| There
are five main food groups that we need to eat food from
every day to stay healthy. Food is the fuel for our body and
we need the fuel for energy, to help our body grow and repair
itself, and to keep warm. |
|
The five main food groups are:
A healthy diet is a balanced diet. Click here to see a healthy
daily meal plan.
 |
This is the food group that we should
eat most often. It includes healthy foods like cereal, rice
and pasta. We should eat between six and eleven servings
from this group every day. Bread products provide us with
carbohydrates which give us energy. |
Fruits and vegetables give us fibre
and important vitamins and minerals. We should eat at least three
servings of fruit and three to five servings of vegetables
every day.
Because they are low in fat and calories,
fruits and vegetables are a healthy snack between meals.
 |
We should have two to four
servings from the dairy food group every
day. This is the best source of calcium which we need to make
our bones strong. |
We should eat two to three servings a day
of the foods in this group. This food group includes poultry,
fish, meat, dry beans, eggs and nuts. The foods from this
group give us proteins, iron
and zinc.
Fats, oils and sweets provide
hardly any nutrition for the body so we
should eat very little from this food group.
 |
fibre:
Fibre is very important in our diet because it helps to move
food through the stomach, helping to prevent constipation.
Everybody needs some fibre in their diet. |
food
groups: It is generally thought that there are
five main food groups.
| However, sometimes fruits and
vegetables are classified as two separate groups, making six
groups in total. This healthy food pyramid shows these six
food groups. |
 |
iron and
zinc:
Iron and zinc are minerals. We need minerals for the growth and care of
our bodies.
milk food group: This
food group includes foods like cheese and yoghurt as well as milk. One
serving of this food group could be one cup of milk or yoghurt or 1 1/2
ounces of cheese.
nutrition: To give
our bodies nutrition, a food must contain vitamins, carbohydrates,
proteins or minerals. A lot of food from the fats, sweets and oils food
group, such as butter, margarine, gravy, salad dressing, sugar and jelly do not contain these things.
protein: Protein
gives us energy but they also serve as one of the main building blocks of
the body. Muscle, skin, cartilage and hair are all made up mostly of
proteins.
| vitamins
and minerals: Vitamins and minerals keep us
healthy. They are known as nutrients. We get vitamins and
minerals from the foods we eat. Two important vitamins are
Vitamin C, which we get from fruits such as oranges and
Vitamin B, which we get from the meat and bread groups.
Minerals such as calcium keep our bones healthy. Calcium is
found in many milk and dairy products. |
 |
servings:
A
serving of grain could be one slice of bread, one ounce of cereal,
or a 1/2 cup of cooked cereal, rice or pasta.
You should eat between six to eleven servings of grain a day. Have a
look at the meal plan below to see how you can have a healthy breakfast,
lunch and dinner.
There are eleven servings of grains in this meal plan.
 
|
Number of servings
|
Total servings of grains
|
Breakfast
|
|
|
 | two pieces of toast |
|
2 |
|
| small bowl of cereal |
|
1 |
3 |
| fruit juice |
|
|
|
Morning snack
|
|
|
| fruit muffin |
|
1 |
4 |
Lunch
|
|
|
| a chicken salad sandwich |
|
2 |
6 |
| crackers with tomato |
|
1 |
7 |
| apple |
|
|
|
Afternoon snack
|
|
|
| crackers |
|
1 |
8 |
| glass of milk |
|
|
|
Dinner
|
|
|
| vegetable soup |
|
|
|
| spaghetti served with a green salad |
|
2 |
10 |
| dinner roll |
|
1 |
11 |
| fruit salad |
|
|
|
|
