5 Easy Ways to Improve Your Gut Health

We spoke to dietician Helen​ Bond about the easiest and most effective ways to achieve your post-lockdown health goals

Here at Great British Food, we’re all about the good life. We love eating and drinking well! But that doesn’t mean we aren’t interested in making positive changes to our diet and lifestyle to stay healthy.

This World Digestive Health Day we spoke to dietician Helen Bond, who is a passionate advocate of creating a ‘happy home’ for your gut friendly microbes – by harnessing the power of plant-based, fibre-filled foods – to improve health and wellbeing.

“An unhealthy digestive system can leave you feeling sluggish, zapped of energy and fed up. That’s why I’m here to encourage everyone to keep their gut in tip-top shape and increasing the number and diversity of your gut microbe community will help you to do just that,” Helen says.

“Happily there are plenty of things you can do to nurture your GM and it’s no surprise that its starts with diet - because what you eat provides the ‘food’ for them, enabling them to thrive and multiply. I encourage everyone to eat more wholesome, natural and delicious plant foods in their weekly diet and making simple additions, like a handful of raisins, as a snack, or as part of a meal, is on my gut health diet sheet as a simple way to add helpful nutrients and gut-caring fibre to people’s diets.“

These are Helen’s top tips for improving your gut health:

Avoid severely restricted ‘faddy’ diets

We’re with Helen on this one! Restrict yourself too much and you’ll only end up longing for everything you’re missing out on, and then overindulging later.

Expand your food horizons

The greater diversity of food you eat, the healthier your gut microbes will be. So make sure you experiment and try out some different recipes, whether it’s sourdough bread or a salad made with heirloom veg.

Snack wisely

However tempting it is to reach for the biscuit tin when you’re hungry, it’s worth pursuing healthier snacking alternatives.

California Raisins are simple and wholesome by nature (they’re just dried grapes after all!), so fit perfectly into a gut healthy lifestyle and varied balanced diet. They’re a source of fibre and naturally occurring plant compounds, which your gut microbes will love to munch on and help keep your digestive system healthy. Plus, they’ll make getting your 5-a-day fruit and veg target a doddle - just 30 grams (one tablespoon) counts as one portion.

Drink plenty of water

​We love this health hack because it’s so easy! Drinking lots of water will help the nutrients move around your body more easily, and being hydrated can even help you maintain a healthy weight.

Ensure you get enough sleep

​It’s really important to get enough sleep. Apparently poor sleep disrupts the hormones that regulate your appetite, meaning you’re likely to eat more. Sleep lost has also been linked to long term inflammation of the digestive tract. So make sure you get those Zzz’s in!