Nutrition, Positive Diets and Health (Essay Sample)

Nutrition, Positive Diets and Health
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Abstract
Human nutrition is a useful factor to consider in preparing meals or raising a family or improving the living standards of people. Nutrition is also useful to consider for sick people, expectant mothers, those who engage in excessive mental functioning at the work place and old people who may have some restrictions on their feeding routines. Normal and healthy people still need to consider the amounts, variety, and balance of the different types of food they consume. Nutrition is, therefore, central to good health and healthy living of all persons. As a general rule, the amounts of different foods and the proportions that must be served need to be regulated for different people according to their age, occupations, health status among other social factors. The manner of food preparation and cooking is critical to nutritional preservation and the quality of food. In this regard, each food needs to be prepared in a manner that preserves the nutritional value as well as enhance the digestion. The processes of food acquisition, storage, preparation, cooking and serving are all critical to the nutritional value. All the processes must be managed effectively if the consumers of the food must gain the most from the meals.
Keywords: Cooking and food preparation, nutrition, health, positive diets
Nutrition, Positive Diets and Health
Introduction
The subject of nutrition today forms a significant social and economic concern for many citizens across the developed and the developing nations alike. For the developed nations, overconsumption is a great course of concern as it results in many public health issues like obesity. In the developing nations, unavailability of adequate food for households results in starvation and causes untold malnutrition and hunger. Positive diet means the consumption of foods that are well cooked. Such foods have their nutritional contents intact and, therefore, do not pose any dangers to the people consuming the foods (James et al, 1997). Positive diet also implies the consumption of healthy foods and avoidance of foods that may pose health risks. For instance, overconsumption of fatty foods, too much intake of sugar, and substance abuse may be regarded as a negative diet because they predispose the individuals to health risks such as diabetes, obesity, overweight, other heart related complications and general poor health.
The benefits of healthy feeding are numerous. For instance, those who feed well show higher rates of recovery from illnesses, they are active and resilient to failure in many daily tasks, they are more mentally alert and tend to have better survival attitudes and social dispositions at all times. On the contrary, those who have poor feeding and diet may suffer increased susceptibility to illnesses; they are easily irritable and have a low rate of social and psychological function in social and professional situations.
Nutrition and Cooking for Positive Diets
Most foodstuffs are prepared with the help of different types of cooking before they are consumed. A few others are dried or taken in the raw forms for convenience or to ensure nutritional value of the food substance is conserved. The essence of cooking is to enhance the digestibility of food and to improve its taste. The nutritional needs of the body are diverse and may fluctuate with the habits and lifestyle changes or modifications. Those who engage in strenuous physical activity generally need to consume sufficient amount of energy rich food unlike those doing minimal strenuous activity (Lichtenstein et al, 2006).
To institute an effective dietary control, people need to observe a regular habit of their daily food intake. In particular, skipping meals is undesirable because it has several negative consequences. It is observed that eating with company promotes effective eating habits. Moreover, taking snacks between the meals generally improves the energy contents in the body and promotes better livelihoods. It is recommended to add some flavor to aid the consumption rather than to avoid the food that may not taste very nice. The healthiest diet is the one that requires to eat a variety of natural foods and to avoid the over-processed foods.
Cooking methods like boiling should be preferable for cereals and vegetables. Excessive use of fats and oils in frying food always result in overconsumption of fats which may pose a health problem. Roasting of foods is desirable but it must be undertaken with a great care to ensure the foods are adequately cooked. The undercooked foods may pose the danger of poisoning; they could cause the ingestion worms and other products of anaerobic digestion by microorganisms. Foods that are poorly cooked may be hard to eat and digest which results into digestive complications like flatulence and constipation.
People are expected to consume a lot of grains and fiber in their foods to sustain effective movement of the guts and digestion. The rate of food abortion and integration into the body also could be influenced by social and psychological factors. Therefore, households need to be effectively managed to enable the provision of adequate nutritional benefit to all the members from the families.
There are stages in life that demand special attention. For instance, the amount of food intake during pregnancy should not be increased but rather maintained with an adequate supply of a variety of nutrients. Expectant mothers need an adequate supply of minerals which are derived from green leafy vegetables, liver, milk and cereals. If they become overweight, there are higher chances of pregnancy complications or delivery problems. Moreover, weight management should start before pregnancy and in the early stages of pregnancy when the mother has greater flexibility and agility to do the exercises and prepare the body for childbearing.
The amount of heat used during cooking and food preparation must be controlled. Some food nutrients are destroyed through excessive boiling of food or frying at very high temperatures over a long period of time. Burnt foods may also cause digestion complications and need to be avoided (Byrd-Bredbenner, 2004). The food processing phase and the serving phase must be effectively managed to ensure nutritional contents are intact.
Nutrition and its relation to Health
Nutrition refers to the modalities of food acquisition, preparation and consumption within societies and households. Good nutrition is useful for effective growth and development of individuals. Good health is attained not only as a result of the consumption of good food, but the food has to be effectively prepared and served. The best health is gradually attained through adequate feeding, adequate exercise, and effective social and psychological conditioning. Healthy practices like avoidance of drugs, avoidance of negative emotions and positively energizing emotions have the capacity to improve the quality of life.
Many complications in an old age could be avoided through consistent and effective nutritional practices. For instance, the chance of getting cancer can be greatly reduced by the consumption of foods that have adequate anti-oxidants. It is noted, that genetic as well as nutritional factors are responsible for the gradual increase in cancer cases globally. The overconsumption of red meat products is one of such reasons. Diabetes, heart diseases and other syndromes that occur among the old people are connected with the excessive consumption of fatty foods, little exercise and a lifestyle that is emotionally unsettled.
Throughout life, people undergo different changes and therefore nutritional alteration is also necessary. It is noted that metabolism generally declines after the age of forty; this decline could easily result in overweight or obesity. Again, the taste and smelling abilities decline through life. It is important that the amount of minerals and salts is regulated to sustain healthy living. In addition, sickness and medication that come as a result of aging could also disrupt feeding abilities and habits. These complications ma...