Vegetarian, lacto-ovo, lacto vegetarian and vegan are some of the types of plant-based diets.
Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says when you eliminate eggs and dairy from your diet, which is what lacto and ovo mean, you have the vegan diet.
Talamas points out your diet is up to your preferences and your reasons. She also highlights as you get more restrictive, your dietitian needs to know where you are going to be getting your calcium from vitamin D, for example. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says plant-based diets can be for anyone just if it is well planned.
“When your start eliminating some food groups, you have to make sure you have another food source and you have to consider supplementation,” she recommends.
She also points out a plant-based diet doesn’t work to lose weight if you don’t control the calories you eat. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says is not a good idea to skip meals during the day.
She advises, if someone has a special meal, having a light breakfast and light lunch if there’s a special situation, an early dinner.
The expert says skipping meals is unhealthy and it makes a patient go into celebration hungry. Living a healthier lifestyle could be thought as a difficult task, but there are some tips to accomplish it. Some of them are keeping a personal health calendar, eating more fruits and vegetables and cooking at home rather than eating out.
Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian at Baptist Health South Florida, says the basis of a healthy diet starts with eating more fruits and vegetables and keeping a health calendar along with self-monitoring. You have to know you are responsible for your health.
Other tips are supporting healthy gut bacteria and not underestimating the benefits of healthy lifestyle changes. Once a child feels involved with a healthy diet, he is more likely to be a better eater, affirms Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
Keeping kids involved makes them feel like they’re part of the process and they’ll be more likely to make healthier choices, she says.
Children not only learn from what they hear, but from what they see. Being a good model, adopting healthy eating habits will make kids have them too, she affirms. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian at Baptist Health South Florida, says farmers markets are the best option to buy food, especially fresh fruits and vegetables that are unprocessed, and also farmers markets bring the community together.
She also recommends taking a list with what you need, because it helps you to stick to your plan and you can make your grocery trips a lot more time efficient as well. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, recommends packing fruits in their most natural form.
She also advises parents to have a conversation with their kids about the benefits of whole-grains in order to introduce them in their healthy diet.
The expert suggests combining bread with peanut butter, jelly and a fruit. About food shopping, Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian at Baptist Health South Florida, says it is important to know that the majority of the fresh foods are found on the perimeter of the grocery store, so you will be spending most of your time on the perimeter.
She also says there are some important foods that you can find in the aisles. She recommends avoiding the processed foods. “The general person out there may feel very consumed when it comes to the topic of what to eat, especially what to eat for weight loss,” says Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
She explains the best thing could be to trust registered dieticians, whether it’s through private consult or through articles that they write, because their job is to interpret the science for you and help make it simple. “Percentage DV stands for a Percent Daily Value, it’s basically a very simple way to look at your nutrient column and the percentage so you can make a quick decision on is this a high amount or low amount,” explains Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian at Baptist Health South Florida.
According to her, you need to remember two numbers: 5 and 20. If the percentage is around 5%, you can consider it low; and high if it is around 20%. For example, if you are looking at saturated fat on the Nutrition Facts label, you want to keep the number more around the 5%. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian at Baptist Health South Florida, says seafood is a good option for your diet, because it is low in saturated fat. She explains choosing seafood doesn’t mean you have to give up your red meat, it just means focus on your portion and frequency of red meat and you can include seafood on some nights instead of your red meat.
She also recommends looking at the first ingredient of any grain you buy, it could be a pasta, a cereal or a bread and it should have the word whole on the label, so you know it is the healthiest option for you. Carla Duenas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says apple cider vinegar will not burn fat: “It will not prevent carbohydrate absorption to the level that we’d want to see for prevention of weight gain, but it’s a healthy habit, it can get you on the right track for continuing your healthy habits throughout the day”.
Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains another myth could be not eating fruit or fruit is high in sugar: “If you’re having one to two servings of fruit as part of a healthy balanced diet, there’s nothing wrong with eating fruit”. There are four numbers that help to maintain healthy diet for children, says Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
5: five or more servings of fruits & veggies per day
2: no more than 2 hours per day of screen time (Tv, cell phones, tablets).
1: hour of physical activity
0: No sugary drinks
She says those are the magic four numbers to remember and It’s important to get kids involved with being healthy. Kids need to eat, because hunger is distracting. Breakfast is one of the most important meals of the day. It can help the children in the morning especially since most of the academic classes are earlier in the morning, affirms Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
She recommends parents, caregivers, teachers or anyone that are working with kids, to keep positive messages about a healthy nutrition. The US Department of Agriculture has made a mite plate, a graphic to help us eat better.
Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian at Baptist Health South Florida, explains it has five food groups. 50% of the plate is fruits and vegetables, the grains are more than the other half with protein.
It is important to remember that we need calcium rich foods and water. Drinking plenty of water or other calorie-free beverages is a good tip to lose weight. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says artificial sweeteners are not the solution, although they may seem like the next step, and recommends just drinking water to stay hydrated.
Another tip is to eat something for breakfast. Carla Duenas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says it could be a half a cup of oatmeal with some fruit in it and a tablespoon of peanut butter. According to Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, eating potatoes is a good decision but when we decide to add them butter or fry them, we turn that decision into an unhealthy one.
Regarding what we can drink, she says alcohol consumption can never be recommended but you have to be aware if you are vegan, for example, that in some alcohol process some animal ingredients are used. If you are going to the supermarket don’t go hungry, practice label reading, shop local and take a list. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian at Baptist Health South Florida, says when you are hungry you are going to be inclined to make choices based on hunger and not what you know is the best for you.
She also recommends looking at the label of a product before it goes into your cart. “The grocery store is the place to practice label reading,” she says. Animal products are not the only protein sources as peanut butter, cheese, yogurt and Greek yogurt, describes Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
She doesn’t recommend any type of processed meat because it is listed as a carcinogen by the World Health Organization. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, affirms juice is actually not necessary as way to get fruits intake.
She explains it is better to take the whole real fruits instead of juice or pulp. The whole fruit has the fiber that juice doesn’t have.
Registered Dietitian adds the serving size recommended for children is no more than four to up to six ounces per day of juice fruit, and for teenagers no more than 8 ounces.
She affirms kids just need water to stay hydrated. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian at Baptist Health South Florida, recommends drinking low-fat, 1% or skim milk, so the label has to say it is low in saturated fats, so you can choose lower saturated fat cow’s milk, cheese and yogurts.
She also explains there are milk alternatives, such as soy milk and almond milk, for example. But you have to always read the label, because some milk alternatives are not fortified in calcium or vitamin D, so you might be thinking you are drinking calcium from that almond milk and that company did not fortify it. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says you can get enough protein on a plant-based diet without eating your animal proteins.
She recommends focusing on what you are eating and you can get protein from peanut butter, almonds, walnuts, chia seeds, for example.
You can add them to a salad and you also can consume some rolled oats and quinoa. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has released new nutrition facts on labels, now the calories segment is much more prominent on the new labels.
“It’s basically the same information, just a different design with some emphasis on some areas. One of the main differences is the added sugars line and the nutrients on the bottom,” says Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian at Baptist Health South Florida.
She also says the serving size is important because the rest of the label is based on that serving size. One of the most important things when preparing the lunchbox is to pack a water bottle, says Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
She notes insulated lunchbox is better than paper brown bags. Also ice packs can help foods stay cold or hot.
Healthy foods such as fruits and vegetables and proteins are the best choice for lunchbox. After-school snacks can be important too, she affirms. Any processed meats are not recommended to be eaten at any point, because they are classified by World Health Organization as carcinogens, affirms Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
She advises decreasing the frequency and portion of any processed meats.
