A food craving has a way of throwing your healthy eating efforts a major curve ball. While you may interpret your need to binge on cookie dough ice cream and pepperoni pizza as weaknesses in willpower, it’s more likely your body’s way of telling you what it needs.
Your body is built to operate on specific whole food-based nutrients to perform and function at its best. If you’re running low on a vitamin or mineral, the body lets you know by pining for something very specific. So when a craving seemingly comes out of the blue, it might actually be your body sending up a flare that it’s deficient in something.
Ready to interpret what your body needs? Here’s a list that helps to breaks down the mind-body communication barrier.
Food Craving: Chocolate
Eat: Dark Chocolate
In addition to simply tasting good, chocolate is high in magnesium. Adding in more magnesium-rich foods, such as dark leafy greens, fish, bananas, and beans, may help to curb your chocolate cravings. However, sometimes you just REALLY want chocolate and nothing else will do. When that happens, go for a piece or two of dark chocolate.
Food Craving: Sugar
Eat: Fresh Fruit
If cookies, cupcakes, and candy are what you crave, your blood sugar may be a bit out of whack. Since filling up on sugar-laden treats could cause levels to spike and then later crash–all while providing little to no nutritional benefit–your better bet is to satisfy a sweet tooth with fresh fruit instead. You’ll get a bit of glucose and fructose (both natural forms of sugar) while also taking in vitamins and antioxidants your body needs. The fruit swap can also help if sugary foods has simply become a snacking addiction, meaning your brain needs it more than your body does.
Food Craving: Salty Snacks
The average American consumes 3,4000 mg of sodium per day, which is higher than the 2,300 mg the FDA recommends. Salt and sodium are lurking in all kinds of processed foods, which is why the intake is often off the charts. The problem is that it’s the wrong kind of salt that the body needs, and often craves. Instead it wants chloride, which is found in table salt and sea salt as sodium chloride. But you can ditch the sodium portion by eating foods such as olives, celery, tomatoes, and seaweed.
Food Craving: Pizza
Fish might not seem like a great replacement for the pie loaded with your favorite toppings, but filled with healthy fatty acids (we’re looking at your Omega-3s) it might be just what your body needs. If fish isn’t your thing, that’s no excuse to dive face first into a few slices. Instead try snacking on walnuts or adding chia seeds to a smoothie
Food Craving: Pasta
Wanting to nosh a big bowl of mac ‘n’ cheese may mean your body needs more fiber. There are lots of foods rich in fiber, including beans, artichokes, berries and avocados, but when you’re looking to find a replacement for pasta in recipes, quinoa–a seed that eats similar to grain–is high in fiber as well as protein.
What foods do you crave the most? Share them with us in the comments!