Boost Your Diet With Fiber

Weight Loss Diets, Weight Loss Tips Boost Your Diet With Fiber Dietary fiber fills you up (without weighing you down), keeps blood sugar levels in check, and helps prevent chronic diseases, including cancer and cardiovascular disease. But even though fiber is widely available in fruits, vegetables, legumes, and whole unprocessed grains, most Americans get very little of the stuff — a paltry 14 grams a day, compared with the recommended 25 to 35 grams. The good news: Not only is boosting your fiber intake easy but it's tasty too! Read on for our Top 10 list of fiber-rich foods. Apples and their skin pack twice as much fiber as other common fruits, like peaches, grapes, and grapefruit. "Plus, for someone who has high cholesterol, the soluble fiber in an apple helps regulate cholesterol," says Sari Greaves, R.D. a national spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association. Just don't peel the skin. A whole medium apple has almost 3.5 grams of fiber, but if you peel the skin, the fiber content drops to 1.7 grams. Apple juice is even lower, with a negligible 0.2 gram. Another reason to keep the skin on: Research shows that apple skin contains significantly more disease-fighting polyphenols than does the flesh.A medium artichoke contains 10 grams of fiber but just 120 calories. "Artichokes are a good source of silymarin, which is one of the most liver-friendly nutrients in the world," says Jonny Bowden, Ph.D., author of The 150 Healthiest Foods on Earth (Fair Winds Press). "They also have more potassium than a banana." Try steaming them with a little olive oil, garlic, and rosemary; eat with a little bit of butter, or add hearts to salads and pizzas.The avocado was vilified during the fat-phobic 1980s. And while this delectable fruit is high in fat, it's time to banish the bad rap. "Most of the fat in avocados is monounsaturated fat, the same heart-healthy kind found in olive oil and macadamia nut oil," says Bowden. Even more important, the fat from an avocado isn't likely to stick to your hips, because the fruit is packed with fiber (between 11 and 17 grams per avocado). Eat avocados whole right out of the skin. With a couple of hundred calories, tons of heart-healthy fat, and half a day's fiber, you'll be full for at least a few hours."Unlike many grains, which contain fiber only in the outer bran layer, barley contains fiber throughout the entire kernel," says Greaves. "So even highly processed barley products that are missing the bran have significant amounts of fiber." A half-cup serving of cooked barley contains about 4 grams of total dietary fiber and 95 calories. Compare that with the 1.75 grams of dietary fiber in long-grain brown rice (white rice has even less fiber — under 1 gram). Plus, barley's soluble fiber binds to fatty substances and ferries them out of the body, regulates cholesterol, and helps keep blood sugar levels in check, staving off future snack attacks.Beans are one of the best sources of fiber on the planet. Just half a cup of navy beans has almost 10 grams of fiber. Baked beans, lentils, black beans, pinto beans, and garbanzos aren't far behind, all boasting between 7.5 and 9 grams of fiber for half a cup. "Beans are low in calories and high in fiber, and they're a great plant source of protein," says Greaves. "Whether you're throwing beans into a salad, adding them to soup, or making a base for salsa, they're a great addition to a meal." But they can also double as the main event — think lentil soup, bean burritos, and rice and beans.You'd be hard pressed to find a nutritionist who wouldn't put broccoli at the top of his or her "healthiest foods" list. Beyond the 2-plus grams of fiber in a single cup, broccoli also contains 2 grams of protein, 288 mg of potassium, and 43 mg of calcium, to say nothing of the vegetable's powerful disease-fighting chemicals. "Broccoli contains plant compounds called indoles, which act as traffic cops for estrogen, shuttling estrogen down more benign metabolic pathways," says Bowden. The result: a reduced risk of hormone-related cancers like breast cancer and cervical cancer.Start the day with oatmeal or a whole-grain cereal that contains at least 5 grams of fiber per serving. "Just make sure the first ingredient on the label is 'whole,' which means all three layers of the grain are intact," says Greaves. A lot of products look like whole grains (some brands of instant oatmeal, for example, and some bran cereals), but the first ingredient listed on their labels is enriched rather than whole flour. If the grain is whole, the product has more fiber. Want to boost the fiber content of your breakfast even higher? Top it with wheat germ, raisins, bananas, or berries, all of which are good sources of fiber.A cup of cubed papaya has only 55 calories and 2.5 grams of fiber, and it's chock-full of important nutrients, including potassium, calcium, and vitamins C and A. What's more, since papaya is loaded with digestive enzymes, it helps break down protein. Fish tacos with papaya salsa, anyone?All berries are disease-fighting superstars — and most are low in calories and high in fiber. Raspberries, for example, have a measly 64 calories per cup but 8 grams of fiber. Berries also contain polyphenols and anthocyanins, powerful plant chemicals that help fight cancer, reduce inflammation, and ease the symptoms of arthritis.Don't restrict this nutritional powerhouse to fall holiday fare. With only 49 calories per cup and 2.5 grams of fiber, it's a great vegetable to enjoy all year long. What's more, pumpkins are loaded with potassium (565 mg per cup), a mineral that has been shown to build strong bones and dramatically reduce the risk of stroke. Need another reason to scoop out the orange stuff? Per cup, pumpkin has more than 2,400 mcg of the carotenoids lutein and zeaxanthin, which help keep your eyes healthy and your vision sharp.