Carla Duenas, Registered Dietitian at the same place, also recommends not eating frequently meat, chicken or fish cooked at high temperature, because they can be carcinogen. “The recommendation is cooking over medium heat,” she says. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, points out dieting is usually seen as something negative, but the reality is that we are all on a diet. “We have to accept that we just need to learn the healthier ways to eat,” she says.
She explains Fad diets don’t work, because after starting the diet, people lose the motivation and give up on continuing eating healthy and eventually they gain weight again. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says we can get protein and calcium from our dairy foods, like eggs, yogurt and cheese.
She also points out Greek yogurt is amazing because it has twice the amount of protein as regular yogurt, which helps you feel fuller for longer so you get more benefits for the same amount.
But she explains you have to be careful because there are so many types of Greek yogurt and some of them have a lot of added sugar. Diet, physical activity, whether you use food to respond to stress, physiologic and genetic make-up, age and health status are some of the factors that influence body weight.
Carla Duenas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says those factors will determine how fast or how quickly you burn fat, where you put on weight when you gain weight and when you lose it as well.
Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains the less sleep you are getting, the more opportunity there is to eat, and when you are sleep-deprived, the hunger hormones can be disrupted. If food has been left outside for more than two hours, It’s necessary to decide to refrigerate it or reheat it for preventing the spread of bacteria. This “danger zone” is known like “Two hours mark”, explains Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
Amy Kimberlain, Registered Dietitian at the same place, also advises remembering an alternative to keep away from the “danger zone”, which is the temperature control. Is coconut oil healthy, or is it just a trend? Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains coconut oil is a solid fat, and its label of nutrition facts says it is mostly saturated fat. Healthy eating includes all types of food, such as vegetables, whole fruits, protein, and whole grains, among others. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains what you should be focusing on to eat healthy. Vegetarian and vegan are overall plant base. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian at Baptist Health South Florida, explains what celiac disease is and how a gluten-free diet can help patients suffering from this condition. The Hunger Fullness Scale is a rule which helps people to rate their hunger on it. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian at Baptist Health South Florida, explains how this scale helps people, what each number on that scale means, and also talks about alcohol consumption. What is matcha? Is it healthy? Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains the pros and cons of this powdered leaf of green tea, used for consuming more nutrients from green tea. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says skipping meals to compensate for calories later in the day is not a good mentality to start your day with.
She also explains emotional eating or mindless eating is when you are just not paying attention to why you are munching on something. She points out you should be truly eating when you feel that queue of hunger. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says vegan and vegetarian diets are currently trending, but they have been around for a long time, mainly due to religious reasons.
She also explains people may think that if they switch to vegan or vegetarian diets, they may see weight loss. However, she suggests making sure they know why they are considering it. When people don’t sleep enough, they may experience increased appetite because leptin will be lower, explains Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
Dr. Jeremy Tabak, Medical Director of the Galloway Sleep Center with Baptist Health South Florida, says sleep apnea can also affect the appetite hormones and stimulate appetite. Lemon juice or seasonings are the best alternatives to reduce salt consumption at home, says Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
The expert says once the sodium is in the body, it remains in it.
People who have high blood pressure must reduce salt in their diet. Half a cup to one cup of carbohydrate in one sitting is a recommended portion by Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
She affirms beans are a great source of carbs, because they’re also protein and beans themselves are a good choice. Sodium is the element that is found in salt, but it’s also in a lot of other processed and packaged foods, explains Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
The expert explains sodium and salt are used as preservatives in processed and packaged foods. The manufacturer decides how much sodium is in the foods that people buy.
She says people are responsible for looking at the sodium in the foods that they intake. Eating healthy involves foods to increase, and foods to limit. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains how many calories you should take from saturated fats and added sugars daily. There are different food groups you should include in your diet. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains how you can have a balanced meal, and gives the example of the tuna salad sandwich. Pumpkin pie is considered one of the favorite Thanksgiving meals. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian at Baptist Health South Florida, explains one recipe for preparing this delicious food. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains regular pie crust can be a source of saturated fat, which is not good for cholesterol; therefore, you can make an almond pie crust instead.
