Food is any substance fed to an organism to provide basic nutritional support needed to maintain the health of the organism. In nature food is generally of animal, plant or fungi source, and has necessary nutrients, including vitamins, proteins, carbohydrates, or fats, which are absolutely vital to the organism’s existence. It is said that the human body needs ten pounds of food a day, but most of us could live on less than that, if only we knew how to get it from where it came and how to make it good, wholesome food that is nutritious and delicious, like fruit and vegetable pie, ice cream and cookies.
One should first realize that food is not a specific food or type, but rather consists of many different food groups that are mixed together in one way or another. Fruits and vegetables are a perfect example of food groups. Vegetables consist of different colored, sweet, bitter, salty, and oily parts, which are combined together in unique ways to create food items with their special flavors and textures, like carrots, zucchini, squash, turnips, onions, potatoes and many more. Each food group has its own amount of calories, but all of them provide a healthy source of nutrition, with very small amounts of calories and fatty oils or calories that cause the body to gain weight.
Most people think of raw and uncooked fruits and vegetables as being healthier choices than cooked ones, but research has proven differently. The same goes for cooked meat and eggs; both of these products contain large amounts of saturated fat and cholesterol that are bad for the health. In fact, eating too much of any of these kinds of food is a leading cause of weight gain in the United States. Uncooked fruits and vegetables are much better sources of natural nutrition, in terms of nutrition content per serving, than those cooked in oil or butter. Although research is still ongoing, experts have concluded that a diet consisting of mostly raw and uncooked fruits and vegetables is healthier than a diet that consists mostly of cooked foods, because the raw produce contains more vitamins and minerals than the cooked ones.