DR Jeevith C Reddy

In a lab, all calories are the same when you burn them. But not when you eat them. Your body is a complicated biochemical, hormonal soup controlled mostly by what you eat. So here’s my rule: If nature made it eat it, if man made it leave it. I'm sure you've noticed that a fresh avocado or kiwi doesn’t come with a nutrition facts label, a barcode, or ingredient list. If you are eating food that comes with a label, focus on the ingredient list, not the “nutrition facts” that are mostly designed and developed under huge food industry lobby efforts to confuse and confound your efforts to eat healthy. If you don’t recognize a word, can’t pronounce it, or it is in Latin, or you don’t have it in your cupboard and wouldn’t use it in a recipe—maltodextrin, for instance—then don’t use it. On every ingredient list, note that the most abundant component is listed first. The others follow in descending order by weight. Be conscious of ingredients that may not be on the list. Also beware of foods with health claims on the label. These claims usually signal a marketing ploy to make you think they’re good for you when they’re really just healthy pretenders. Things like sports beverages, energy bars, and even multigrain breads (which often contain high-fructose corn syrup) fall into this category.