Nowadays, most of us live in a constant rush. Education, work, the desire to constantly develop and achieve better results make us forget about the basics due to lack of time. These include, among others... a healthy diet. Nutritional education at the public level or alternative methods, such as adding an eatyx product to the menu, come to the rescue, but when is it worth introducing it? You will learn this from the article!

What does our diet look like nowadays?

The most recent WOBASZ II study, conducted on a representative sample of Poles in 2016, showed quite unpleasant results. As Poles :

• we do not balance our diet correctly;

• we provide too few vitamins and minerals (almost all of them);

• we consume inappropriate sources of fat (e.g. fatty meat instead of olive oil or nuts).

And finally... the diet of only 15% of adult Poles was considered healthy , while the vast majority of respondents had poor nutritional quality [1]. The conclusions note that the eating habits of the majority of adult Polish society differ significantly from the recommendations of the World Health Organization (WHO) and this is a very unpleasant conclusion. The WOBASZ II study did not analyze the reasons why our diets are not suitable, but other publications have pointed to certain factors, including [2-3]:

• easy availability and convenience of consuming highly processed food (unhealthy, e.g. fast food, sweets);

• emotional eating (so-called emotional eating, in which we often reach for snacks);

• eating out of boredom and tiredness (when we come back after a hard day's work and don't feel like cooking, we first think about something ready-made or when we can't find a specific activity during the day, we are more likely to reach for snacks);

• lack of time to prepare healthy meals (we think that a healthy diet means hours a day spent in the kitchen and a lot of sacrifices).

What can we do to improve the diet of Poles?

As a dietitian, it is my duty to educate people about a healthy diet and this should always be the first step towards changes for the better. From my several years of experience, I see that we associate healthy eating with a lot of sacrifices and total dedication to cooking and living in the kitchen. The truth is, of course, completely different and in practice it doesn't look like that at all. You can believe it or not, but a healthy diet includes room for your favorite sweet, cake or fast food. What's more, in 30-45 minutes you can prepare healthy meals for the whole day !

Most often, each of us has 30-45 minutes a day to prepare healthy meals, but it's just a matter of setting priorities. And considering that an inadequate diet is responsible for 22% of deaths worldwide, taking care of it should be high in the hierarchy of each of us.

The main message I want to convey to you from this part of the article is that implementing the principles of a healthy diet does not require much dedication and time . You can easily make quality meals for the whole day in 30-45 minutes and at the same time do not eliminate the products you like the most - the diet should be for you, not you for the diet, and cultivating your relationship will bring you and your health many benefits.

What to do when basic education does not bring the expected results?

Okay, but there will also be people who will stubbornly claim that they won't even find 40 minutes a day, and then what? In this case, we have several options.

The first one is to prepare as many meals as possible at home and replace those for which we do not have time with so-called "ready-made" meals from the market . Nowadays, we have plenty of options, so everyone will certainly find something for themselves. However, you must know that in this case there are many traps waiting for you. Ready-made products, even those that seem healthy, are often not free from defects. For example, beans with tofu in tomato sauce sounds good and healthy, but by eating the entire package we can provide about 5 g of salt - that's practically the amount we should consume throughout the day. Excessive salt consumption increases the risk of hypertension, which in turn is associated with serious diseases. Other ready-made products may contain a lot of saturated fatty acids, while for the health of our heart we should replace them with unsaturated fatty acids. However, we can also find ready-made products that meet these health standards. Remember, however, that these are processed foods that should not dominate our diets - the more meals prepared by hand from low-processed products, the better . You can keep this ready-made product from the supermarket in the fridge for a rainy day, but remember about the pitfalls. The ability to read food labels is an extremely important issue here.

The second option is dietary catering . This is another option that is extremely popular these days. We can choose our diet (e.g. vegan, ketogenic or Mediterranean), calorie content and even choose specific meals for a given day. This makes catering seem to be a reasonable option, of course if the owners and chefs are dietary conscious and care about ensuring quality in meals. The disadvantage of catering is its high price and the fact that the content of vegetables, fruit, whole grains, fatty fish and other products generally considered healthy is often suboptimal.

The third option is to sensibly include products from the "hyper food" category . These are, by definition, ready-made products that provide the necessary vitamins and minerals and at the same time require virtually no work and, above all, time. Such products are offered by the eatyx brand.

The advantage in this case is the fact that everyone will find something for themselves. A salty hot meal? No problem. Sweet when cold? No problem. A ready-made liquid product in a convenient bottle or a high-protein and high-fiber bar? Also no problem.

And seriously, such meals can help you in a crisis. I say deliberately in crisis, because it is still, like ready-made food from the supermarket, processed food, the content of which in our diet should be properly balanced. However, looking at today's realities, most people in Poland eat a lot of ready-made products and fast food. I don't remember a time when I walked into McDonald's and there was no line at the register. So before we change our habits to ideal ones and at least 90% of our diet consists of low-processed products, it is worth first taking a small step forward and choosing the lesser evil. And among fast food, sweets and many ready-made supermarket products, any eatyx brand product will be much better in terms of health .

Let's compare the classic Cheeseburger, which we reach for quickly on the road, with ready-made Italian-style pasta from eatyx.

