{"id":786,"date":"2011-09-26T09:31:01","date_gmt":"2011-09-26T13:31:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondgorgeous\/?p=786"},"modified":"2011-09-26T09:31:01","modified_gmt":"2011-09-26T13:31:01","slug":"healthy-eating-on-a-budget","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondgorgeous\/2011\/09\/healthy-eating-on-a-budget.html","title":{"rendered":"Healthy Eating on a Budget"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cI\u2019d like to be at a healthier weight,\u201d a friend told me. \u201cBut we just don\u2019t have the money to buy expensive diet foods and there isn\u2019t enough in the budget to join a gym.\u00a0 I\u2019m stuck!\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Many folks feel that way — that a healthy diet and exercise plan is out of reach because of expense.\u00a0 Don\u2019t despair! We\u2019ll be looking at ways to make healthy choices on a shoestring budget in this series of blogs.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s take a look at the grocery list first.\u00a0 You don\u2019t need to buy the pricey pre-prepared \u201cdiet foods.\u201d \u00a0 In fact, I\u2019d advise skipping the convenience foods altogether.<\/p>\n

Back in the early 1970s when I started housekeeping, 90% of the food I bought were ingredients.\u00a0 Very few things were pre-processed.\u00a0 Now the numbers have flipped and 90% of the food you find in the store is convenience food.\u00a0 That\u2019s a bad thing for several reasons.<\/p>\n

Quick foods like boxed \u201cjust add hamburger\u201d meals, or freezer meals ready for the microwave have had the fiber removed to make it faster to prepare.\u00a0 Take a look at the label on that box.\u00a0 It likely will have low numbers listed under \u201cfiber\u201d and similarly low numbers in the nutrients category.\u00a0 The lower fiber usually makes the food higher glycemic, because fiber takes longer to digest.\u00a0 The\u00a0 low fiber meal is digested and the sugar is dumped into your bloodstream in a flash.\u00a0 This results in an insulin dump — and insulin signals your body to store fat.\u00a0 It\u2019s not just the calories in the processed food that pack on the pounds, but the type of calories and the message they send.\u00a0 Besides that, your body is starved for nutrients.\u00a0 You will be driven to eat more to try to make up for the low quality of the food you are eating.<\/p>\n

And then there are the chemicals the producers add to the quick meals to make them palatable.\u00a0 Otherwise, the stuff would taste like cardboard and you wouldn\u2019t bother with it.\u00a0 These chemicals may be addicting and certainly aren\u2019t good for your health.<\/p>\n

The answer?\u00a0 Buy whole ingredients and skip the expensive, low nutrition, processed foods. \u00a0 Do the cooking yourself and you will have control over what is in your food — and it will cost less, too. \u00a0Look for low glycemic recipes, and be sure to share with us the ones that are least expensive and best tasting. \u00a0I’m always looking for recipes to post.<\/p>\n

More coming up about inexpensive, low glycemic food choices and ways to make healthy cooking convenient.<\/p>\n

Eating to live an living for Christ,<\/em><\/p>\n

Susan Jordan Brown<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cI\u2019d like to be at a healthier weight,\u201d a friend told me. \u201cBut we just don\u2019t have the money to buy expensive diet foods and there isn\u2019t enough in the budget to join a gym.\u00a0 I\u2019m stuck!\u201d Many folks feel that way — that a healthy diet and exercise plan is out of reach because…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":423,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[31,212,211,35,15],"class_list":["post-786","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-eating-plan","tag-choices","tag-fiber","tag-groceries","tag-low-glycemic","tag-weight-loss"],"yoast_head":"\nHealthy Eating on a Budget - Beyond Gorgeous<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondgorgeous\/2011\/09\/healthy-eating-on-a-budget.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Healthy Eating on a Budget - 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