The Key to Healthy Eating is Balance

By
Dan J
-

Eating healthily is an important component of living a healthy life, but you shouldn’t obsess about it. In fact, being obsessive about healthy food is ultimately not good for your mental health and quality of life, so balance should be the thing you’re striving for.

How to Start

When you first start looking into healthier food options, you may feel deprived. You have certain habits and love certain foods that don’t necessarily have much nutritional value, so it’s important to keep a healthy relationship with food. Healthy foods are important, but so is your ability to relax and eat what you want from time to time without feeling guilty about it.

How to Stay Balanced

If you don’t trust yourself to intuitively eat healthy foods most of the time and treat yourself occasionally, you should try the 80/20 rule. Eat “right” 80% of the time and get more relaxed during the remaining 20%.

Don’t See it as Sacrifice

Once you realize that healthy food is not a punishment tool, but something you need to stay healthy and strong, you will start loving it more and more. It’s hard to deny the good effects it can bring and you need to trust the process until you can see results.

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PEARL BARLEY WARM SALAD WITH MINI MOONG FALAFELS 🌱 // I learned a great trick for cooking barley – you soak it overnight in water and the juice of half lemon. The next day you just drain and cook. The lemon helps barley retain its nutrients and speeds up cooking time by a lot and gives you a barley that is not chewy at all. The same process works also for brown rice, spelt and any other whole grain. Perfect for this weather, this warm salad has a nice combo of textures, flavours and beautiful colours. The mini falafels were made with moong dal, a nice change from the classic falafel and so cute that you can’t help popping one after the other in your mouth 🙂 ✅INGREDIENTS 🌱For the barley salad: Pearl barley – 1 cup Lemons – 1 Sun-dried cherry tomatoes marinated in oil – 3 tbsp, oil drained and chopped Artichoke hearts marinated in oil – 3 tbsp, oil drained and chopped Mange tout – 100g, halved Walnuts – 50g, chopped Raisin – 2 tbsp Mint – a small bunch Micro herbs to garnish (optional) Salt and pepper to taste 🌱For the mini moong falafel: Split yellow mung beans – 1 cup Cilantro – 1 small bunch Parsley – 1 small bunch Cumin seeds – 1 tsp Black pepper – 1/2 tsp Baking soda – 1/2 tsp Sesame seeds – 2 tbsp Oil for frying ✅METHOD The night before: soak pearl barley in plenty water and the juice of half lemon. Separately, soak mung beans in plenty water. The next day, drain water and set aside. Bring a large pot of water to boil and add the barley. Cook for around 7-8 minutes or until the barley is cooked through and drain. Transfer to a bowl and season with salt and pepper then add the remaining half lemon, sun-dried tomatoes, artichokes, mange tout, walnuts, mint, raisins. Garnish with micro herbs and set aside. Add all the falafel ingredients (minus the oil) to a food processor. Run the food processor 40 seconds at a time until all is well combined forming a the falafel mixture. Heat the oil to 140C, form tiny balls with the falafel mixture and fry in batches. Drain excess oil on kitchen paper and serve along with the barley salad. Enjoy! #salad #warmsalad #autumn #fall #fallrecipes #autumnrecipes #falafel #moongdal #vegan #vegetarian #f52gram

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