Diet and health

Home economics food and nutrition

Lesson objective – to understand the important of diet and health

Success criteria

To research several sources of help such as:

MAFF report

COMA guidance

National Health service

5 ‘a day’ scheme

Eat well plate

Diet and Health – Tasks to find out

1. Where do we get current nutritional advice from?

2. What official sources of information are there?

3. What voluntary sources of information?

4. What are the general guidelines for healthy eating?

5. Why do we need to follow dietary advice?

6. Find out as much as you can on each?

Lesson objective – to understand the important of diet and health

MAFF reportCOMA guidanceNational Health service5 ‘a day’ schemeEat well plate

Are you fairly confident about what not to eat?

Trans fat Saturated fat High-sodium foods Cholesterol Over-processed foods White bread and flour Added-sugar products

So what does a healthy diet really look like?

Lesson objective – to understand the important of diet and health

Lesson objective – to understand the important of diet and health

Why do we need to have fibre in the diet?

Fibre is an important component of a healthy balanced diet. We get fibre from plant-based foods, but it's not something the body can absorb. This means fibre is not a nutrient and contains no calories or vitamins.Fibre helps your digestive system to process food and absorb nutrients. Fibre lowers blood cholesterol. Fibre helps to control blood sugar levels, which in turn controls appetite. There are two types of fibre: insoluble and soluble.

Insoluble fibre

• Insoluble fibre contains cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin. It helps your bowel to pass food by making stools soft and bulky. This type of fibre helps prevent constipation.

• Insoluble fibre is found in the following foods:• beans • brown rice • fruits with edible seeds • lentils • maize • oats • pulses • wheat bran • wholegrain breads • wholegrain cereals • wholemeal breads • wholemeal cereals • wholemeal pasta • wholewheat flour.

Soluble fibre

• Soluble fibre contains gums and pectin. This type of fibre lowers cholesterol levels and controls blood sugar. It can be found in all fruit and vegetables, but the following are rich sources:

• apples • barley • citrus • guar gum • legumes • oats • pears • strawberries.

What's a 'good‘ amount of fibre?

• The British Nutrition Foundation has issued the following guidelines for labelling food.

• 'High fibre' should contain 6g fibre per 100g or ml.

• A 'source' of fibre should contain 3g fibre per 100g or ml.