Tips on How to Eat Healthy when you Travel

In this Article (Index)

• Eating & Traveling; the basics
• Airplane food is bland and unhealthy
• Some proactive measures to eat better while you fly
• 1. Choose a healthy meal option when you book your flight
• 2. Carbs bloating and flatulence
• Not all carbohydrates and fiber are the same
• 3. Eat to sync your body clock
• 4. Carry Wholesome snacks with you
• 5. Keep hydrated: drink plenty of water
• Travel eating in general
• 1. Mealtimes
• 2. Eat in moderation
• 3. Carry a snack with you
• 4. Breakfast is the main meal of the day
• 5. Find a nice restaurant and Enjoy
• Travel is good for your Mood

Eating & Traveling; the basics

Your healthy eating habits should not suffer because you travel. You should always try to stick to a balanced diet.

A Balanced Diet

• A balanced diet includes a wide variety of food from each of the five food groups, and in the correct proportions: Fat, Protein, Carbs, Oils, and Fruit and Vegetables.

You should also try to balance your calorie intake with your energy expenditure:

An active trip with trekking, walking, climbing steps, or working out in the hotel's gym, burns more calories than simply sitting in a car 8 hours a day during a road trip, or sitting cramped in an airplane during a 4-hour flight.

So let's explore each type of trip and find out more about healthy travel diets.

Airplane food is bland and unhealthy

Food tastes different on an airplane; eating is an insipid experience that you put up with just because it distracts you from your uncomfortable inflight surroundings.

There are several reasons for this, and research by Rahne et al. (2018) (1) found that low atmospheric pressure, such as the kind experienced during a flight, coupled with loud background noise (think jet engines), impairs tasting and olfactory sensitivity.

Taste combines the sensation in your taste buds with the smell of food to create a pleasant tasting experience, but inflight cabin conditions conspire against it.

The parched air inside the cabin has only 15% relative humidity and is, therefore, drier than the driest desert on Earth, the Atacama Desert.

This extreme dryness causes your odor receptors to malfunction, so you smell less.

The low atmospheric pressure conditions decrease odor concentration because the "vapor" carrying the food's smell expands and dissipates before it reaches your smell receptors.

Lack of oxygen causes hypoxia that may alter your taste and smell receptors.

Rahne's team also noticed that the noise, similar to that of a commercial aircraft, "impaired sensitivity for sour and sweet but not for bitter or salty tastants." They also reported that "temperature, stress, or lighting might be more relevant than ambient noise for an altered perception of flavors."

Summing it up, food during a flight won't taste good.

Making inflight food palatable: unhealhty ingredients

To make matters worse, it is a daunting task to prepare tasty meals to be served 30,000 feet (10,000 m) above sea level. The meals are cooked on the ground, packed, chilled, and stored at low temperatures.

The food is reheated on board. For safety reasons, microwaves and ovens with open flames can't be used in an airplane, so the meals are heated with convection ovens.

These ovens blow hot air around the racks of food trays for about 20 minutes.

As this process tends to dry-out the pre-cooked food extra sauce is added to it to keep it moist. The problem is that sauces contain salt.

Excessive Sugar and Salt

To counteract the taste reducing effects on flights, airlines make their food more salty and spicy than "ground-level" food.
However, the so-called fifth taste, "umami" does not seem to be altered by inflight conditions, and that is why tomatoes, mushrooms, soy sauce, spinach, and shellfish taste the same in the air as they do on the ground.

Airlines choose pasta, a typical inflight meal, because it has tomato sauce, making it more palatable.

The downside of inflight meals

The extra seasoning increases your salt intake, and don't forget about the extra sugar in the desserts. This adds calories and unhealthy sodium to your diet.

The average airline meal contains more than 800mg of sodium, which is more than 40 percent of the daily limit of 2000mg set by the World Health Organization.   The City University of New York (2020) (2)

Plastic cutlery

Light plastic knives, forks and spoons, cheap plastic glasses and foam cups make food taste worse as proven by a study conducted by Spence and Harrar (2013) (3), who reported that "the properties of the cutlery can indeed affect people's taste perception of everyday foods."

Furthermore, these one-use plastics are a source of microplastics.

So, what can you do to improve your inflight food?

Some proactive measures to eat better while you fly

1. Choose a healthy meal option when you book your flight

I am gluten intolerant (and suffer from celiac disease), so I always book a "Gluten-Free Meal" (GFML), which is far better than a regular airline meal.

