We hear about such a thing as the nutritional value of products quite often. It is especially important to take it into account for those people who decide to put their diet in order, to make it the most useful and healthy. But this value is not always explained correctly, sometimes as the nutritional value of a product is only its calorie content. What does this concept mean, and how to choose the most useful products?
Nutritional value is the set of product qualities that are required to meet the physiological needs of a person. Simply put, a product with high nutritional value contains enough necessary and useful substances for humans, it is easily absorbed, the most safe for the body, and its calorie content is comparable to its usefulness.
I must say right away that the correct nutritional value of products is calculated for a long time and it includes a lot of components that are complicated for a simple calculation. But in order to make your diet more balanced, it is enough to consider just a few factors. It:
- The presence of proteins, fats and carbohydrates necessary for your daily diet.
- The number of calories that is simply necessary to consider for people who want to lose weight.
- The glycemic index of a product (GI), which indicates how well it is absorbed by the body.
When planning your menu, you can rely on the following numbers:
- Typically, a person needs to consume 2,000-3,000 calories per day, where a lower indicator is for people who lead a predominantly quiet lifestyle, and a larger one is for those whose physical activity is strong enough.
- For a day, a person needs to consume about 120 g of protein, 500 g of carbohydrates and 80 g of fat.
- The greater the GI of the product, the more likely it is to gain weight by eating it.
And it is not necessary to calculate on your own what the nutritional value of the products is - a table of this indicator will help you quickly navigate. It usually indicates the calorie content of the product and the amount of nutrients (proteins, carbohydrates, fats and others). The latter are sometimes indicated as a percentage of the daily norm. GI is not indicated everywhere, since it was not so long ago to take it into account when drawing up diet menus. But it is important enough for those who follow their figure. Such a table, which indicates the nutritional value of individual products, allows you to choose the products that are necessary for you, especially if you are on a diet.
Below I will give some basic foods based on their nutritional value.
Beef - kcal 171, protein 18, fat 10
Cooked sausage - kcal 197, protein 12, fat 15, carbohydrates 1
Eggs - kcal 53, protein 12, fat 12, carbohydrates 0.5
Kefir - gi 30, kcal 69, protein 3, fat 3.6, carbohydrates 3
Milk - gi 32, kcal 67, protein 3, fats 3.7, carbohydrates 4.6
Buckwheat - gi 50, kcal 351, protein 12, fat 2.5, carbohydrates 67
Tomatoes - gi 10, kcal 24, proteins 1, fats 0.3, carbohydrates 3
Boiled potatoes - gi 65, kcal 76, proteins -, fats 0.5, carbohydrates 15.8
Potato chips - gi 85, kcal 540, protein 2, fats 37.9, carbohydrates 49
Orange - gi 35, kcal 37, proteins 0.7, fats 0.4, carbohydrates 8
Cracker - gi 80, kcal 354, protein 11, fat 13, carbohydrates 67
Wafers without filling - gi 80, kcal 548, protein 2.7, fat 32, carbohydrates 61.6
These special tables are quite possible to find in books and the Internet. Often the main parameters of nutritional value are indicated on the packaging of products. In such tables, it is possible to find out the presence of vitamins and minerals, which is important for making a menu of young children, as well as for those who prefer to receive the necessary substances not from special vitamin complexes, but from natural products.
What and how we eat has a huge impact on our appearance and health. Sometimes it is possible to improve the quality of life and acquire an attractive figure by simply abandoning unnecessary products in your menu. Replace fat with veal, and chips with tasty cooked potatoes. Often even this is enough to lose those extra pounds.