Best Diets for Health 2023

So many people say, “I am on a diet.”  They always mean they are on a diet to lose weight.  But we are all “on a diet”.  Our diets may be healthy ones or not so healthy ones.  And some who think their diets are healthy may have little or no idea what a “healthy diet” means.  It doesn’t mean keto, gluten free, or any of the fad diets.  What is a “healthy diet”?

In the last two blogs we discussed simple changes you can make to start eating healthier.  There are diets to follow, not for weight loss but for a healthier you.  In the class I teach, students are always recommending we should “eat healthy”.  But when I ask them what this means they often struggle to come up with specifics.  Instead of making a resolution to go on a “diet” this year, why not go on a “diet” to eat healthier?  Are there healthy diets to follow?  A diet not for weight loss or weight gain, but just a healthy eating pattern? Not a “diet” you go on for a week or two but a lifelong way to eating healthier every day. 

I was watching TV recently and saw the commercial for taking pills to get your fruit and veggies each day.  A “nutritionist” said he has no time to eat fruits or vegetables so he purchases pills that supposedly contain all the fruits and vegetables he needs.  My husband watches this commercial and says, “No time to eat a banana?  Eat an apple”?  I agree, rather than take pills, eat your fruit and veggies as a way to eat healthier in 2023.  How do you know what a healthy diet is?  A popular quote from Hulk Hogan is “Train.  Say your prayers.  Eat your vitamins.”  By “eat your vitamins” he means rely on food for your nutrients, not pills.  

Best Diets for Healthy Eating 2023:  Each year, for the past 13 years, the US News & World Report has evaluated the “Best Diets”.   For 2023, U.S News reviewed and ranked 24 different diets using a panel of health experts. They looked for diets that didn’t exclude any food group and ones that provide all the essential nutrients.

 They ranked diets for healthy eating based on: 

• How easy is the diet to follow?
• Is the diet nutritionally complete? Contains all food groups, not short of important nutrients, does it provide enough calories?
• Is the diet safe?

Overall, the Best Diets for Health promote healthy eating habits, are safe, easy to follow, provide good nutrition, and are best for overall health and fitness.  What do they look for?  The health experts rank diets on a number of parameters including how nutritious the diet is, how safe it is and whether the diet protects against diseases like diabetes and heart disease.  Similar to the diet rankings in 2022, the top spots for 2023 went to Number One:  The Mediterranean Diet, Number Two:  The DASH diet and Number Three the Flexitarian Diet.       

Diets that ranked as the “Best Diets” for Healthy Eating 2023

      Number One:    Mediterranean Diet – This diet gets a 4.6 ranking out of 5 points for being a Best Diet Overall, and 4.6 out of 5 points for “Healthiness Score”.  In the nutrition class I teach, we often talk about the Mediterranean Diet and why it is so good for one’s health.  This diet is based on the foods people eat in Greece and other countries around the Mediterranean Sea. Not only is this diet rich in fruits and veggies, in Greece, they lead an active lifestyle.  Many nutritionists and health experts recommend this pattern of healthy eating.  Rather than giving up a food group, this diet recommends foods from each food group – but healthy foods from each group.

a.       Why is this diet good for your health?  The Mediterranean diet is good for your overall health and can be used for weight loss, for good heart health by lowering cholesterol, for brain health, to prevent cancer and to prevent and help control type 2 diabetes.   Basically, a good diet pattern for a healthier you in 2023.  To get started, try the 30-Day Mediterranean Diet Challenge at Eating Well.  Rather than go on a poorly ranked diet like the Whole30 for 30 days, choose to try the Mediterranean Diet for 30 days. 

b.      Foods to enjoy:  fruits, vegetables, olive oil, nuts, and fish.  