Let's assume that the average person eats about 2,000 kcal and spreads it over 4-5 meals. Three main ones have 500-600 kcal and the additional one has 300-400 kcal. And an additional, quick option on the road can be a cheeseburger or Italian pasta covered with boiling water from eatyx, ready in just a moment - what to choose?

The fiber content is immediately striking . From a biological point of view, it is a substance of plant cell walls that is not digested and absorbed in our digestive tract. In practice, fiber is extremely important for us and, in addition to ensuring satiety and the proper functioning of the digestive tract, it also protects against many diseases. We have 1:0 for pasta .

Moving on, we can look at the salt content. This is almost 3 times higher in the burger compared to the eatyx brand product. As a population, we consume too much salt, so any intervention that reduces this intake is worth its weight in gold. We are already 2:0 .

According to dietary standards for the Polish population, we should limit saturated fats to a minimum, because replacing them with unsaturated fats reduces the risk of heart disease . Here again, the eatyx brand product is much better and we have 3:0 and I immediately add a fourth point to the pasta account due to the higher protein content . A similar comparison of the Eatyx bar will be made to classic bars available on the market, even those considered by some people to be healthy because they contain "protein".

And quite honestly, any eatyx product will be better than eating standard fast food or other commonly consumed highly processed product . Likewise, an eatyx bar will be much better than standard bars you can find in the supermarket. Remember, however, that preparing meals yourself is still the best choice, so I will now show you situations in which we can use " hyper eating ".

Situation number 1: Complete lack of time

Projects at work are chasing you. Or maybe a college session is already on the horizon? Then, when we are stressed and lacking time, we often reach for candy bars, convenience stores, or order a pizza or a hamburger. Keep eatyx products in your cupboard for this period of time and when you come up with the idea to order something, remember what you have in the cupboard and reach for it. Eating the right amount of protein, fat and carbohydrates and providing the necessary microelements supports our brains to function optimally, so making a conscious choice will help you get through this difficult period.

Situation number 2: Going on tour

Another long journey and you leave home again without prepared meals? It's a waste of time, so you don't want to leave the expressway, so what do you do? We usually have hot dogs at the station or popular fast-food restaurants, which have little to do with healthy food. In such a situation, it is also worth having your favorite product from eatyx and taking it on the road for a rainy day. Remember the comparison above? You can easily get boiling water at a station or restaurant, and it's much better to eat an Italian-style macaron than a hot dog or cheeseburger.

PS. Not to mention airplanes which usually serve mediocre food even on flights lasting several hours. You can throw an Eatyx bar into your backpack and, apart from satisfying your hunger, you won't wake up the passenger next to you with your growling stomach.

Situation number 3: eatyx suits your tastes

In dietetics there is a rule called 80/20 or 90/10. In the case of the first option, we eat 20% of products a day for our own mental comfort and we choose those we like the most, regardless of the degree of processing and nutritional value. The remaining 80% are low-processed products, i.e. vegetables, fruits, nuts, vegetable oils, etc. Let's assume that your daily requirement is 2000 kcal, so you can easily consume 300-400 kcal/day by consuming your favorite products. Do you like a chocolate bar or a ready-made vanilla drink from eatyx? If your overall diet is healthy, there is nothing stopping you from including it in your menu and staying there for good.

Situation number 4: A crisis is coming

Let me be transparent, when you are 100% sure that you will eat fast food at a given moment, even though you don't want to let it happen, just have an eatyx product at hand - its consumption will always be more beneficial in terms of health than the consumption of a standard, highly processed product .

Situation number 5: It's the same at work again!

Every day you promise yourself that you will finally prepare meals for the entire day for work. Reality checks you, once again you go with an empty bag and eat at the employee restaurant. Of course, today's lunch of the day is fried pork chop with a load of potatoes and a small amount of vegetables + soup - and how could you not choose it? Seriously, if a certain situation has been repeated for X amount of time and you always end up in the employee canteen, eating mediocre dishes or you run downstairs to buy ready-made food from Żabka, then invest in eatyx - it will be a better choice for the main meal at work.

Summary

As Poles, we still have a problem with the quality of our diet. The first step we should take towards changes for the better is social education on a healthy diet. However, this requires a huge investment of time and human resources, and as a helpful alternative in a crisis situation, it is worth having healthy, ready-made products at hand, for example the eatyx brand. Such products should not form the basis of our diet, but there are times when their consumption is reasonable and can help us save time while maintaining the quality of the diet. Let me remind you that the eatyx brand offers a wide range of products and everyone will find something for themselves. The offer includes:

• cold meals;

• hot meals;

• liquid meals;

• bar meals;

• accessories in which you can prepare and take these meals with you.

PS. As a dietitian, I am not a supporter of completely replacing traditional meals with ready-made meals. However, it is indisputable that we often reach for highly processed products and practically each of them will be of lower quality in terms of health than products from eatyx, so in this case the choice is clear.

Literature

1. A. Waśkiewicz et al. , “Are dietary habits of the Polish population consistent with the recommendations for prevention of cardiovascular disease? - WOBASZ II project,” Kardiol Pol , vol. 74, no. 9, pp. 969–977, 2016, doi: 10.5603/KP.A2016.0003.