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COLUMN: You are your own guru when it comes to dieting and nutrition

Published: Fri 3 Aug 2018, 5:33 PM

Last updated: Fri 3 Aug 2018, 6:38 PM

With the fashion media awash with its annual body shaming beach body frenzy it’s time for some reality.
After thirty five years in food I have seen a hell of a lot of diets come and go. We are forever bemused from inside food on how the public are consistently duped by health gurus with new fangled trends to cut the calories. We now have tiger nut milk shakes, collagen drinks, fat burning and blocking pills, appetite suppressants, it’s staggering the never-ending train of products while the ratio of time spent watching TV to actual cooking is now at two to one.
I have been asked to compile diets but everyone’s body is different. One size does not fit all. We all taste food differently; my taste sensation can be your dinner hell. I recall my old Latin teacher in St. Pats, Navan, she taught me “de gustibus non est dipuntandum”, one should never argue about taste, in other words I cannot taste what you taste, simply because everyone’s palate differs.

The Romans were dead right. So when it comes to diet you must compose your own. Not eat someone else’s. You know what foods you like, no one knows your body better than you. Eating must remain a pleasure not a torture, every meal, morning, noon and night. It’s simple really and no secret.
A basic equation you must calculate so that the fuel and calories you consume is not greater than the energy you burn. Okay we can let it slip now and again we are only human not robots, but generally that’s the rule. So by respecting how sedentary or active your life is and knowing your food groups, that is your fuel or energy foods like your carbohydrates versus your replenishing proteins like your meat and dairy and by being in control of this intake you keep a happy equilibrium.
Of course if you eat more than you burn then that is your weight gain and it should all start in childhood with good parental tuition. Throw some regular exercise into the mix, don’t snack between mealtimes and bingo you have the winning personal food formula.
It's okay to skip the odd meal each week also to give your gut a break, we had millions of years not knowing where our next meal would come from so we are well programmed for this. It’s not rocket science, just eating an informed balance of what you like, watching your portions and having a bit of discipline.
Have you noticed how scones for example have doubled in size from a when you were young? If you eat loads of carbs in the evening, filling up on these fuel foods while slouched on the sofa watching the soaps then you have no chance.
I have quizzed the Italians, French and Spanish about diets over the years and their food diet awareness is amazing. They have an innate ability to do their own personal calculation of what and how to eat which is indoctrinated into them from youth so that they are in control of their winning balance for eating as an adult. That comes from having an informed food culture which we are only beginning.
The diet and nutri-cosmetic industries are multi billion euro food sectors but the failure rate is sky high, a fact everyone ignores in the PR haze, the solution is in the mirror, you are the answer, the information is all out there, eating has to be for pleasure, you are your own guru.