Do you eat enough fruit?
The German Nutrition Society recommends five portions of fruit and vegetables per day – one portion corresponds to “a handful”.
If these five servings are divided equally between fruit and vegetables, the highest German authority on nutrition believes that two and a half handfuls of fruit per day are sufficient.
Eating more fruit is without doubt one of the best things you can do for your health. There is practically no single list of the “healthiest” foods that doesn’t consist of at least half of different fruits.
To name just a few of the many positive qualities of fruit:
- Fruit has a very high water content
- Fruit contains lots of fibre
- Fruit contains many simple carbohydrates that our body can use very efficiently as a source of energy.
- Fruit contains more nutrients per calorie than most other foods (excluding vegetables) – especially vitamins.
- Fruit does not have to be cooked, seasoned or processed in any other way so that we can eat it.
- Fruit is super practical: often you just have to bite into it
- Fruit varieties that cannot simply be bitten into come in a 100% compostable packaging (also called “tray”).
- Two and a half handfuls of fruit a day. German Society for Nutrition, are you serious?
Fruit can be more than a snack between meals
Personally, I eat five to ten handfuls of fruit a day today. And I think it’s only logical: If something is good for me, then I want to eat as much of it as possible!
Maybe you’re like me a few years ago – you’d like to eat more fruit, but you’re wondering how to do it: muesli in the morning, a warm meal at noon, a salad in the evening, a little student food in between as a snack … there’s hardly any room left for more than an apple for dessert and a banana as an energy kick before training.
I used to feel the same way. What I have learnt in the meantime is that our rigid ideas about the role of fruit in our diet prevent us from eating more of it. Fruit is traditionally either a dessert or a snack – fruit is eaten on the way to work, during a hike, during sports.
The idea that fruit can be a satisfying main meal is completely alien to us. When we hear about people like the Frutarian Michael Arnstein, who feed almost exclusively on fruit, we first shake our heads in disbelief.
If you leave this “fruit is just a snack” thinking behind you, you have made an important first step. It will then be much easier for you to eat more fruit in the future!
Tips for eating more fruit from now on
Since I have been eating vegan, my fruit consumption has increased significantly. At least half of my daily meals now consist of fruit. On some days I eat almost nothing else – and especially on these days I often feel particularly light and full of energy.
With the following tips and strategies you can now eat more fruit. Of course, you don’t have to implement them all at once! For the beginning, choose a tip that you like best and then try the others bit by bit.
Bulk purchase
The more fruit you have at home, the more fruit you will eat – because you don’t want to spoil the many colourful delicacies in your kitchen! When you go shopping next time, put considerably more fruit in your shopping cart than usual. Instead of a bouquet of bananas, take two or three with you. Instead of three single apples you grab the 1 kilo bag and so on.
Don’t be afraid – after you’ve made a bowl of fruit salad and two large smoothies (see tip 2 and 3), half of it is already gone!
Fruit salad
The classic. Prepare a huge bowl, then a fruit salad is a great main meal, for example as breakfast. Our favourite fruit salads are melons, bananas, pears, peaches, mangoes and blueberries. We add the juice of a lemon and sometimes garnish it with walnuts and linseed.
Smoothies
That Katrin and I are addicted to smoothies is something you should have noticed by now. Smoothies are a great way to eat a lot of fruit and they taste fantastic.
We use as few different fruits as possible for our smoothies (try a smoothie made exclusively of bananas or watermelon) and prefer to fill it up with tap water (plant milk or half of it is also possible!). If you need any more suggestions, check out Katrin’s 7 colourful smoothie recipes for more variety in the glass.
