I have a problem with the word "healthy." Not because healthy food is bad. Obviously. My problem is that the word has become almost meaningless.
You can put the word healthy in front of almost anything on the internet and suddenly people become interested. Healthy pancakes. Healthy brownies. Healthy pizza. Healthy cookies. Healthy cheesecake.
At some point, I am expecting someone to invent a healthy kebab covered in Nutella and somehow convince me it is good for my cholesterol.
Healthy Does Not Automatically Mean Good
A recipe can be high in protein and still contain enough calories to feed a small village. A recipe can be low-carb and still be something you probably shouldn't eat three times a day. A recipe can contain ingredients that sound incredibly healthy and still taste like punishment.
I have seen recipes where people replace sugar with twelve different ingredients, replace flour with something that costs more than the actual meal and then proudly announce that the result contains only 400 calories. Congratulations. You have created an expensive pancake.
I Don't Want Fake Food
One of the things that annoys me about many healthy recipes is the obsession with pretending that food is something else. "This cauliflower is pizza." No. It isn't. It might be delicious cauliflower. But it is not pizza.
I would rather eat a smaller amount of something genuinely good than a large amount of something that is pretending to be dessert.
This doesn't mean substitutes are always bad. I use protein powder. I experiment with low-carb ingredients. But I don't need to lie to myself about what I am eating. A protein pancake is not exactly the same as a real pancake. Sometimes it is better. Sometimes you need to stop pretending and just eat the damn pancake.
Protein Is Not Magic
I like protein. Especially when I am trying to lose weight or maintain muscle. But the internet has developed a strange obsession with adding protein to everything. Protein cookies. Protein ice cream. Protein cereal. Protein coffee. Protein water.
I am surprised nobody has created protein toothpaste yet. Actually, by the time you read this, someone probably has.
Protein is useful. It is not magic. Adding protein powder to a dessert does not automatically transform it into a health food. Calories matter. Ingredients matter. How often you eat it matters. And whether you actually enjoy eating it matters.
Healthy Food Should Be Sustainable
The biggest problem with extreme diets is that most people cannot maintain them forever. You can survive on chicken breast, vegetables and sadness for a while. Eventually, however, you will probably start thinking about bread. Then you start watching videos of pizza. Then one Friday night you decide that you deserve a reward.
Three hours later, you are sitting on your couch wondering why you ate enough food for an entire weekend.
I have learned that sustainability matters more than perfection. I would rather eat reasonably well for years than follow a perfect diet for three weeks. Because life is not a laboratory.
My Definition of Healthy Is Simple
For me, healthy food does not need a complicated marketing strategy. Food doesn't give me guilt. I give myself guilt. The food is innocent.
I want to eat mostly real food. I want enough protein. I want to control my calories without obsessing over every gram. And I want my food to taste good. That last part is important. If your healthy lifestyle makes every meal feel like punishment, I don't think you have solved anything.
The best diet is probably not the one that looks most impressive on Instagram. It is the one you can actually live with. And if someone creates a healthy Nutella recipe that genuinely tastes like Nutella, I am willing to reconsider everything I just said.