How to Eat Greens Daily for Health and Weight Loss

WHAT ARE GREENS?

Leafy greens and cruciferous vegetables, including:

WHY EAT GREENS?

Dark green leafy vegetables are the healthiest foods on the planet. They offer the most nutrition per calorie. They are extremely nutritious, packed with vitamins and minerals, full of fiber, can reduce the risk of certain diseases, and can aid in weight loss.

See these links for more information about the health benefits of consuming greens:

• Greens – https://nutritionfacts.org/topics/greens/
• The Healthiest, Anti-Cancer Foods: G-BOMBS – https://www.drfuhrman.com/blog/62/the-healthiest-anti-cancer-foods-g-bombs
• 6 Steps to Reversing Disease with Supermarket Foods – https://goodbyelupus.com/6-steps-to-reversing-disease-with-supermarket-foods-webinar/
• Making Heart Attacks History: Caldwell Esselstyn at TEDxCambridge 2011 – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EqKNfyUPzoU (clip from this lecture was featured in my video)

HOW TO EAT GREENS DAILY – Even if You Hate Them

Start Small and Gradually Eat More Greens

If you’re not accustomed to eating green vegetables, I recommend starting small and gradually working your way to consuming more greens over time. A great way to get started is to add greens to sandwiches, burgers, and wraps. This can be an easy, no-fuss way to add some greenery to a meal that you’re already eating and enjoying.

Hide Your Greens

Blend greens into smoothies with fruit and you won’t even be able to taste the greenery. Blend greens into soups or sauces and gradually increase the amount of greens you’re using to boost the nutritional content even further!

Start with Milder Greens

Begin with milder greens or ones that you already enjoy. Baby greens or microgreens are typically milder (ex. baby spinach, baby kale). Cauliflower and broccoli can also be great ones to get started with!

Chop Finely and Add to Everything

Add greens to soups, curry, chilli, sauces, mashed potatoes, hashbrowns, pasta, rice or other whole grain dishes. Since they are chopped so finely, they will be virtually undetectable and won’t impact the flavour of the dish in a major way. You can even try adding riced cauliflower or finely chopped greens to your oatmeal in the morning if you want to have veggies for breakfast!

Salads – Colourful and Delicious Salads

Eating salads may seem like an obvious way to eat veggies and boost your intake of leafy greens. If you don’t love salad, don’t force yourself to choke it down. I would encourage you to rethink salads and try them in a new way that will make you thoroughly enjoy them. Mixing up the types of greens used along with different legumes, whole grains, potatoes, and/or sauces can really jazz up your meal. Dressings can be as simple as hot sauce, bbq sauce, balsamic vinegar, hummus, salsa and guacamole with nut-free nacho cheese. We really enjoy these 3 hummus-based dressings.

Serve Meals on a Bed of Greens

Consider serving meals on a bed of greens. I used to eat bowls of soup, chili, or pasta, which I still do, but now I tend to serve them on a bed of leafy greens or cruciferous veggies. The flavour of the dish isn’t compromised, but serving it over greenery gives my meals an extra boost of vitamins and minerals that wouldn’t have been there otherwise.

Try in a New Way

Try veggies in a new way. For example, if you’ve only ever had boiled or steamed cauliflower, try cauliflower rice, cauliflower bites, or sauces made with cauliflower. Another example is Brussels sprouts. I previously disliked Brussels sprouts, but I had only even eaten them boiled or microwaved. So, I decided to play with roasting them with different flavourings to jazz them up. Now we make roasted Brussels sprouts and enjoy them regularly!

A couple of bonus tips are to:

• mix green vegetables with other foods you already enjoy
• add your favourite spices, seasonings, sauces, or dressings to make your food delicious

I hope you found this post helpful. What is your favourite way to eat your greens? I’d love to hear how you like to prepare and enjoy your green veggies!