Eating routines change during the summer months due to the heat. Ibizan dietician Marina Ribas recommends the Mediterranean diet as a good diet at this time of year. “You have to ensure macronutrients, with balanced dishes that have carbohydrates, fats and proteins,” advises Ribas, author of the book ‘Ketomediterranean Recipes’. “The important thing is to cover the basic nutritional requirements and to achieve this it is crucial to consume seasonal vegetables,” she adds, such as tomato, eggplant and zucchini, “which are very rich in vitamins, minerals and with high water content” for hydration, and the Mediterranean diet is perfect for this.
Mediterranean diet with local produce
The dietician, an enthusiastic defender of local produce from Ibiza, confesses that, according to her point of view, it is essential “to eat fish, especially small oily fish” such as sardines, anchovies, mackerel and “everything we can find now in this season”. In addition, she stresses that to accompany the diet, healthy fats such as olive oil, nuts and olives should be taken.
“We must pay close attention to the issue of hydration and mineral salts, it is not just about drinking liquids“, stresses Ribas, who also recommends seasonal fruits and vegetables such as watermelon, melon and cucumber, because “it is true that we lose much more liquid because of high temperatures“.
Homemade ice creams
Loss of appetite due to heat is normal in summer and is not worrying: “For children and the elderly, who sometimes have more difficulty eating, it is interesting to develop recipes that are easier to chew like a gazpacho with a chopped hard-boiled egg and make homemade ice cream with natural fruit and yogurts,” says Ribas. “You can always have a moderate consumption of red meat, once or twice a week”, stresses the dietician, who affirms that chicken, turkey or rabbit “are meats with a very healthy nutritional profile”.
The expert attaches great importance to eggs in the daily diet because “nutritionally, it is a high biological value protein”. “Eggs for breakfast are an excellent option,” says Ribas. “If we eat protein at breakfast, we are much more satiated and we don’t have to eat so often,” she says. “I recommend never forcing ourselves to eat at breakfast because that’s the right thing to do, there is no problem in eating breakfast later or having a larger meal,” she warns.
One of the most common mistakes in nutrition is “the excessive consumption of ultra-processed products”, since, in Ribas’ opinion, supermarket bread is abused a lot. “It is necessary to take a good look at the quality because they usually contain sunflower oils, sugars, sweeteners and other ingredients that are unnecessary” in bread. In addition, she advises to eliminate flavored yogurts from childrens’ diets, which are not homemade and sweetened dairy products .
For Marina Ribas, what is essential in the Mediterranean diet is the consumption of whole grains, vegetables and fresh fish, “all washed down with olive oil,” she concludes.
For the full article, please visit Diario de Ibiza website here.