Natural foods. Sounds good doesn’t it? Most of the time it is, but it is getting harder and harder to find truly natural foods. At your local grocery store, the natural foods are usually those located on the edges and back of the store. You should spend most of your time in these aisles where the fruit, vegetables, poultry, fish and meat are sold. The aisles in the center of the grocery store are predominantly processed, meaning that a company took a natural food and converted it into a different product.

Not everything that is natural is healthy though for the overweight person. Remember some of the things we have told you earlier:

Protein

Be careful of your protein sources. These are all natural, but not necessarily healthy:

• Dairy products are high in saturated fat. Use low fat dairy products.
• Most livestock are fed corn today. This makes them higher in fat, specifically Omega-6s.
• Nuts are certainly natural, but they are very high in fat.

Fruit

I love fruit. It is so naturally good for you. Unfortunately, it is full of carbohydrates. You don’t have carte blanche to eat as much fruit as you want.

• Fruit counts against your carbohydrate limits.
• Beware of fruit drinks. They are often heavily sweetened. It may say “naturally sweetened,” regardless, these calories count.

Grains

These are a very good source of protein, vitamins and minerals, but they contain a large amount of carbohydrate. Again, watch the carbohydrate grams. There is no free lunch here. Grains have higher ratios of carbohydrate to protein than is ideal. Also, you may be one of those people who have bacteria that can ferment fiber into fat. If you become gassy with ingestion of grains, that may be you. Stick to insoluble fiber if you become gassy with grains. It will help to keep you from gaining weight.

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