In these trying times, eating a balanced diet may seem like a miracle. Diets that promise quick results, fads that spread on social networks, or the emergence of ready-made foods further complicate the path to a healthy menu. In the context of hype and misinformation around food, what guidelines really shed light?
Azahara Neto, clinical nutritionist and author of the EL PAÍS newsletter, Healthy food for people in a hurryOn November 5, I gathered with a group of distinguished subscribers to the newspaper to share the keys to simple and balanced nutrition, but above all “freely and without guilt”. This meeting is part of the exclusive activities of the EL PAÍS+ loyalty program.
During the event, Nieto explained the origins of his latest book, Guilt makes you fat: “With healthy eating, a lot of morality is generated and we feel guilty because we crave certain foods.” The nutrition expert wanted to delve deeper into the origin of this feeling of guilt and its weight in society, to provide a radical approach in an age obsessed with thinness. The expert adds: “There should be no banned foods at any time in our lives. The more we prevent them, the more we want to eat them.”
The meeting, moderated by El Pais newspaper journalist Bernardo Marin, lasted for an hour, during which Nieto answered questions from the participants. He cautioned that there are no magic recipes, but there are general guidelines that can be found at the base of the Mediterranean diet: a high-protein diet, with a daily intake of fruits, vegetables, legumes, high-quality carbohydrates and adequate hydration (about two liters of water per day). It is recommended to eat white meat up to three times a week, with a maximum of 90 grams in the case of red meat, making sure it is “fat-free.”
From there, each guideline can be customized based on age, gender, or genetics. He explains that between the ages of 35 and 40, muscle mass begins to be lost, so it is recommended to increase protein intake. As for women, especially during menopause, it is recommended to “increase protein in every meal, oily fish, healthy fats such as avocados, chia seeds, nuts and legumes, and limited consumption of carbohydrates.” Likewise, encouraging sun exposure and rest is key to regulating hormones at this stage.
Food supplements, which have become popular on social networks, were also a topic of discussion: “Without prior analysis, it is not recommended to add any of them, except vitamin B12, in the case of a vegetarian diet,” warned Nieto. “We are in a moment where we complete everything and that is not always necessary.” For the expert, “There is a commercial aspect, because it is easier to add supplements than to prescribe a personal diet,” and she insists on consulting a specialist before adding them to our diet.
Attendees were able to learn how to distinguish between healthy processed foods and harmful ultra-processed foods. Nieto doesn’t trust apps like Yuka or Nutri-Score, whose ratings meet their developers’ standards and don’t always provide an unbiased rating. Instead, he encourages learning to read labels: “More than the number of ingredients, you have to look at their ratio and find out how sugar is present — starch, syrup, agave, concentrates — or oils like palm or coconut.”
Both at the event and in the newsletter, which you can sign up for here, the nutritionist debunked some nutritional myths, such as that fruit ferments in the stomach or that it’s impossible to gain muscle mass on a strict vegetarian diet. To conclude the workshop, Nieto advised eating mindfully, with at least half an hour for lunch or dinner, spacing meals no more than three hours apart, planning a shopping list and cooking in groups to save time (the well-known method Batch cooking). Other methods, such as the Harvard Board, provide simple visual clues to creating balanced menus.
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