Streussnig: Healthy eating is natural eating

Eating healthy is a drag. When all of your friends decide to order pizza one night, the last… Eating healthy is a drag. When all of your friends decide to order pizza one night, the last things you want to think about are calories and saturated fat content.

I mean, really, who wants to swap a nice, juicy burger for a hunk of reconstituted veggies taking on a patty shape, without bun and condiments? Not me, and I’m guessing not most of you, either.

But before you completely lose hope and decide it’s not even worth it to try, before you resign yourself to a life filled with preservatives, artificial flavorings and a general lack of knowledge as to what the heck you are putting into your body, take heart — you can do what’s right for your body while keeping your tongue and tummy satisfied.

One of the keys to eating well when you’re strapped for information as to the particular content of a certain snack or meal is to choose natural.

The less whatever you are going to eat has been tampered with, the better. Instead of choosing a pack of prepackaged peanut butter-filled crackers, buy some natural peanut butter and whole grain crackers, and make them yourself.

The more influence you have over making the food you consume, the more in control you are of what makes it into your body.

As college students, however, the sad truth is that most of us don’t always have the time to be so diligent with what we are eating.

If a prepackaged meal is what you require, you can still make simple choices at the grocery store to stay slim, healthy and in charge of what you eat.

Take bread for example. Do a quick scan of the nutrition label on your loaf before purchasing, and you are already on your way to a better diet.

Ditch brands that contain more sugar than they do fiber, and make sure to take note of the ingredients list. Generally speaking, the shorter the list, the more natural the product.

Big fan of Kraft mac? Annie’s brand is a better choice and can be found near the Kraft at most grocery stores. It’s a tad pricier, but the few cents is worth it. Annie’s mac and cheese contains 72 percent less fat than Kraft Organic, not to mention a list of ingredients that can actually be pronounced.

According to “Eat This, Not That” by David Zinczenko and Matt Goulding, you should choose the boxed products with ingredients lists that read “like the recipe you’d use to fix it at home.”

Love candy? No problem — a little sugar in moderation is a totally acceptable addition to a healthy diet, but when choosing a candy bar, it is really best to pick the lesser evil.

Candies like Hershey’s Take 5 and Nestle Raisinets are some safe choices, with Take 5 ditching the nougat for pretzels and Raisinets providing the antioxidants of raisins.

However, you might want to steer clear of Twix Peanut Butter, “one of the fattiest, oil-saturated candy bars on the market” according to Zinczenko and Goulding.

Juice can be another huge pitfall for grocery shoppers with a limited amount of time. If you don’t read the label, you could be purchasing something very different from what you intended.

“Juice cocktail” is a tipoff that the actual juice content of the beverage you are purchasing might actually be very small, sometimes on the order of 10 to 20 percent.

What makes up the rest of these so-called fruit juices? Artificial colors, sweeteners and sugar. Look for juices that say “100 percent juice,” such as Mott’s apple juice line.

Another consideration: Even though fruit juices are a much better choice than sodas, beware that the natural sugar content of fruit, and thus of juice, is very high.

A tip you can use to decrease sugar intake while simultaneously stretching your money is to buy 100 percent juice, but mix a little water in every time you pour a glass.