Bettina’s (14) entries
„And in the last half of the plate there are vegetables and fruits.”
Sustainability is today’s biggest concern. Closely linked to this is the production and consumption of food and, through this, nutrition. Healthy eating is not something magical, there are many ways to get there. Regular physical activity is an integral part of a healthy lifestyle. If we exercise for half an hour a day in addition to our usual daily rhythm, we have already done something for our health. I live in a village, so I can do this relatively easily by cycling, walking, running, skateboarding. That means that healthy living is part of my everyday life. We have our own garden where we grow most of the vegetables for the family. That’s why I started thinking about how I could help other people to eat healthily. As a 9th grade student, I would like to program and make an app so that I can help as many people as possible and guide them towards a healthy lifestyle. The goal of this app would be to create a calorie counting solution which, after the entering of the data, will immediately tell you the actual calories depending on the cooking method.
T.E. (standing for “Táplálkozz Egészségesen”, i.e. “Eat Healthily”) will be a simple phone app allowing people to share healthy diets and encourage others with their own experiences beyond calorie counting. They will be able to use the software to organise joint activities (under the current conditions, by keeping sufficient distance and in full compliance with the legal rules in effect), such as cooking together through video conference, to learn about other people’s cooking and lifestyle habits. Not only will this allow them to find healthy new ingredients and dishes, but also to make new friends. Eating healthy is very important for everyone as it can prevent diseases. We cannot eat healthily every day, it gets boring after a while, so there will also be so-called cheat days. This means that you can eat sweets on a certain day of the week and deviate from your strict diet. I want each person to find a plan in the app that suits their taste. Every person is different, but everyone has one thing in common: eating.
Let’s see how a meal of optimal composition would look like: one quarter of it would be carbohydrates, such as bread, pastries, etc. In order to be healthy, we should eat as many unprocessed foods as possible: brown rice, wholemeal flour, oatmeal, oat flakes, wholemeal pasta. The next quarter would be protein. Here it is important to have good quality meats with a fat content as low as possible, such as poultry, fish and seafood. Try to choose dry meats that are not high in fat. As for cheese and dairy products, give preference to light, i.e. fat-free products. The consumption of fermented dairy products such as yoghurt and kefir is beneficial for the gut flora. The remaining half of the plate should be filled with vegetables and fruit. Eating vegetables with a low calorie content is beneficial because they are high in fibre, which makes you feel full sooner, but they are also good to eat because of their colour. They contain a lot of vitamins and minerals. Regular fluid intake is just as important for healthy nutrition. Our body needs water first and foremost. Avoid sugary, sweet drinks and alcohol. Natural sugar substitutes such as xylitol and stevia are recommended for sweetening. For cooking, use starch, oat flour or potatoes instead of wheat flour.
Until we could go to school, I used to bring sandwiches from home and my mother would put cheese, ham and lots of vegetables in them. In the afternoon, when I got home, I had a cooked meal with lots of fresh vegetables and chicken breast. Unfortunately, diabetes is very common in my family, so it is important for me to eat healthily to avoid this disease. Giving up sweets is the hardest thing for me.
