Looking to Make a Healthy Change? 5 Food Swaps That Will Help You Live Longer

“Processed meat, such as hot dogs, sausage and some deli meats, should be avoided as much as possible,” Dr. Trent Orfanos, the director of integrative and functional cardiology at Chicago’s Case Integrative Health, said. “They’ve been implicated in cancer, and they can promote heart disease.”

Instead, swap them for fresh, lean proteins like poultry, eggs, beans, tofu and fish such as tuna and salmon, which can lower the levels of bad fats in your bloodstream.

"Grains and starches aren’t taboo and don’t need to be avoided to be healthier,” Dr. Lisa Young, author of Finally Full, Finally Slim, said. But instead of white bread, white rice and white pasta, eat “whole grains such as brown rice, quinoa and oatmeal,” advised Dr. Young. “They’re the best choices, as they’re full of nutrients and fiber.”

Replacing juice with real fruit can go a long way in life, explained Dr. Athena Philis-Tsimikas, an endocrinologist and VP for the Scripps Whittier Diabetes Institute. “Juices have all the sugar of the fruit but none of the fiber. The fiber helps to slow down how quickly that sugar is absorbed, and that prevents insulin levels from spiking and then dropping.”

Another good swap, according to experts at Johns Hopkins Medicine, is choosing nuts over chips for a snack. “That bag of chips is high in sodium and often contains unhealthy fats contributing to the buildup of plaque on the inner walls of your arteries and increasing your risk of coronary heart disease. Nuts contain heart-healthy unsaturated fats along with fiber and other nutrients.”

Per the folks from Emblem Health, “Despite being a staple of many delicious desserts, cinnamon is much healthier for you than sugar. Cinnamon can reduce your cholesterol and blood sugar levels, speed up your metabolism and even suppress your appetite.”