"Eat The Rainbow" Stirfry - A Recipe Straight From The Farmer's Market (2024)

FAQs

How does the rainbow diet work? ›

What is a rainbow diet (definition)? The rainbow diet is not a new idea, but it's newly popular. The idea behind it is that colourful vegetables and fruit contain specific micronutrients that support your health and combat biological stress with antioxidants and anti-inflammatory molecules.

Simply put, eating the rainbow involves eating fruits and vegetables of different colors every day. Plants contain different pigments, or phytonutrients, which give them their color. Different-colored plants are linked to higher levels of specific nutrients and health benefits.

HEALTH BENEFITS: These foods keep your heart healthy by decreasing the risk of stroke and certain kinds of cancers like breast cancer. FOODS TO CONSUME: Carrots, mangoes, winter squash, sweet potatoes, pumpkin, papaya, apricot, banana, etc. FOODS TO CONSUME: Blue berries, eggplant, blackberries, prunes, etc.

From the reds of watermelon and tomatoes to the greens of spinach and honeydew, these colorful hues are all natural. Recipes like Eat-the-Rainbow Chopped Salad with Basil & Mozzarella and Spiralized Rainbow Carrots are nutritious, delicious and beautiful.

One of the primary benefits of the Rainbow Diet is weight loss. Fruits and vegetables are low in calories but high in fibre, which helps to keep you feeling full for longer periods.

“I eat a healthy mix. I dropped weight because I've been listening to my doctor — a couple years I didn't. And 90 percent of the time I'm really good at it because a protein diet is good for me anyway. I'm a Texas girl, so I like meat — sorry, vegetarians in the world!”

Dark green, leafy vegetables have the highest concentration of antioxidants and fiber.

Phytonutrients in food come in all different colors—green, yellow-orange, red, blue-purple, and white. To promote good health, it is important to eat fruits and vegetables of varied color each day. Aiming for one to two of each color per day is a healthy goal to strive for!

I'm not talking about colorful candies, but instead eating a variety of colorful fruits and vegetables. Eating a rainbow can be beneficial to your health and general enjoyment of food in several ways. First, eating a rainbow introduces a variety of foods into your diet and prevents boredom from eating the same things.

How do I start eating the rainbow? ›

Make a goal of eating 1-2 servings of each color every day. It may sound difficult but it can be quite simple. Having a hardy salad may give you 1 serving of each color if not more in just one serving. Make a game for yourself and see how many colors you can eat in a day.

You do not have to give up meat entirely, and there are labels to identify where you fall in your plant-eating journey. Do what is comfortable for you so you will stick with it. You can choose to be a flexitarian, which means you occasionally eat meat, but you choose plants as the primary foods you eat.

See what eating a rainbow of colors can do for you:

These contain lycopene, which improves heart health, decreases prostate and breast cancer risk, contributes to stroke prevention and increases brain function. Good sources of lycopene include tomatoes, beets, radish, cherries, strawberries, red onions and red peppers.

We have several ideas for a rainbow theme but you can also be creative in your dinner menu by adding lots of color such as chicken with a mango salsa, a green vegetable, fruit salad on the side and rainbow Jell-O for dessert. This party theme is all about color.

Each color provides various health benefits and no one color is superior to another, which is why a balance of all colors is most important. Getting the most phytonutrients also means eating the colorful skins, the richest sources of the phytonutrients, along with the paler flesh.