•   Choose low-fat dairy – 2%, 1% or non-fat milk.  Choose low-fat yogurt.  Buy cheese that is made with low fat or skim milk like mozzarella cheese.  Real dairy means it comes from a cow, and thus does not include oat milk, almond milk or other non-dairy milks or non-dairy yogurts.  Focus on eating real dairy foods at every meal. You don’t want to cut back on dairy foods on the Mediterranean Diet as you need the calcium and vitamin D real dairy foods provide.  NIH notes that eating real dairy products can lower one’s risk of osteoporosis.
•  Whole grains – as noted in a previous blog (Add some whole grains to your day), so many Americans have few or no whole grains in their day.  Find a way to add whole grains to your daily food intake and to your kid’s diet.  Starting the day with oatmeal or Cheerios is a good way to add whole grains to your day. For kids, let them choose any General Mills cereal as all of them are whole grain.
• Fruit and Vegetables – 5 A Day is a start.  More than 5 A Day is even healthier. As noted in last week’s blog, bring a vegetable or piece of fruit with you for lunch every day.  Simple changes can be oh so good for your health.
• Nuts – add a handful of nuts a day
• Olive oil – buy some Extra Virgin Olive Oil (EVOO) and use it in cooking.  (See Which cooking oils are healthy?  Which oils are not so healthy?)   Olive oil is a heart healthy oil. But oils do have calories, a whopping 119 calories a tablespoon.  So, if you are concerned about your weight, enjoy some olive oil but be aware of its calories. 

c.       Foods to cut back on: red meat, foods with added sugar and foods high in saturated fat.  But you don’t want to cut back too much on red meat as red meat is a great source of iron.    

      Number Two:  DASH Diet – this diet stands for Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension, thus the acronym, DASH. Although it was designed to help lower blood pressure, the diet is good for your health.  This diet gets a 4.4 ranking out of 5 points for being a Best Diet Overall, and 4.5 out of 5 points for “Healthiness Score”.  U.S. News & World Report notes the diet is praised for its nutritional completeness, safety, ability to control diabetes, and prevent high blood pressure (hypertension).  The focus on fruits, vegetables, whole grains and real low-fat dairy, loads the diet up with potassium, calcium, protein and fiber.  These nutrients help lower blood pressure and U.S News terms them “blood pressure-deflating nutrients”.  The DASH diet also lowers your risk of stroke, Type 2 diabetes, obesity and heart events. This diet can be used for weight loss if one cuts back on the amount of fat and watches portion sizes.

a.       Nutrients – the diet emphasizes nutrients that help lower one’s blood pressure like potassium and calcium.  It encourages more fruits, vegetables, whole grains and lean protein and dairy – but low-fat dairy products Be sure to choose real dairy, not fake dairy.  Note: “dairy” means from a cow so almond milk, oat milk, other plant-based milks don’t count as a serving of dairy.  Real dairy means cow’s milk, yogurt made with cow’s milk and cheese.

b.       Foods to limit are those higher in saturated fats like fatty meats, full-fat dairy foods, coconut oil, and foods high in salt.  Choose lean cuts of meat to lower saturated fat, like lean hamburger meat, chicken without the skin, pork chops.  Also, cutting back on added sugar by cutting back on sodas, sports drinks and other sugar-sweetened beverages and sweets high in added sugar. (Note:  I saw a family buying a gallon of Sunny D.  I am sure they thought it was just like orange juice.  But no, mostly full of added sugar.  The second ingredient is high fructose corn syrup.)

c.       Cut back on salt in foods by using herbs and spices to flavor your food. 

d.       Fruit and Veggies – be sure to have at least one serving of fruit or a vegetable at every meal. And don’t count the fast-food French Fries as your veggie serving.

e.       Exercise – Aim for at least 30 minutes a day.  This could be a 15- minute walk after lunch and a 15- minute walk after dinner. 

f.        To get more guidance on the DASH diet from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, get a 20 page guide, DASH Eating Plan or a 6 page guide at Lowering Blood Pressure with DASH.  Try some DASH-diet recipes from the Mayo Clinic. 

