What to eat for a slim figure and immunity at the same time? What the menu should look like in the cold months – advises an expert

What to eat for a slim figure and immunity at the same time? What the menu should look like in the cold months – advises an expert

Be careful not to kill all the vitamins. Prolonged cooking, baking or improper storage can affect the quality of fruits and vegetables and the amount of vitamins in them. Learn how to properly prepare and consume them.

What to eat to support immunity

Winter is traditionally a time of various unpleasant viruses or colds. From autumn to spring, our days are also associated with bad weather, which affects our mood, when we naturally do not feel like eating various green salads or fresh lunches. It is therefore a good idea to pay more attention to your health and include foods full of vitamins in your diet, which will strengthen us in this bad time, but at the same time exclude foods that put a strain on the body.

The best protection against diseases is to maintain a long-term healthy lifestyle, to have enough exercise, sleep, quality food and good clothing in the cold season. Well, it’s high time to include in the diet foods that are natural antioxidants and sources of vitamins. Our questions are answered by the director of the Institute for Reduction and Prevention of Excess Weight, compliment® PharmDr. Katarína Skybová.

What foods should we add to our diet in winter, and which are suitable for supporting immunity?
Onion and garlic – They are natural antibiotics thanks to the natural content of flavonoids and essential oils with antibacterial and anti-inflammatory effects. We recommend using onions and garlic in large quantities, in soups or stews, when preparing meat, salads or in homemade spreads.

Sauerkraut – Contains not only vitamin C, but also a lot of prebiotics (fiber) and probiotics. Vitamin C is a strong antioxidant and thus contributes to the body’s defenses. Probiotics, on the other hand, have a beneficial effect on the health of the intestine, which is also an important part of our immune system.

Ginger – A suitable choice is not only ginger tea, but also ginger as part of soups or meat dishes. Ginger has an anti-inflammatory effect and is a great warm-up on cold days. Attention, pregnant women should use it in moderation.

Vegetables and fruits of all kinds – Crops such as broccoli, kale, cauliflower or pumpkin are suitable. Prepare a soup or stew that warms, satiates and does not weigh you down. It’s also citrus season, so enjoy it to your heart’s content. Ideally in the form of whole fruit as juice. In addition to vitamins, they also contain a lot of fiber, which feeds our good intestinal bacteria.

Legumes – Do not forget about legumes, which are full of vegetable proteins, and it is proteins that are very important for maintaining a healthy immune system.

Tomatoes, beans, garlic, honey, sauerkraut, or kefir are also suitable for supporting immunity during autumn. Why is that so?

Tomato – Food that is characterized by a higher content of valuable lycopene (a red dye with antioxidant effects). For better utilization of lycopene from tomatoes, it is advisable to boil or stew them for a while.

Beans – As a legume, it contains higher amounts of plant proteins, very suitable for vegetarians and vegans. Beans also contain valuable fiber, which helps with regular emptying.

Garlic – It is a natural antibiotic, so it should not be missing from our menus now.

Honey – It also has anti-inflammatory effects, but as with other sweeteners, you don’t need to overdo it. A teaspoon in the mouth or cooled tea is enough. Honey is still a sweetener composed of glucose and fructose, just like regular sugar.

Kefir – It is a sour milk product that is made from fresh milk by adding kefir grains, which subsequently ferment the milk and create a fermented milk drink full of mainly probiotic bacteria that support the health of the intestine, and thus the overall defense of the body.

We often don’t have that much appetite for green leafy salads. So what should we eat to eat healthy and not gain weight? What can we replace salads with?

Stews and soups. You can make stews from frozen or fresh vegetables – spinach, pumpkin, zucchini, green beans or lentils. They are excellent in combination with egg or stewed meat.

Prepare soups without roasting or gravy, from vegetables to taste, or with sour. There are no limits to taste and imagination. But even such a good chicken broth is a balm not only for the body, but also for the soul. And add fermented vegetables, pickles or a bowl of salad to the main meal. A little freshness won’t hurt us, for example:

There is still talk about supporting immunity through diet, but many people eat foods that they think are healthy and full of vitamins, but it is not true. For example, it is known that spinach contains iron and lemons contain vitamin C, but it is said that when we add lemon juice to hot tea, the vitamin is gone. Is that so?

It is not necessary to fixate on specific foods, but it is necessary to eat many different types of vegetables and fruits, legumes, whole grains, lean meats, fish and dairy products. That way you will supply the body with everything it needs. Of course, even vegetarians and vegans know how to eat healthily, you just need to know how to compensate for the exclusion of animal foods and meat.

Speaking of iron, its best source is meat. Vegetables also contain it, but it is absorbed worse. Nevertheless, vegetarians do not suffer from iron deficiency. Probably because they have more vitamin C in their food, which supports the absorption of iron.

And as for vitamin C, yes, it is heat-labile, so if you put lemon in boiling tea, you will destroy it. This also applies to some other vitamins, so it is ideal to cook vegetables only for a short time and not overcook them in order to preserve as much of them as possible.

As for lemon and its vitamin C content, it is not the richest source of vitamin C. A better source of lemon is peppers, onions, rhubarb, raw broccoli, cabbage, and nowadays highly valued sea buckthorn.

What should we eat and in what form so that it is really a source of vitamins and immunity support for us? Is it possible that we degrade vitamins by storing or cooking them? For example, when we bake a pumpkin, do as many vitamins remain in it as in the raw one?

In general, fruits and vegetables are most beneficial in their raw state. However, there are also exceptions, when the effect of heat on specific vegetables, or fruit increases the content of the given nutrient in the food.

A good example is the tomato, where lycopene, a carotenoid with demonstrable antioxidant effects, is better utilized by the action of heat. The iron in spinach is also better usable after a short heat treatment. It is true that prolonged heat treatment destroys valuable substances, so it is recommended, especially vegetables, to boil or steam them for a short time.

Most vitamins are found in vegetables and fruits immediately after harvesting. They disappear during storage. That is why it is good to freeze vegetables that are not used while they are still fresh. That’s when the most vitamins are stored in it.

Many people also reach for various vitamins and syrups to support immunity. Is it appropriate to use them, or should we replace them with food?

We can also support health with nutritional supplements, whether they are vitamins or extracts from mushrooms or Echinacea. Vitamin D and C are evergreen in winter, we all suffer from lack of vitamin D in winter. Immunity is made up of a complicated system of reactions and it is difficult to support it with a one-time action. That is why it is important to eat well, exercise, rest and not expose yourself to unnecessary physical or mental stress. These are the best weapons to support immunity and good health.