About Healthy2NITE and How We Determine if a Recipe is Healthy
Healthy2NITE is a free resource for someone who wants to eat a low fat, healthy diet and is looking for easily accessible recipes and nutritional information. Our aim is to be your source for low calorie, low fat, healthy recipes! The website has been designed so that you can enter your own recipes and have them rated against our low fat, low calorie, healthy meter. All you have to do is register (don’t worry, we won’t send you lots of spam emails!) and then add new recipes.
Once your recipe has been entered, you can submit the recipe to be part of our main public recipe collection.
The main criteria the recipes are rated against are:
Low Calorie Recipes: The maximum calories in a single serving of any recipe on Healthy2NITE is 500 calories. This value is based on a 2000 calorie diet. The idea is that if you have one serving for breakfast, lunch and dinner along with some side dishes, you will be under 2000 calories for the day!
Low Fat Recipes: The maximum fat in any recipe on Healthy2NITE is 20g. The FDA recommends a daily allowance of up to 65g of fat, so each serving will have less than 30% of the daily recommended fat allowance.
Low Saturated Fat Recipes: Saturated fat is the main cause of high blood cholesterol and is found mostly in animals and some plants. The maximum saturated fat in any recipe on Healthy2NITE is 5g. The FDA recommends a daily allowance of up to 20g of fat, so each serving will have less than 25% of the daily recommended saturated fat allowance. Good information about saturated fat can be found here: AHS: About Fats
Low Cholesterol Recipes: Cholesterol is important, because it is used to produce your body’s cells. Too much cholesterol is bad and can lead to coronary problems. The maximum cholesterol in any recipe on Healthy2NITE is 250mg. This value is still higher than we would like it, but in order to add recipes including common ingredients such as eggs, we chose to allow this to be higher. The American Heart Association recommends keeping cholesterol intake at 300mg a day for most people and less then 200mg per day for people at risk for coronary or high LDL levels. Good information about cholesterol can be found here: AHS: What is Cholesterol?
Low Sodium Recipes: High sodium levels can increase your blood pressure level. The maximum sodium in any recipe on Healthy2NITE is 650mg. The FDA and American Heart Association recommend around 2300mg per day, or 1 teaspoon of salt! Good information about sodium intake can be found here: AHS: Sodium
Here are some more good links about food and diet:
Food and Drug Administration: FDA
About Food Labels: FDA: About Food Labels
American Heart Association: AHS
Remember to check with your physician if you have any questions about healthy eating!