Healthier Fast Food Choices
There are going to be times when you will visit a fast food place. It would be impossible not to be put in that situation in this day and age. You should not feel bad about eating this food every once and awhile. What should be taken into account though is choosing the healthier things on these respected menus. I am going to give you a little list of what is healthier and what is unhealthier at your favorite fast food places.

A lot of the places now are introducing healthy option menus. Where some of the unhealthiness comes in is in the condiments. Eliminating mayonnaise, sour cream, salad dressings and cheese can help in keeping those items down in calories and fat.
Even with choosing the healthier choices menu and doing your best to keep the calories down when eating fast food, keep portion sizes down. It is proven that people tend to eat bigger portion sizes when not eating in there own home.

So here are the lists:

Least Healthy:

Chicken Nuggets
Croissant Breakfast
Fried Fish or Fried Chicken Sandwiches
Fried Chicken
Large and Jumbo Size Fries
Onion Rings
Cheese Sauce
Most “Special Sauces”
Tartar Sauce
Sour cream
Gravy
Guacamole
Soda/Pop

.
Most Healthy:

Grilled Chicken or Fish Sandwich
Whole Wheat Rolls
Fruit or Fruit and Yogurt
Baked Potato (vegetables instead of cheese, butter or sour cream)
Salad with Dressing on the Side or Fat Free Salad Dressing
Single Hamburger (regular or children’s size)
Low Fat Deli Sandwiches on Wheat Bread or on Pita Bread
Wraps on Whole-Wheat Tortillas (without dressing)
Fat Free / Low Fat Milk or Water

Feel free to leave comments on anthing that I have missed. Lots of different things I am sure :)! I will also add to this list as I come across more items.

Something that is crucial when eating fast food or dinning out is choosing something healthy. You will be able to start feeling a bit better about yourself if you choose something healthier, haha at least that my excuse. But serious, even someone that is doing a specific diet should be able to find something healthy on any menu out there.

I am not saying to eat fast food or dine out all the time, but if you get put in the position then you might as well choose healthier then average items. The biggest problem with this is 99% of all people aren’t sure what is healthy or NOT. Well, I will give you some simple and easy choices when out and about. Give me the night to gather some info up and I will have a list set out for you all tomorrow. Until then, contain yourselves, lol, and I will too! Talk to you tomorrow!

 Beef, Pork, Veal and Lamb
Baking, roasting and broiling are the healthiest ways to cook these meats. Try and trim away any fat from the cut of meat before cooking. When choosing these meats, make sure and pick lean cuts with the least amount of gristle or fat showing. I usually will ask the clerk in the meat department for advice when looking for a nice lean cut of meat.

Poultry (chicken)
Baking, broiling and roasting are the healthiest ways to cook poultry. A regular chicken breast is the healthiest choice of poultry. Try and choose chicken with no skin, or make sure and remove any skin. Before cooking be sure to remove any fat or gristle.

Fish   
Baking, steaming, and broiling are the healthiest ways to cook fish. I will also ask the meat man when I am looking for fresh fish. If it has a strong fishy smell then it isn’t fresh. If there isn’t much of a fresh fish selection then frozen fish may be better.

Other Proteins
Dry beans, peas and lentils offer protein and fiber without the cholesterol and fat that meats have. These can be easily interchanged or added into meals with the meat group, while either maintaining or enhancing the protein intake.

Bread, Cereal, Rice and Pasta   
Whole-wheat or whole-grain breads are low in fat; they’re also high in fiber and complex carbohydrates. Super Markets are also starting to introduce more whole grain pasta, pitas, rice, wraps and things of that nature. Try and choose these when you have the option, they are becoming more readily available. Both hot and cold cereals are usually low in fat.

Try and stay away from bakery foods like donuts, muffins and rolls. These foods can contain high fat calories. Also avoid snacks like potato chips and tortilla chips. There are many baked or low-fat alternatives out there now.

Fruits and Vegetables
Fruits and vegetables are naturally low in fat. They add flavor and variety to your diet. They also contain fiber, vitamins and minerals. Dark green vegetables are known to contain more nutrients. When choosing lettuce, choose the darker romaine style lettuce. Try and use herbs and spices to enhance taste of these things because stuff like butters and oils will only add fat and calories.

Low Fat Foods that are healthy
I know you have heard many times over to “eat healthy”. This can be very simple to do; it is just a matter of knowing what things are healthy. Now when most people see or hear “low fat” they automatically think that it will taste bad or be different in bad ways. This is not the case, and once you start to incorporate these things into your everyday food, you will realize they really do taste good.

Meats and Proteins
With all the different meats and proteins try and use herbs and/or low fat marinades for flavor before cooking rather then using higher fat gravies and other sauces. These methods add amazing flavors to your meat while keeping them healthy and low fat. Also, cook your meats with non-stick surfaces or pam spray instead of having to use butters or oils, which tend to be higher in fats.

So that is just a basic little look that should help you start to make little changes. Feel free to leave comments if you feel I missed something!

One thing that I know people eat a lot of is bread, rice and pasta! When eating pasta or rice in a restaurant, you rarely get a choice of white or whole wheat. This is something you should look for more often within your diet. Simply changing to the whole wheat alternative will help give you added nutrients that the regular white choice doesn’t have.

The whole wheat alternatives taste the same and usually are around the same prices. Some people try and cut things like bread, pasta and rice out of there diet because they think it is unhealthy. Sure, to much of anything is unhealthy, but within moderation and now with a whole wheat alternative you can start feeling better about having these items.

