Improve your mood with better food

Feeling grumpy? Battling anxiety? Here’s how to improve your state of mind with food that will boost your mood

YOU’RE feeling stressed. As soon as you tick one item off your todo list another three get added to it. There never seems to be enough time to get it all done. So you head for the fridge. Sound familiar?

It might seem like a bad habit to eat when you’re tired, stressed, sad or even plain bored, but it’s only bad if you binge or choose the wrong foods. So instead of mindlessly reaching for chocolate, chips or a glass of wine, opt for foods that feed your mood as well as your body.

“What you eat can affect your mood and how well your brain works,” says Judith Wurtman, research scientist and co-author of The Serotonin Power Diet. The trick is to stop mindlessly munching and focus on giving your body what it needs.

Here’s a guide to the foods you should eat based on your mood. BY WENDY STELZMANN WHEN YOU’RE STRESSED: YOGHURT AND CHOCOLATE Studies have shown that the anxious or stressed.” probiotics in yoghurt aren’t Believe it or not, chocolate only good for gut health but is also a good option. But as can also help reduce anxiety with yoghurt it has to be the and boost mood. But it has to right one. Ditch those milk be the plain, sugar-free kind. chocolate bars and go for “Our stomachs are now being dark chocolate instead. referred to as our second A recent Swiss study found brain,” says nutritional that eating just 40g of dark therapist Alice chocolate lowers levels of Mackintosh in cortisol and other stress hormones Th e Hap p y in the body. Kitchen: Good Food Mood. “No wonder we literally feel sick to our stomach when we’re

‘Our stomachs are now being referred to as our second brains’