U.S. News recommends some easy steps to take to start eating the DASH way.  Try one or more of these small steps:

• Add a fruit or vegetable to every meal.  If you already have a vegetable at dinner, add a fruit. 
• Aim for 2 meat-free meals a week.  Enjoy some seafood in place of meat like tuna fish salad sandwiches.
• Instead of chips, enjoy a handful of nuts like peanuts, cashews, pecans.
• Add some whole grains to your day, like whole wheat bread, a bowl of whole grain cereal.
• Start taking a 15-minute walk after lunch or after dinner each day.

Although the DASH diet was designed for lowering high blood pressure, it is a good overall pattern of healthy eating.

      Number Three:  Flexitarian Diet– Actually tied for 2^nd place is the Flexitarian Diet.  This sounds like it would be a “quack” diet, but it is actually a diet that emphasizes many healthy foods, fruits, vegetables, whole grains and plant-based protein.  It is a diet that combines vegetarian eating and flexibility.  This diet has been around since 2009 and was popularized by Dawn Jackson Blatner, R.D. in her book, “The Flexitarian Diet: The Mostly Vegetarian Way to Lose Weight, Be Healthier, Prevent Disease and Add Years to Your Life”.  The diet is mostly a vegetarian diet, the flexibility comes in because you can still enjoy a burger, a steak and other meat – but on occasion.  If you are interested in getting started on this diet, try the Beginner’s Guide. 

a.       You ADD these foods to your diet:

• Plant-based protein and eggs = tofu, beans, lentils, peas, nuts, eggs and seeds.
•  Fruit – all kinds
•  Vegetables
•  Whole grains – including brown rice, Quinoa, oats, buckwheat, barley
•  Herbs and spices – spices are super healthy so a good addition to any diet,
•  Oil – olive oil
• Protein – emphasis on fish and poultry
• Dairy – real dairy milk

b.       Foods to cut back on:  red meat, fried and fast food, butter, stick margarine (choose tub margarine) and foods with added sugar like sweets and soft drinks.

On Twitter, I just read about a man whose doctor said his BMI was too high and he had to lose 67 pounds.  He could go on a diet to lose weight like WW (Weight Watchers) or he could modify one of the above diets to eat healthy and lose weight.  One wants a “diet” that is really a lifestyle change – a change to eating healthier every day.  Not a diet that one goes on for a week or so and then go back to eating the junk food.  So rather than going on some crazy diet plan in an effort to eat healthier in 2023, choose one of the above diets to begin modeling your eating after a healthy diet.   

As noted in the past few weeks, healthy eating doesn’t mean giving up all the foods you like to eat, but adding foods that promote good health like more fruits and vegetables, more whole grains, and more low-fat real dairy to your day.  I eat healthy but I also enjoy my desserts.  I don’t focus on foods to cut from my diet but on healthy foods I can add to my day.  Every semester I tell my students to eat at least 5 A Day – five fruits and vegetables a day.  One student gasped and said I couldn’t mean 5 A Day.  This student wanted to lose 15 pounds but never was successful.  He started the 5 A Day and before the semester was over, he had lost 15 pounds. When I asked what he did, he said he was so full from eating the 5 fruits and veggies a day that he didn’t have room for all the unhealthy snacks he used to eat.   More recently one of my students worked full time and came to class at night.  She was always so tired and admitted she had little energy.  Then I taught the class about the Mediterranean Diet.  She decided to start following the Mediterranean Diet pattern of eating.  She added some whole grains, more fruit and vegetables and started drinking real dairy milk at meals and eating some yogurt.  Within a few weeks she told the class that she had more energy and just “felt better”.  She said she was usually dragging at work by the afternoon, but now she went through the day with enough energy.  

 

Sources:  quote , Best Diets for Healthy Eating 2023 , US News & World Report  ,  Best Diets  ,  Mediterranean Diet , heart health  , Eating Well ,  mozzarella cheese , dairy foods , Add some whole grains to your day , General Mills , Which cooking oils are healthy?  Which oils are not so healthy? , calories , DASH Diet , DASH Eating Plan , Flexitarian Diet   Image Sources: Best Diets   , Mediterranean Diet , DASH Diet