It always has fresh salad, grilled or boiled veggies, fruit salad, and yogurt for breakfast instead of scrambled eggs, croissants, or sugary buns.

Another option is a VLML meal (Ovo-Lacto vegetarian meal).

2. Carbs bloating and flatulence

The low cabin pressure during a flight causes the gas inside your body cavities to expand, this makes you feel bloated and is the leading cause of high altitude flatulence (or, in plain English, farting during a flight).

Airline foods tend to be low in fiber and high in refined carbohydrates because carbs calm your digestion and reduce bloating and gas generation.

But more carbs means more calories, especially if these are simple carbohydrates like sugar. Lower fiber means slower intestinal transit and less cholesterol absorption in your bowel.

Discomfort, such as bloating is common on flights. It is caused by the maldigestion and malabsorption of carbohydrates in the digestive system.

The unabsorbed carbs serve as food for the microbes living in your colon that ferment it into gas.

But not all carbs have the same effect: only 1% of white rice is malabsorbed, compared to around 10% in wheat, potatoes, or corn (4).

The fiber in the food may also hinder the movement of gas through the digestive tract. It can promote gas retention and make you feel bloated. Replacing protein with carbohydrates can help alleviate bloating. (5).

Not all carbohydrates and fiber are the same

Not all fiber is the same. Studies involving the role of food in Irritable Bowel Syndrome symptoms (among which are bloating, pain and flatulence) (6) found that fibers should be classified by their "fermentability" and viscosity, and those that are tacky and ferment quickly (generating gases) should be avoided.

Foods with certain types of carbs, known as FODMAP (which stands for Fermentable Oligo-, Di-, Mono-saccharides and, Polyols), should also be avoided because these carbs cause digestive issues. Following a diet with low FODMAP reduces gastrointestinal symptoms, and lessens bloating and flatulence (6).

What to eat and what to avoid during a flight? See the following table for some tips.

3. Eat to sync your body clock

Long flights crossing several time zones (such as a US coast to coast flight) upset your body's internal clock.

You can help resynchronize its circadian rhythm by eating the right food (7).

• Take a high-carbohydrate, low-protein meal in the evening to promote drowsiness and sleep better.
• Take a high-protein, low-carbohydrate meal in the morning, to stay awake and alert.

4. Carry Wholesome snacks with you

When I travel, I always carry some Gluten-Free cereal & nut bars, seeds, assorted nuts, raisins, prunes, and fresh fruit (usually apples or bananas for their high potassium content).

You can also take some salad, hard-boiled eggs, chopped veggies, cheese, and rice crackers as a low calorie, low carb snack.

We will look into the benefits of a wholesome snack below.

TSA's rules regarding carry-on food

For domestic and international flights, the TSA rules apply: you can carry 3.4 ounces or less (100 ml) of liquid or gel-like food and place it in a clear plastic zip-lock.

The TSA website lists the following food as liquid⁄gel: nut butter, jam, jelly, yogurt, creamy cheese, soups, etc.

5. Keep hydrated: drink plenty of water

Stick to the rule: drink 8 glasses of water a day and when flying, drink more.

Dry inflight conditions make you lose water rapidly, you should drink plenty of water: 1 glass per hour of flight time. Avoid carbonated beverages because the gas will expand and bloat you.

Contrary to popular belief, drinking coffee or tea will not cause excessive fluid loss or upset hydration (read more: Water, coffee, or tea?).

Skip the alcohol

Try to keep away from alcohol, it has a diuretic effect and will dehydrate you.

Inflight air has less oxygen than you normally have at sea level: it is equivalent to an altitude of around 6,600 feet (2.200 m), and this hypoxic environment does not mix well with booze.

A study conducted by McFarland and Barach in 1936 (8) concluded that two or three drinks at an altitude of 10,000 to 12,000 feet packed the punch of 4 or 5 cocktails.

So keep calm and healthy, sipping water instead of a glass of wine.

In the following section we will look into what to eat during the rest of your trip.

Travel eating in general

Once you've reached your destination, you should follow your balanced diet, keep hydrated, and follow these simple common-sense tips:

1. Mealtimes

Stick to your regular meal times. After you have switched to a new time zone, keep your usual eating schedule, this will help your body maintain its normal hormonal output and digestive cycle.

Don't skip meals during travel. Although travel means different routines, you should always eat your breakfast and eat every four to five hours.

If you go hungry for too long, you might end up bingeing or eating unhealthy food.

