8 Healthy Foods That Can Easily Replace Their Less Healthy Counterparts

You don’t have to sacrifice taste when switching to a healthier diet.

There are a number of nutritious foods which can replace your naughtier preferences without forgoing flavor. From ice cream to pasta, there are much healthier alternatives which will please your palate and your waistline.

1. Quinoa instead of Rice or Pasta

White rice and pasta are “bad” or simple carbs–you know, the ones that don’t provide much in the way of nutrition. But quinoa! This amazing ancient grain not only acts as a perfect platform for soaking up sauces, just like pasta and rice, but also it’s a complete protein, which means it delivers all nine of the essential amino acids.

Quinoa – One of Nature’s Healthiest Complete Proteins

2. Fruit Sorbet instead of Ice Cream

Conventional ice cream is loaded with added sugars, emulsifiers and preservatives (not to mention pasteurized milk). It is so simple to blend frozen fruits such as strawberries, bananas, blueberries, pineapple, mango and many others into your favorite fruit sorbet with a fraction of the calories, fat and plenty of vitamins and minerals. Just add your favorite fruits into a high speed blender with a little water and you have the perfect substitute for even some of the best ice creams. If you want it thicker, mixing in organic greek yogurt always does the trick.

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3. Nut or Seed Milks Instead of Cow Milk

Conventional milk is loaded with pesticides, hormones, and by products of genetically modified foods not to mention that pasteurized milk is perhaps one of the most nutritionally deficient beverages misappropriately labeled as a “perfect food.” Nut or seed milks are super easy to make. Almonds, brazil nuts, cashews, macadamias walnuts, hemp seeds and flaxseeds make wonderful milk substitutes with healthy omega-3s and vitamins you will actually absorb (unlike conventional milk).

Kick Pasteurized Milk To The Curb And Make Your Own Healthy Nut Milk

4. Shaved Zucchini instead of Pasta

Another magical swap, shaved zucchini (created by shaving zucchini into strands with a vegetable peeler) can carry sauces from the plate to your palate–and add a serving of veggies to your dish to boot. Bonus: You don’t even have to cook it and it’s a refreshing way to serve saucy dishes during summer’s heat!

Raw Zucchini Pasta With Marinara Sauce

5. Coconut Water instead of Gatorade

Unless you’re a serious athlete, you don’t need the kind of potassium and electrolytes found in Gatorade anyway; gulping down a good amount of water will more than do the trick for the average gym goer. But coconut water, or the water harvested from inside young coconuts, does provide additional nutritional value over water–without the additives found in sports drinks. Expect great, refreshing, even sweet taste plus about as much potassium as you’d find in a banana.

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6. Spinach and Tomato Sauce instead of Spaghetti with Sauce

Let’s be honest. Pasta’s main purpose is to be a vehicle for sauce. So why not drive your favorite pasta sauce into your mouth via a more healthy vehicle? Lightly cooked spinach can be a perfect partner for tomato sauces–not to mention a valuable source of vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients, which are known to be anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer.

7. Kale Chips instead of Potato chips

We don’t need to tell you how unhealthy potato chips are. But you might like to know you can enjoy similarly crisp, greasy flavor and eat healthily if you reach for kale chips. There is a catch–you’ll need to make them yourself. But on the upside, all you need to do is de-stem kale leaves, spray them with a tiny bit of coconut oil, sprinkle them with sea salt, and bake them for 30 minutes at an oven preheated to 200 degrees Fahrenheit. Even you have a dehydrator, even better (although it will take longer). If you ate an entire bunch, you’d have satisfied your greens requirement for the day and only ingested about 200 calories!

8. Cauliflower instead of Potatoes

Taste aside, there’s not much good that comes from mashed potatoes. But substitute even half of your spuds with cooked and mashed cauliflower and you’ll cut calories and add protein to your favorite rib-gripping side dish. After all, pound for pound, potatoes have nearly four times as many calories as cauliflower and not nearly the amount of nutrition.

Forget The Mashed Potatoes: Try This Very Healthy Alternative

Natasha Longo has a master’s degree in nutrition and is a certified fitness and nutritional counselor. She has consulted on public health policy and procurement in Canada, Australia, Spain, Ireland, England and Germany.