The Importance of Incorporating Dessert Into Your Diet

Dessert is delicious, isn't it? In this article, we'll be giving you ideas of healthy desserts that you should incorporate to your diet. Keep reading!

Written and verified by the nutritionist Saúl Sánchez Arias.

Last update: 27 May, 2022

We’re going to tell you about the importance of incorporating dessert into your diet. However, it’s vital to make a clarification right from the start: we’re not talking about candy and sweets. You surely know that abusing sugar isn’t the healthiest thing to do since it’s an ingredient capable of conditioning metabolic health.

Nonetheless, dessert isn’t just about sweets, there are other healthy and delicious alternatives, and we’ll tell you all about them.

Before we begin, we need to break a popular myth: dairy desserts aren’t the same as yogurt. It’s necessary to make this premise very clear because it’s easy to get the concepts confused. Both products are different in composition and properties. Now, read on to learn the importance of incorporating dessert into your diet.

Yogurt for dessert

Incorporating dessert into your diet is important because it’s one of the best times of the day that’s perfect to consume yogurt. This food, obtained from lactic fermentation, is rich in probiotics.

Probiotics are nothing more than live bacteria that are quite beneficial for the body since they’re capable of colonizing the intestinal tract. According to a review published in the American Family Physician journal, eating it on a regular basis can lower the risk of developing gastrointestinal problems.

Furthermore, not only can they prevent the appearance of diarrhea but they’re also used to treat chronic diseases. There’s a lot of scientific evidence that affirms that the administration of probiotics improves the course of inflammatory bowel diseases, for which a cure hasn’t been found.

There are two ways to benefit from probiotics. The first is including it in your diet as a supplement. The second is by eating yogurt.

Eating fruit for dessert

In the past, some authors wouldn’t recommend consuming fruit for dessert. Instead, they’d state that it was better to eat it before meals to increase the feeling of satiety. However, scientific literature doesn’t support this statement.

The consumption of fruits is beneficial at almost any time of the day. In fact, according to research collected in the Critical Reviews in Food Science and Nutrition journal, their polyphenol content is associated with a lower degree of inflammation at the systemic level.

For this reason, we recommend that you include fruit after meals and, of course, in your snacks. It’s great to choose fruit that is rich in soluble fiber, such as apples. These contain pectins in their composition, which is linked to better intestinal health, according to several investigators.

Not all desserts are beneficial – watch out for sweets!

As you can see, incorporating dessert into your diet is vital. However, as we discussed at the beginning, not all of them have the same qualities. We all know that dessert is often related to the intake of sweets and processed foods.

Cookies, cake, and pudding are just a few examples of products of poor nutritional quality, rich in additives and simple carbohydrates. As a result, they throw the blood glucose curve out of control. Consuming these types of desserts on a regular basis can lead to insulin resistance, which is the prelude to diabetes.

It’s important to remember that diabetes is a chronic disease, which conditions the state of the body for life. Once it develops, there’s no cure. Actually, some recent pieces of research link the appearance of this pathology with an increased risk of cancer. However, more studies are needed to confirm this association.

In this case, the best remedy is prevention. To do this, pay attention to the foods you eat for dessert and also your snacks. If you must choose between a sweet or sugary option and another option, consider it in the context of your overall dietary plan.

Incorporating healthy dessert into your diet

Not all foods are the same. For this reason, you must take care of what you consume for dessert. In all honesty, this choice may condition the overall quality of your diet. No matter how healthy your main meals are, consuming sweet desserts regularly can spoil the effort you’ve previously put in.

Now, we must clarify something. This doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy a good sweet treat – the important thing here is that you do it every once in a while. The word dessert isn’t synonymous with sweet, however, you’re allowed to treat yourself on a special occasion.

When it comes to healthy desserts, both fruit and yogurts are an ideal option. They’re quite sweet and their intake is associated with good health. You can even combine them to take advantage of all their properties.

Finally, we want to warn you that not just any old yogurt is healthy. You must read labels and choose the one that doesn’t contain added sugar. Otherwise, its nutritional quality won’t be as high. If you’re able to opt for natural ones, then do so. In addition, you can consume Greek yogurt from time to time if you’re not overweight.