Plan an early dinner and adjust your evening accordingly. It will let you unwind.

2. Eat in moderation

Treat yourself to local foods, but don't overdo it if you are not used to eating spicy or ethnic foods.

Unwind at the end of the day with a glass or two -not more- of wine and share a tasty dessert with your travel partner.

My celiac disease means that I can't eat pasta, pizza, or burgers with French fries, so fast food isn't an option -unless a gluten-free alternative is available. But I always manage to find a good meal when I travel: steak, fish, chicken, salad, baked potato, salads, grilled vegetables, rice, quinoa. They are all good options.

Below is a photo of a very healthy and Gluten-Free meal I ate in Moab, Utah, on a road trip:

3. Carry a snack with you

I usually visit the local supermarket and pick up some healthy lunchtime snacks to eat on the go: gluten-free rice crackers, cherry tomatoes, and parmesan cheese provide fiber, protein, healthy fat, and good carbs.

Nuts, fresh fruit, or a cereal bar are all good options to carry with you in your backpack.

My wife and I always pack non-dairy creamer (she is lactose intolerant and you don't always find Coffee-Mate when you travel abroad), and instant coffee, you can always prepare a decent cup of coffee anywhere you find hot water. We also take some instant soup with us.

Dikariyanto et al. (2020) (9) reported that eating tree nut snacks (TNS) was associated with a "higher intake of fiber, vitamin A, thiamin, folate, vitamin C, vitamin E, potassium, magnesium, phosphorus, selenium and iron; and lower intake of saturated fatty acids, trans fatty acids, total carbohydrate, starch, free sugar, sodium and chloride."

They also had lower cardiovascular disease risk.

4. Breakfast is "The" main meal of the day

A nutritious breakfast is fundamental. It gives your body the necessary energy to get you through the day and also all the vitamins and nutrients your body needs. There is truth behind the popular saying "Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a pauper."

A study (Fayet-Moore, McConnell, Tuck, and Petocz, 2017) (10) involving 12,153 subjects found that those who ate breakfast ingested healthier food than those who skipped it.

Breakfast skippers had higher intakes of saturated fatty acids and lower intakes of dietary fiber and most micronutrients.
Among breakfast consumers, those consuming breakfast cereals had higher intakes of total sugars but not of either free and added sugars and also had higher intakes of dietary fiber.
They had lower intakes of total fat and sodium. Generally, they had higher intakes of most micronutrients. Fayet-Moore, McConnell, Tuck, and Petocz (2017) (10)

Eggs, yogurt, oatmeal, muesli, or cornflakes are good options -try to avoid the waffles and whipped cream and you will be fine.

5. Enjoy your trip, find a nice restaurant

If you have a schedule, you will know your destination and where you will spend your nights. So you can do some research on the Internet and find restaurants close to your hotel, apartment, or lodging place. Check their menus and find out what dishes they offer, ethnic, vegan, local cuisine, Italian, etc.

Indulge yourself, explore, experience, enjoy some local food in a nice setting, unwind. Live your vacation.

Travel is good for your Mood

Taking a holiday can make you happy. Two studies show that taking a trip and anticipating a coming vacation improves mood and boosts happiness.

A 2004 study published by the University of Surrey (11) reported that anticipation of a holiday improved the well-being of holiday takers:

Those who are waiting to go on a holiday are much happier with their life as a whole, experience less negative or unpleasant feelings and thus enjoy an overall net positive effect or pleasant feelings. [They] are also happier with their family, economic situation and health domains compared to the non-holiday-taking group. Gilbert, D., and Abdullah, J., (2002) (11)

A 2014 study (12) investigated the same effect and found that the positive effects of anticipating a trip made people happier than anticipating buying something. Money spent on experiencing situations causes "more enduring happiness than material purchases (money spent on having)."

Travel will improve your overall satisfaction, prod your mind to think about other things, and give it less time for worrying thoughts.

You don't have to travel overseas, book a stay at a nearby inn, and spend the night there. Stay at home and visit some local tourist attractions that you've never visited before. Explore, and experience new emotions.

Closing comments

Eating a healthy and balanced diet when you travel will keep you fit, healthy, and energetic.

Plan if you have food allergies or medical conditions to make sure you will find the food that you need. Request the correct airline meal when you book your flight and carry some healthy snacks with you when you travel.

Keep hydrated, eat in moderation, and don't skip your meals are some things that you can do to eat healthy on your trips.