness or physical ailment, but eating a healthy diet can improve your mood, focus, and cholesterol levels in a significant way. It can also lower your risk of developing serious conditions like heart disease or type 2 diabetes.
When it's air-popped and lightly seasoned, popcorn is an efficiently healthy snack. That's because it is a whole grain, and high-fiber whole grains have been linked to a lower risk of heart disease, diabetes, some cancers and other health problems.
