Unhealthy Foods You Should Avoid - Important Things You May Not Know

Agricultural technology can be a bane sometimes. Production of food has become way too advanced that instead of eating natural foods, we are ingesting pesticide-laden, highly-processed fare that contributes to the development many diseases, not the least of which is cancer and heart ailments. In order to get nutrition that is truly beneficial for our health, we must not only eat healthy natural food, we have to learn to practice spotting unhealthy foods to avoid and keep them out of our pantries and refrigerators completely. By avoiding these completely, you are working towards reducing your risk of allergies, the development of obesity and decreasing your chances of acquiring heart disease. While the general guideline of avoiding anything processed is a good one to follow, it's a bit too broad of a classification. Here is a more specific listing of unhealthy foods to avoid to guide you on your next trip to the grocery store:

1. Save whole milk for the kids. The next time you shop and are tempted to get whole milk, full fat cheese and ice cream, resist the urge. The saturated fat, cholesterol and caloric content of whole milk only serve to increase your blood cholesterol and blood pressure levels. It also contributes to fatter midsections. These increase your chances of having a heart attack. If you must buy whole milk, buy it for your kids but choose skim or non fat varieties for yourself.

2. Soda is a beverage to avoid because of its exceedingly high caloric content that is only full of empty sugars. But aside from soda, you must also ditch processed fruit juices and sports drinks, among others. These are way too high in sugar content that only gives you cavities and increases your triglyceride levels that makes you more prone to stroke.

3. Skip processed meats. These include hotdogs, bacon and sausages among others. They mask saturated fat, cholesterol and preservatives with their delicious tastes. The list of diseases that you can get if you consume these meats on a daily basis involve are only all too-familiar--heart disease, high blood pressure and obesity are just some to name a fee.

4. Pastries, baked goods and sweets have trans fats which should be avoided because they raise your bad cholesterol and lower your good cholesterol levels. Some kinds of vegetable shortening such as some margarines and other foods also have high trans fat content. Be sure to avoid partially hydrogenated vegetable oils if you don't want to die early.

5. Go easy on the ice cream. One cup has about 300 calories. Factor in the increase in calories if you add toppings like whipped cream and cookie crumbs. If the temptation becomes too difficult to resist, opt for low fat varieties or choose non fat yogurt instead.

6. Cheeseburgers and other fast food burger fare are unhealthy foods to avoid. With mayonnaise and cheese, they can easily add more than 500 calories to your frame and a give you more than 900 grams of sodium! When you eat out, you usually add French fries and soda to your order, so add that all up and you'll get an easy thousand calories just in one meal! And you haven't even started supersizing yet.

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