The new Canadian Food Guide, released last week, recommends fruits and vegetables make up half our plate at any meal. This is the first update in more than a decade. The new Canadian Food Guide now looks much more like the American 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines. Both guides recommend half your daily intake of nutrition to come from fruits and vegetables, with even more priority towards vegetables. These updates are prioritizing health over agriculture. It’s about time.

But even though everyone says “Eat Your Veggies,” it’s easier said than done, I know. I struggle with it. Every night. Trying to get the kids to eat a bite of their vegetables is a struggle. Why do we resist from such a young age? I honestly don’t think it’s because vegetables taste bad! In contrast, I think the kids resist because food and sleep are the only 2 things they can really exhibit control over. And I think adults resist because we don’t all know how to prepare vegetables that taste good!

So in an effort to get more vegetables on our plate, here are some of my simple tips to get more veggies into your mouth and enjoy them!

1. Buy produce of the season and what’s grown locally, whenever possible. (Unless you’re buying frozen which is totally fine and was flash frozen when it was at peak season.)
2. Add flavor with various herbs, spices, and lemon.
3. Make your salads colorful and delicious with your own fresh salad dressing (like my version of a Green Goddess dressing, recipe below!)
4. Experiment with size and texture.
5. Make homemade smoothies and add veggies into it (the kids will never know!)
6. Make a vegetable soup.
7. Be ahead of the game. Cut up vegetables like carrots, celery, peppers, cauliflower, etc. at the beginning of the week: think easy to add to kids lunches, easy to throw into a soup, easy to add to a roasting pan w/ your protein of choice for a quick week-night dinner.
8. Try different methods: steaming, sautéing, broiling.
9. Experiment with at least two new vegetables or fruits each month. As an alternative to potatoes, try turnips, parsnips, rutabaga, etc. Switch up your kale occasionally for mustard, turnip, or collard greens. Explore a variety of vegetables.
10. Buy vegetables that are easy to prepare. Pick up pre-washed bags of salad greens and add your chopped celery and carrots or grape tomatoes for a salad in minutes.

What veggies do you love these days? I’d love to hear. Eating more fruits and vegetables is the best way to take charge of your health and start clean eating.

If you feel like you’ve been doing the “clean eating” thing for a long time and are not seeing the fitness results you would like to see, maybe it’s time to dig a little deeper into how and when and with what you are fuelling your body. I’d love to help you with this. My next round of the FASTer Way to Fat Loss® is starting February 4th. Let me know if you’d like more info!

Have a great week,
Meryl

P.S. Current Personal Training clients be sure to ask me about the promo I’m offering for the FASTer Way to Fat Loss®.

Ingredients:
Juice from one lemon
1/2 large avocado or full small avocado
1/3 cup olive oil
1/3 cup water
2 green onions
1 TBSP honey
Handful of fresh dill and fresh basil
Salt & Pepper to taste
Blend it all up! Keep in fridge for a week.