She also recommends substituting the simple onion topping that usually goes on the green beans with toasted almonds, and the marshmallow topping of the sweet potato casserole can be replaced with a little bit of added sugar with cinnamon and some chopped nuts. Are green juices healthy? Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains the healthy benefits of this trend and talks about the difference between homemade green juices and store-bought green juices. A healthy dish is composed by a portion of protein, a portion of carbs and a lot of vegetables.
Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida recommends keeping away from words like crispy or crunchy, because they are going to mean fried and more calories.
She describes when someone is eating fruits in a dessert presentation, it doesn’t count like a fruit serving.
The expert advises skipping desserts for maintaining healthy habits. Nutrition, hydration, sleep, movement, breathing, and thinking are the foundations of health. Coach Hamad Shirazi, Holistic Health Practitioner, explains there are spiritual, emotional, mental, physical and environmental components to health and well-being.
He points out each component plays a pivotal role in achieving optimal health and well being. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, highlights the food plate should have fruits and vegetables in one half, and in the other one it should have grains and proteins. Dr. Jeremy Tabak, Medical Director of the Galloway Sleep Center with Baptist Health South Florida, talks about the two different types of sleep apnea.
He also affirms the most important risk factor of sleep apnea is weight. 80 % or more of the condition occurs in people who are overweight or obese. It is more common in men until women achieve the age of menopause.
Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says Registered Dietitians advise the patient during the weight maintenance phase. Acai is a type of berry that has a naturally sweet taste, and it is native to Central and South America. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, talks about the benefits of this purple berry for your health. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains the ketogenic diet is a medically prescribed diet for children with uncontrollable seizures. Therefore, there is a medical purpose to the existence of the diet, but currently it is trending for weight loss.
She says ketogenic diet is eating fats, moderating amounts of protein, and having a very low to minimal carbohydrate intakes. When you cut carbohydrates, you are not providing your body with glucose; but the body adapts and converts the metabolism to use fats as fuel. Coach Hamad Shirazi, Holistic Health Practitioner, says if people cultivate a lifestyle that is healthy and balanced, they will be able to enjoy themselves on vacation.
Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, encourages people to enjoy the holiday, and to take some measures; for example, instead of marshmallow topping, you can add some cinnamon. She explains eating healthy comes down to being mindful and practicing moderation. Carla Duenas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says having an excess of calories could be emotional or lifestyle related. “The main thing to remember is that calories are energy and the body runs on energy. So, we need to constantly feed it and in order to lose weight, there needs to be a deficit by consuming less calories or burning more calories than what we consume,” she explains.
She also says drastically cutting back on calories and restrict yourself from eating can be just as bad as overeating. Carla Duenas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says it really doesn’t matter how many calories a person is consuming throughout the day, as long as those meals are spread out throughout the day.
She recommends having three meals and two snacks (in the morning and in the afternoon).
The Registered Dietitian explains the body needs energy even three or four hours and food is fuel for it. That cycle is the best to keep satiety and hunger control as well. Pre-planning meals online is the best idea to start off to make better decisions, according to Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
She recommends making vegetables half of the plate, because it’s one way to balance the other side of it, which is with grains and protein. Lactose is the natural sugar found in dairy products such as milk, cheese and yogurt. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian at Baptist Health South Florida, also talks about how simple substitution of milk or cream, in certain meals such as mashed potatoes among others, can help with this condition. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains the majority of the sodium in one’s diet comes from processed and packaged foods, such as canned vegetables.
She recommends always reading the label to make sure the amount of sodium is not too high. She says the value has to be closer to 5% and no more than 10%. Talamas points out if you are going over to someone’s house for a holiday celebration, make sure you talk to that person or bring your own dish if you are really trying to manage a condition, like heart failure, or another specialized diet. Carla Duenas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, recommends having separate cutting boards for fruits, vegetables, meats and fish in order to avoid spreading bacteria. The three most common bacteria are: salmonella, E-coli and listeria.
