LAURA JANE KENNY | staff writer
photo | ROBIN FAWCETT
Shop the outward aisles in a grocery store
to find the healthiest food.


Already forgot that New Year's resolution? Get back to a healthy diet with five easy tips.

Eating healthy remains one of the top New Year’s resolutions in America. Developing a healthy habit, such as eating better or exercising is ranked third as a New Year’s resolution this year, topped only by getting out of dept and losing weight. Luckily, healthy eating has become a trend that’s easy to follow. It’s as simple as 1,2,3... 4,5!

1. Drink more water.
The magical number is 8 glasses a day! The more water you drink the more hydrated you are. This will cause you to feel more energized.

“The bigger the bottle, the more water you’ll drink,” junior psychology major and Whole Foods employee Everson Marsh said. “Carry a big bottle with you and you’ll drink more than the minimum of 8 glasses a day, hydrating your body.”

Fitness and wellness professor Noelle Hoye explains that it is good to drink a large amount of water in the morning because it gets your system going. Caffeine can throw off the balance of how much water our bodies are supposed to get.

“If you drink coffee or teas, you deplete your body. So you need to make sure that you drink an extra amount of water,” Hoye said.

2. Eat at the Caf!
I know what you are thinking, but it’s true, the APU Caf can be a place for healthy meals. The cafeteria has changed their menu to help give students healthier choices. They now offer vegan and vegetarian items and have started to provide more fresh vegetable and fruits as well as other healthy options. The Cafeteria has also committed to cooking their the food in oil instead of butter. The future goal is to eliminate all foods with trans fat.

“We are always making progress,” head of Food Services Samuel Samaan said. “We are changing stuff every year.”

3. Eat more.
Well, in moderation, eat less, more often. The more you eat the less you’ll eat. Discovery Health studies show that if you eat smaller meals more often, around five a day, you tend to eat less because you eat when you are hungry. It stops the urgency to overeat.

“I actually go for six small meals a day because you tend to graze or take your food in as you need it,” Hoye said.

Hoye explains that you can better feed your body to its particular hunger. She recommends small meals, such as a piece of fruit or a shake to get you through the day.

4. Be a smart shopper.
“I think that we, as part of our priorities, put too much money into [entertainment] and not enough into food. We try to nickel and dime our way through food, spending as little as possible,” Marsh said.

Although health food stores can be more expensive, it is usually because they offer better products. Marsh explained that we show what we prioritize by where we spend our money. When students think about health, they might immediately go to doctor bills, but spending more money on the things you put in your body can keep you from paying those doctor bills and improve your quality of life.

“I think we need to shift those priorities into our food, something that we are in taking everyday,” Marsh said.

When grocery shopping, an easy rule of thumb is to shop along the outside of the store. The healthier foods are usually put toward the outside because they have to replace them more frequently. These foods include the produce, milk, dairy, meat and fish.

The further toward the inner aisles the more you submerge yourself into aisles with food full of preservatives, which usually are high in sugar and salt.

5. Listen to your body.
If you are trying to eat healthy, you need to remember that it is important to feed your body. Women need more calcium than most men. And students need extra protein to keep studying longer. Listen to your cravings, often it could indicate a deficiency in certain minerals or vitamins.

Eating healthy doesn’t have to be a stressor. So start small and aim for balance.

“You need to find something that works for you because not all the same things appease everybody or every culture,” Hoye said.