No one food or nutrient is the key to healthy eating or weight loss. Think about your eating pattern as a whole. Take stock of what you eat over days, weeks, and even months. Small changes have a big impact over time.

The Heart Healthy Eating Pattern

The Heart Foundation’s recommendations for eating a heart-healthy diet can help you achieve a healthy weight and reduce your risk of heart disease.

Our Heart Healthy Eating Pattern includes:

Plenty of vegetables, fruits and wholegrains
A variety of healthy protein sources
Unflavoured milk, yoghurt and cheese
Healthy fat choices with nuts, seeds, avocados, olives and their oils for cooking
Herbs and spices to flavour foods, instead of adding salt.

Eating for a healthy weight means limiting how much highly processed food you eat, such as:

Cakes, biscuits, pastries, muffins
Chocolate, lollies, chips
Take away foods like pies, burgers and pizza
Sugary drinks like soft drinks, energy drinks and cordials.

Be mindful of portion sizes for all food you eat.

Cook at home

Foods bought outside the home are often high in kilojoules, salt, added sugar, and saturated fat. Cooking at home puts you in control of what goes into your food.

Stay positive

Focus on the foods you should eat more of, such as fruit, vegetables, whole grains, nuts, and fish rather than focusing on the foods you need to limit.