151 intro i eat some type of salad nearly every day its a goto staple i really look forward to and i love mixing it up some days i toss greens with pico de gallo black beans and guacamole others involve grilled veggies quinoa and almonds or roasted chickpeas and olive tapenade i enjoy creating new combinations and to do so without throwing my meal off balance i use a mixandmatch philosophy i start with a greens and veggie base add a lean protein choose a goodforyou fat include a small portion of healthy starch season and commence crunching when i talk to my clients about how they build salads i often find that theyre doubling up in some areas and missing out in others and those imbalances can either prevent a salad from being slimming or lead to missing out on key nutrients here are some common saladbuilding blunders and the best ways to build a balanced bowl quicklist 1category 5 biggest salad mistakes youre makingtitle too little or too much proteinurltext in my clients food journals ive seen plenty of salads with lots of veggies but no protein and others with protein overload like chicken plus cheese and hardboiled eggs protein is an essential salad component for several reasonsit boosts satiety revs metabolism and provides the raw materials for maintaining or building lean tissue including both muscle as well as hormones healthy hair skin and immune cells but excess protein beyond what your body needs can prevent weight loss or lead to weight gain in short your body requires a certain amount of protein for maintenance and healing when too little is delivered those jobs dont get done but when your body has more than it needs it has no choice but to send the surplus straight to your fat cells for balance choose a half cup of a plantbased protein like lentils or beans or 3 ounces of lean meat or seafood thats about the size of a smartphone if you choose dairy stick with cup of organic cottage cheese or one whole hardboiled organic egg and three whites if you like to include more than one type reduce the portions of each 10 biggest myths about the flu quicklist 2category 5 biggest salad mistakes youre makingtitle not enough veggie varietyurltext greens and veggies are the typical salad base but if youre keeping your selections narrow eg just spinach or romaine youre missing out on important veggie benefits one colorado state university also found that over a twoweek period volunteers who downed a broader array of the exact same amount of produce 18 botanical families instead of 5 experienced significantly less oxidation a marker for premature aging and disease another study which evaluated more than 450000 people and looked at their consumption of commonly eaten veggies found that regardless of quantity the risk of lung cancer decreased when a wider variety of veggies were consumed this may be because each plant contains unique types of