At Freshly Chopped we love to encourage healthy eating & good practices for your mental health!
As it is World Mental Health Day, we have decided to share some ways your diet can affect your mood & tips & tricks on how you can incorporate healthy eating into yourself care routines. Just like mental health; your internal health cannot be seen to the naked eye but both need as much care as your physical health.
Knowing what foods we should and shouldn’t be eating can be quite confusing, especially when it feels like the advice changes regularly. However, evidence suggests that as well as affecting our physical health, what we eat may also affect the way we feel.
When it comes to mental health, what we eat can make a big difference. A diet rich in fruit, vegetables, wholegrains, seeds and unsaturated fats can help protect your mental health. Some ingredients that Chopped know all too well!
Vegetables and fruit contain a lot of the minerals, vitamins and fibre we need to keep us physically and mentally healthy and eating a variety of different coloured fruits and vegetables every day means you’ll get a good range of nutrients.
HOW CHOPPED CAN HELP WITH GUT HEALTH:
Sometimes your gut can reflect how you are feeling emotionally. If you’re stressed or anxious this can make your gut slow down or speed up. For healthy digestion you need to have plenty of fibre, fluid and exercise regularly.
Healthy gut foods include fruits, vegetables & wholegrains, beans, pulses, live yoghurt and other probiotics.
Our Chopped Green machine smoothie is a perfect way to incorporate this into your diet.
HOW CHOPPED CAN HELP GET MORE PROTEIN INTO YOUR DIET:
Protein contains amino acids, which make up the chemicals your brain needs to regulate your thoughts and feelings. It also helps keep you feeling fuller for longer.
Protein is in lean meat, fish, eggs, cheese, legumes (peas, beans and lentils), soya products, nuts and seeds.
We offer a variety of Proteins & Vegan protein on our menu to encourage amino acid intake as well as a range of Nuts & seeds that can be added to your salads.
To top this off, you can choose to bulk up your bowl or wrap by adding extra protein to any meal for an extra cost.
EATING THE RIGHT FATS:
The brain runs on glucose but it is mostly made up of fat. There are 2 types of fat, saturated fats and unsaturated fats.
Avoid eating too many saturated fats in your diet. Saturated fats can affect your mood and increase the amount of cholesterol in your blood.
Saturated fat is highest in processed foods such as biscuits, bars, crisps and chocolate, takeaways and fried foods, fatty meats, cream and butter, full-fat spreads and cheeses.
Happy World Mental Health Day! We want to encourage you all to take care of yourself and those around you, be kind because you don’t know what other people are dealing with beneath the surface. Please take care of yourself inside & out and we hope you found out something new today & try healing from the inside out!
The Freshly Chopped Team
Chopped Blog 