Beverages
Vegetables
Healthy Meal Plate
Tips:
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Choose fruits and milk or yoghurt for between meal snacks and supper.
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If you need to snack, choose a variety of foods from the five food groups e.g. fruit, corn cob, vegetable sticks with low fat dips, grainy crackers with peanut butter, fat free yoghurt, nuts and seeds.
Eating well has many benefits for your health and wellbeing. Whether you are an omnivore or a vegetarian or a vegan, planning a healthy meal is very important. Every meal you eat can make a difference. The effects are immediate inside your body; your meal choice can suppress or progress a disease.
For good health we need to eat foods from five food groups each day to get all the nutrients needed by the body. The five food groups are:
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Vegetables
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Grains and cereals
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Protein foods
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Fruits
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Milk and milk products.
While we need to eat foods from the five food groups each day, it’s difficult to eat them all at each meal. Below is a more practical healthy meal plate guide to show you what foods your lunch and dinner plate should include and how much.
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50% of your meal plate should be filled with non starchy vegetables, raw and/or cooked. Choose vegetables with different colours - purple, red, yellow, orange, green and white.
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25% of your plate should be filled with carbohydrate foods such as pasta, noodles, rice, potato or bread. The healthiest carbohydrate foods are either whole grains or high fibre (brown rice, wholegrain bread) or low glycemic index (GI) foods such as sweet potato, pasta.
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25% of your plate should contain protein foods, such as lean meat, skinless chicken, fish, egg, tofu, nuts, seeds, lentils and dried beans.