The specialist also recommends not using the same plate for the cooked meats and the raw meals, especially salads. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, talks about healthy Mexican food choices.
The specialist advises selecting more vegetables options and healthy fats such as avocado. She affirms guacamole is a good choice, because it’s healthy fat.
She recommends taking one option at the time. For example, if someone gets a burrito, he skips the rice and beans. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says handling food allergies during Halloween can be a challenge, but it shouldn’t be the first time that you encounter this. She recommends having healthy conversations with your child about if they can go trick-or-treating.
She points out it is important to make sure your child understands that mom or dad has to review the candy before eating it, for example. The majority of the sodium that most people ingest comes from processed and packaged foods.
Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, recommends always reading the nutritional information labels to make sure that the amount of sodium is less than 5%. She also recommends that patients that are in strict diets plan ahead when eating outside of their home. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains thanksgiving foods are not necessarily unhealthy in their independent form. For example, potatoes can be rich in fiber and vitamin A, but the whole spread across the plate can get us into trouble.
She points out some traditional thanksgiving desserts are pumpkin pie, apple pie, and pecan pie; she says calories can add up if you have a couple slices of pie. Talamas highlights a thanksgiving meal can hit over 2,000 calories, which may lead into what some people call the food coma. Chain restaurants, which have 20 or more locations, are required to provide people the nutrition information for their foods, either online or on sites, explains Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida.
The expert explains the label of the nutrition information of boneless wings. She describes when someone is looking for nutrition facts, he’s usually doing it for individual items. In this case, information of boneless wings is without any sauce or dressing.
She says in the example, this meal has a lot of calories as well as total fat and sodium. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says the problem is that Halloween is not a day-celebration, but it seems to be more of a one-week or two-week celebration where there is access to so much candy.
She recommends watching how much candy is truly coming into your home and into your child’s diet, being mindful of all that candy, and sitting with your child and having them pick their favorite candies out. Sleep apnea refers to a disorder where people stop breathing with sleep. It happens over and over during the course of the night.
Dr. Jeremy Tabak, Medical Director of the Galloway Sleep Center with Baptist Health South Florida, explains sleep apnea is beyond snoring. “Snoring is the very mild end and then it progress to mild sleep apnea, moderate severe sleep,” he describes.
He advises addressing and treating sleep apnea, especially if the patient has other medical conditions which are adversely affected such as high blood pressure, heart disease, atrial fibrillation, heart failure, diabetes or history of stroke.
Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says sleep is the third factor when physicians are talking to their patients about how managing their weight. Food and exercise are the other two factors. Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, suggests being the one that brings the healthier dish, such as roasted winter vegetables (Brussels sprouts, rainbow carrots, butternut squash, and rosemary herbs).
She says it is a misconception to think that carbs are bad, the problem is that on holidays there are just too many of them. Therefore, the idea of vegetables is that they provide non-starchy carbohydrates. Coach Hamad Shirazi, Holistic Health Practitioner, recommends trying to get all the colors on your plate, because each color is associated with a different nutrient.
Lucette Talamas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, shares the recipe of oven-roasted vegetables for going to a potluck or for a real prepping for the week. It contains Brussels sprouts, rainbow carrots, butternut squash, and fresh rosemary. Carla Duenas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, says most of the minerals that we get from whole grains are found in wheat containing products: “Pasta and breads, those are the ones that we think most commonly contain gluten and if we go gluten free, we can be missing some of the minerals we need”.
She explains gluten intolerance is when a particle of gluten can trigger a whole cascade of responses in the body, where it affects them negatively. Trying to get the lowest possible fat, when reading the numbers on the label when buying a product is the best way to understand the nutritional information of any product.
Carla Duenas, Registered Dietitian with Baptist Health South Florida, explains with a graphic what the numbers mean.
