Healthy Diet, Healthy Heart
To have a healthy heart, lifestyle and diet is very important. Things like blood pressure and cholesterol are affected greatly by what you eat.
Fat is important when it comes to cholesterol - different types do different things. For example, saturated fats raise your blood cholesterol and monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats help lower cholesterol if your meal is low in saturated fats. So basically, you don't have to stay away from all fats, just saturated fats.
How about salt? Salt increases your blood pressure AND risk of cardiovascular disease, which means it is pretty bad!
Being overweight also increases your risk of coronary heart disease, high cholesterol and high blood pressure, so try to stay eating what is healthy.
Some advice on whats great to eat:
Fish and plain nuts such as walnuts, hazelnuts and Brazil nuts are full of polyunsaturated fat; avocados and plain nuts such as peanuts, cashews and almonds are stocked up with monounsaturated; there are also margarine and oil products that are polyunsaturated or monounsaturated.
Some advice on what to avoid:
Try to stay away from processed foods - foods like take away meals, potato chips, biscuits and pastries, and even some dairy products such as full fat milk, cream and cheese. Foods like that are chock-full of saturated fats and salt. Fresh food is way better for you and your heart!
Also try not to add salt to your meals - there is probably salt in there already, and you don't need anymore!
If you still aren't really sure about what's good and bad, look out for the Heart Foundation Tick. This literally is a tick of approval, and every product that has the tick has been checked and deemed okay by the Heart Foundation.
