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People of all ages live such hectic lifestyles, that eating nutritious meals is seen as something of a luxury to. However, this healthy eating dilemma is greater for the typical business traveler.

The second biggest source of unhealthy food for a typical business traveler is at the airport. They offer travelers a selection of fast foods or snack foods that are usually very high in carbohydrates, unsaturated fats, and high in calories.

So if the airport is the second largest source of unhealthy food, then what is the first? Without doubt, it is on the airplane itself.

Indeed, according to a recent study, the average meal served by airlines in all service classes tops 1000 calories. But this problem goes beyond calories. Almost 45% of the 1000+ calories in an airline meal come from fat.

Some awareness is happening in the world of business traveler nutrition; however this awareness is not happening fast enough. Business travelers need more nutritious food.

A few nutritionally sound products are generating positive feedback from business travelers. Taken as either a supplement or a meal on its own, these nutritional products, which offer a complete range of essential vitamins, can help business travelers stay healthy in ways that fit into their busy, time-conscious lives.

You can find these products on the internet, but be sure to check for airline restrictions.

Tagged with: business traveler • Carbohydrates • high in calories • unhealthy food • unsaturated fats

Carbohydrates are made up of carbon and water. Atoms of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen form carbohydrate compounds such as sugar and starch. There are five types of carbohydrate sugars: glucose, fructose, sucrose, maltose and lactose.

Carbohydrates are the body’s preferred way of getting energy and in fact your brain needs a constant supply of carbohydrates.

Carbohydrates are broken down into glucose by the body and as you may know, are absorbed into the blood stream. Carbs can also be stored in your muscles and liver as glycogen. You need about 40 – 50 % of your diet to be made up of carbohydrates for good health.

Fats are waxy, oily substances and are essential for good health. Fat has double the amount of calories, and because of this, poses a problem to individuals who find it difficult to exercise. When the body breaks down a fat, it gets broken down into something called a fatty acid and glycerol.

Proteins are made up of chains of amino acids and are necessary for your body to build enzymes, antibodies and hemoglobin. When you eat protein, your body breaks the protein down into amino acids and then tries to re-assemble them into other configurations to make other needed proteins for use around the body.

Tagged with: Carbohydrates • Carbs • Fats • hemoglobin • proteins

When a person eats food, the process of how the body gets its nutrients is called digestion. This breaks food down into its respective nutrients.

Carbohydrates get broken down into single units of sugars, protein into amino acids and fats into fatty acids. This process of receiving nutrients actually starts when you chew the food. Then the food travels down into the stomach through the esophagus where it is liquefied by stomach acids. When the food reaches your small intestines, this is where the nutrient harvesting begins.

Most of the digestion and absorption of the food occurs here in your small intestine. Digestive enzymes called lipase, amylase and protease act on fats, carbohydrates and proteins to break them down into their nutrients for absorption.

Once the food has been broken down by the acids into their simple units, they are then absorbed into the blood stream for further chemical changes to make other compounds that the body needs.

Water and small fats cross the intestinal wall easily. Some nutrients such as water and fat soluble vitamins need a carrier to take them across the wall. Other nutrients such as proteins and glucose move across the wall and into the blood stream by themselves but use energy to do so. This is a simple explanation of how the body uses foods as nutrients.

Tagged with: amino acids • Carbohydrates • digestion • nutrients • units of sugars