Designing a Healthy Eating Plan

To have a healthy, balanced diet, you need to eat a wide variety of foods from all the food groups.

Your best bet is to choose the most nutritionally rich foods you can from each food group each day — those packed with vitamins, minerals, fiber, and other nutrients, but also lower in calories. Pick foods like fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and fat-free or low-fat milk and milk products. You may want to choose organic sources of foods. (Organic means that no man-made pesticides, hormones, or antibiotics were applied to the crop while it was being grown or to feed that was given to animals that provided the food, or were given to the animals.)

Figure out how many calories you need

What is the right number of calories for you to eat each day? This number depends on your age, health status, activity level, and whether you're trying to gain, maintain, or lose weight. You could use up all your calories on a few high-calorie items, but chances are you wouldn't get the full range of vitamins and nutrients your body needs to be healthy.

Knowing exactly how many calories your body needs per day can be an important first step in creating a healthy, balanced diet. The USDA Children's Nutrition Research Center at the Baylor College of Medicine has an online calorie calculator tool that will figure out the daily calories you need based on your sex, age, height, activity level, and weight. If you would like to weigh less than you do now, put in your desired weight and you'll see how many calories you need to get down to that weight.

You may want to talk to a registered dietitian about how to create a healthy diet plan that is right for you. If you live in the United States, you can get a list of dietitians in your ZIP code at the American Dietetic Association web site.

Analyze your diet

Counting calories and measuring nutrient levels are only a beginning. You may want to do more to design a diet that meets your individual goals. If you're unable to work directly with a registered dietitian, you have some other options. Computer programs and online tools can help you further analyze what you eat. They go beyond whether or not you're getting enough of a specific nutrient. Some of them might even make recommendations about how much of specific foods you should eat per day and track your eating and nutrient patterns over time.

One option is the "My Pyramid Plan" and "My Pyramid Tracker" on the USDA's food pyramid web site. For a quick estimate of what and how much you need to eat, enter your age, sex, and activity level in the My Pyramid Plan box. For a detailed assessment of your food intake and physical activity level, click on My Pyramid Tracker.

You can use the information and analysis to make smart choices from every food group, find your personal balance between food and physical activity level, and get the most nutrition out of your calories.