Control Your Cravings: 3 Snack Options

Picture by Arnold Gatilao

Let's face it: Our body doesn't always let us know what's good for us. At different times during the day we may crave something sweet, salty or greasy. None of these options are particularly encouraging for someone who is trying to eat well and stay healthy.
What you need is a way to fool your body into thinking you're satisfying a junk-food need, while really feeding it something reasonably healthy.
I've figured out some tricks to limit the amounts of ice-cream and salted chips/crisps that I eat.

1. Craving something sweet: Try to eat a sweet kind of fruit, maybe one that's on the verge of too sweet, like grapes or a very ripe mango. Dried fruits are even sweeter and guaranteed to make you crave some water instead!
   
2. Craving something salty and crunchy: Toast some bread and top it with some peanut butter and a little bit of salt. You could also use gomashio, which is a Japanese sesame salt that goes really well with peanut butter in my opinion! One of my go-to snacks.
   
3. Really hungry: Eat something that contains fat and protein. Ideal snacks to combine both are eggs, nuts and beef jerky. These are a great way to help tie you over until the next big meal.

Any idea what to do about craving french fries? That seems to be the one that's eternally difficult to control in my case. Can't imagine what it would be like if I lived in Belgium where they are pretty much everywhere! I used to eat them at least once a week.