How to keep an optimal weight?

• Exercise regularly to acquire and maintain an optimal and healthy weight.
• Eat a variety of foods in moderation.
• Adopt healthier ways of cooking that will result in meals with lower calories.
• Steam, boil, grill or bake in the oven without oil or in a non-stick pan.
• Remove all visible fat from the meat and the skin from chicken before cooking.
• Stew foods with tomato juice or tomato paste and a little olive oil (1 tablespoon per serving size).
• Don’t fry foods in great quantities of oil until the oil is burnt up. Use less quantity of olive oil (2-3 spoonfuls).
• Use olive oil and avoid butter and margarine.
• Steam or boil vegetables in very little water or microwave in a covered container and don’t overcook in order to preserve most of the vitamins.
• Use only very little salt in your cooking and no salt at the table for the whole family to get used to less salty tastes.
• Use herbs and spices (e.g., oregano, onion, pepper, mint, basil etc.) instead of oil or salt to add flavour to your food.
• Simplify your favourite recipies, reducing oil and avoiding ingredients such as fresh cream, full fat cheeses and butter or margarine. Instead of these use equivalent amounts of low-fat substitutes.
• Avoid fatty and sweet foods.
• Increase the consumption of foods that are rich in synthetic  carbohydrates and vegetable fibres, e.g., legumes, cereals and whole meal bread, whole grains, unpeeled rice, whole meal pastas, fruits and vegetables.
• Reduce the consumption of fatty foods especially of animal origin, e.g., delicatessen, meat, full fat milk and butter. If they are necessary for you, you may replace them with choices lower in fat (e.g., in delicatessen prefer turkey, low-fat cheese etc.).
• Reduce the consumption of butter margarine and bakery items with fatty ingredients or pastries.
• Limit your consumption of salt, sugar and alcohol.

          Eat healthily:

Eat fish (twice a week), legumes and soya (thrice a week) and more rarely chicken, rabbit and turkey.

Reduce consumption of red meat (pork, beef, lamb and delicatessen) to once a week and cook them after you have removed all visible fat.