Have a healthy snack

Take a minute to think before you reach out for that snack.

Everyone loves to snack: Feast on a dosa Photo: CH. Vijaya Bhaskar

Snack-time is the best time of the day, be it garama-garam bhajjiye or a two-minutes noodles or lip-smacking burger. But do we give a thought to the nutrition that it gives us?

Important

A snack is a very important meal. “It is that meal which takes a portion of the main meal. It helps fulfil the nutritional requirement of the body by providing those nutrients which were not supplied to the body in the main meal,” says Dr.Lata Sasi, Director of Nutrific.

Dr. K. Damayanti, Senior Research Officer, National Institute of Nutrition(NIN) says, “A packet of instant noodles will have the same amount of calories and energy content as that of two whole wheat

chapathis only that these processed instant noodles will be devoid of nutrients. This results in excess energy which is not good as it leads to obesity.”

Eat right

So, we need to be careful on “how much are we eating for a snack” along with “what we are eating for a snack” and also “how we eat” is important, because just sitting in front of the television and gobbling some food keeps us ignorant of ‘what we are eating' and ‘how much we are eating.' This results in getting us habituated to always eating something while watching TV, which is actually not a healthy habit.

Variety is the key to a healthy and tasty snacking habit, keep experimenting and try out new ways of making our traditional dishes healthier and tastier.