Foods That Should Be Avoided or Limited

Although a balanced diet is key in maintaining a healthy diet there are some foods that should be limited or completely avoided. The list as follows is a list of foods that should be avoided or limited and although they are very tempting to teenagers, teens should try to avoid them as much as possible, or limit their intake on them. These foods include soft drinks, fast foods, salt, foods' that are high in saturated or trans fat, simple sugars, and highly processed foods.

Nutrition Box of a Big Mac

Soft drinks should be completely avoided. The reason why is that they contain many calories while they contain either very little nutrients (in terms of daily values) or none. So when you drink them your filling up on the daily amount of calories you need but your not getting any of the other nutrients you need to get from your food. Fast foods should also be avoided; the reason why is that they contain many calories, nutrients that you can get from other much healthier foods and they contain tons of trans fats, saturated fats, and oils. Take for example a McDonald's hamburger.

Salt should be limited because it's already found in many of our foods and it is very easy to consume too much of it. Studies show that if you eat a lot of salt on your foods when you are young then when you are older you will eat your foods with much more salt then it is good for you and that you will have a increased chance of stroke and obesity. Like all people teens should limit the trans fat and saturated fat they consume. Most teens are lead to believe that all fats are bad but this is not true it is mainly the trans fat and saturated fat that is unhealthy. In America teens tend to eat 50% more the
recommended serving of trans and saturated fats, which is a major health risk. According to the American Hear Association a serving of some foods high in saturated/trans fats contain enough for the whole day! Due to this foods that are high in these types of fats should be limited, otherwise it would be impossible to avoid consuming to much of this saturated/trans fat. Simple sugars should also be limited; they have a bad effect on the blood sugar levels of teens but some is still needed. Some examples of foods you might find simple sugars in are packaged cookies and candy. Highly processed foods are another food that should be limited. Various types of processed foods are injected with hormones, additives, preservatives, unnatural material, chemical, irregular enzymes, and fatty acids. Some processed foods are much more unhealthy then others (for example bacon and chips compared to airborne) so try do to research on the processed foods that you eat to see how healthy they are for you. There are also several other foods that should be limited by teenagers that we did not mention in this post (due to not trying to make this article so long) so try to find out what those other foods are.

http://ezinearticles.com/?A-List-Of-High-Fat-Foods-That-Are-Bad-For-You&id=740783
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0846/is_12_22/ai_104943689/pg_2/?tag=content;col1
http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/fast-foods-generic/8053/2
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