I will usually cook a bag of whole wheat noodles up at the start of the week and have them in my fridge. It makes for a quick, easy and healthy meal for me through out the week. I can cook up some veggies with a little meat and add the noodle and I have a healthy stir-fry withing 15 or 20 minutes. Quality!

When I was in high school, I loved to experiment. I still like to experiment, although my principles are more grounded than they were back then. I came across a website called Crossfit and was immediately mesmerized. Their idea of constantly challenging yourself with a new stimuli and doing crazy things by combining forms of exercise that you wouldn’t normally combine drew me immediately to the WOD’s (Workout of the Day). I followed Crossfit WODs on and off throughout the years.

There are definitely certain things I love about Crossfit, but there are also things I don’t like:

PROS:

1. Trains your entire body in one session
2. Very good crossover between gym, real life, and sports
3. Incredibly effective method of burning fat
4. Very challenging and fun
5. Randomized stimuli keeps your body guessing

CONS:

1. Too much randomness
2. Not something a beginner can jump right into
3. Not very optimal for pure muscle mass
4. Athlete may have problems with recovery if they are not used to high intensity training
5. Does not seem to have a singular goal
6. Can be very confusing and frustrating to a typical gym goer
7. Huge learning curve

These are my personal beliefs about Crossfit. Overall, it is a very good program, but I have a problem with the fact that there really doesn’t seem to be much of a “program.” It seems like a bunch of workouts thrown in together. Over the years I’ve studied the programs both by reading message boards, comments on the main website, and trying out workouts on myself.

Hands down, a Crossfit approach to fitness is much more effective than a bodybuilding approach. Crossfit will help more people in their daily lives, and deliver faster results than a Bodybuilding approach. This is because bodybuilding is a very specific form of training. A regular housewife has no business trying to put on a half inch on her arms, unless she’s training for a figure competition. A truck driver has no business jogging on a treadmill for 30 minutes every morning, unless he’s cutting for a bodybuilding competition. What average people need is an exercise program that focuses on developing skills that carry over to normal life.

So there you are, hope you enjoyed the post, I am hoping Parth can keep giving some posts to use here at fitlifeplus.com, Parth runs a quality blog called shahtraining.com, you can check out his profile and learn more about him here, Parths Profile. Thanks Parth!

Weight loss is a struggle for a high percentage of our population. Whether  it be to lose weight or to gain weight. I have found by reflecting on one word or phase every time I see food it helps me to gain control of myself so I can accomplish what I have set out to do. That makes me feel good inside.

There is no right or wrong words or phases. It can be different for everyone.

For someone that wants to gain weight your phase maybe, I AM HUNGRY

For someone that wants to loose weight it maybe, I AM FULL

So if you want to lose weight, it doesn’t mean you don’t eat. What it may mean is when you feel a craving for unhealthy food or over eating, you use your phrase “I am full” to remind yourself of your goal! Simple and effective. Feel free to leave a comment as to the phrases you may try or just give some ideas for phrases that may help. Thank you

In that time I have been able to make a few contacts and get some more quality guest posters for fitlifeplus.com . Today I will be introducing a guest post from a person I have known for awhile, my Mom! hah! Yeah she loves health and weight loss, so she has offered to post here and there about different things then I would. Today I will start with a short but sweet post from my mom. I’ll add it up in the next little bit!

Habits
Being able to break bad habits is another important part of starting to eat healthy. No I don’t mean habits like biting your nails or smoking, I mean bad meal, snack and drink habits. It is way easier to be unhealthy because everywhere you turn, there is another fast food restaurant being built. Now, the way you start to rid yourself of these, is to figure out what your unhealthy habits are. My worst habits were from snacking, any little snack I had was bad for me. I stopped buying unhealthy snacks, now anytime I snack; I am forced to eat good things. Once you figure out what the habits are, you can find out how to work on deleting them. If most of your habits are at home, only keep healthy things in the house. I have learnt by experience that if there is any type of junk food in the house it will get eaten before the healthy stuff, always.

It is all the automatic unhealthy choices you make that affect you the most. No matter what type of habit you have, you always have to be committed to breaking it. Say you eat lunch ‘out’ every day of the week. Well, not only is that very costly, but also usually always unhealthy. A very simple technique to interrupting eating out is packing your own lunch. It may take a bit more time to prepare and put together at first, but with time it gets easier then fast food.

Organization
Two little things called organization and preparation will help you out 10 fold when you start trying to eat healthy. Yes you read it right, Organization and Preparation. There are a few different aspects to it, but in the end of this you will be a wizard at all of them. See the thing about my mini course tips is that each one is as important and simple as the next. This makes your success rate that much better.

So when I say stay organized this is what I mean. If you have junk in the house it will get eaten right, well be prepared enough to have all the bad food gone and make sure all healthy food is on hand. The concept is very easy, but you have to be organized to pull it off. So you want to start making lunches instead of eating out, then you’ll need to organize your meals and be prepared enough to have all the food available. Like I said, very simple, you just have to put it into effect.

One thing that helped me out with this is, I would take one night on my day off, and write out what I was going to do each day for lunch. I would then make sure I had all the needed food at home ready to go. I would also pre-cook some things. If you are making a nice dinner, make a bit extra and use it as a lunch through the week.

As I was saying above, none of these concepts are hard to do but you actually have to do them to see the effects. I challenge you to see the results. If you want to start eating healthy then doing these will defiantly help you on your way.