Fiber is key to taking care of our health and helping us lose weight or maintain weight . However, most of us don't get enough: the average intake is 12.5 g per day, a far cry from the recommended 30 g per day. But reaching that amount is not that difficult, just make a few simple changes to your diet.
Instead of fries …
- Popcorn (15 g of fiber per 100 g). There are hateful comparisons and this is one of them. Not only does popcorn provide much more fiber (15g versus 1g for potatoes), but it also has much fewer calories and is very rich in polyphenols, a type of antioxidant. Of course, they have to be homemade popcorn made with very little oil and little salt or sugar.
Instead of rice …
- Quinoa (7.9 g of fiber per 100 g). Substituting white rice for brown rice is a first step to increase your fiber intake, but even better if you change it for quinoa, since it provides 7.9 g of fiber and brown rice only 3 g. To this is added that quinoa almost doubles the protein content of the latter and, in addition, it is complete proteins. If you don't know how to incorporate it into your menus, try our easy-to-prepare quinoa recipes.
Instead of pasta …
- Red lentil paste (7.6 g of fiber per 100 g). Ideally, you should substitute the pasta directly for lentils or some other legume, which are excellent sources of fiber, but at least with pasta made from their flour you are already doubling the content of both fiber and protein.
Instead of mayonnaise …
- Hummus (6.5 g of fiber per 100 g). If you tend to resort to mayonnaise to avoid making your sandwich too dry, try swapping it out for some hummus (if you want, here's the formula for super light chickpea hummus ). Not only will it be juicy, but you'll also add fiber (mayonnaise doesn't give you a measly gram) and reduce saturated fat to almost a quarter. Another equally healthy alternative is to substitute the mayonnaise for mashed avocado.
Instead of green juice …
- Shake or smoothie (5.2 g of fiber per glass). With the shake you multiply by five! the amount of fiber you take and although the caloric content is somewhat higher (as long as you don't add milk, yogurt … in which case the calories would increase a lot) it is compensated because it satisfies you more and you will snack less. And to do so, you can get an idea of our easy shakes with which you will look (even) more beautiful and healthy.
