20.2 million posts on Instagram have assigned the hashtag ‘clean eating’. That’s at the time of me writing – the figure will escalate by the hour. What is Instagram’s clean eating?
The idea is based around the various ways to showcase fruit and veg. Maybe that’s a smoothie, a smoothie bowl or a salad bowl. Sometimes it’s oatmeal (or as I say porridge), which is decorated with fruit toppings. If you see one with chocolate – don’t kid yourself. That’s protein chocolate.
I joined this trend back when I was on my fitness transformation. My account was full of food that I believed qualified me as healthy. Of course, I sometimes ate crisps and to this day, delight in my morning bread wake-up – but I’m not going to post that.
It goes against the image of wellness. It’s an image that’s so scrutinised – people are blinded by what healthy now means.
Think about this – a smoothie bowl with an array of fruit blitz, followed by fruit on top, followed by choc shot (made with natural fruit) – is it necessary to consume that much in one sitting?
Let food be thy medicine, thy medicine shall be thy food – Hippocrates
Firstly, it’s not nice. Okay – I’m sorry if you’re reading and you love smoothie bowls. The only exception was that one nice-cream dessert I made. A smoothie you drink is more appetising. And I LOVE smoothies!
Though if I post a smoothie bowl filled with fruit, and then another image of soup with slices of bread – I know which is heading to popularity.
Instagram’s Clean eating side-effects
Food has become categorised into good and bad. The obsession for ‘good ‘is increasing the eating disorder orthorexia. It’s partly defined by the obsession to eat only ‘pure’ produce.
As reported in Teen Vogue, there was a study last year which found a link between Instagram and the condition.
Instagram star Pixie Turner famously rebelled away from the wellness movement, and gave up on her vegan lifestyle after discovering she was a sufferer. She now tries to spread the message that no food should be feared and uploads a wide selection of meals and desserts.
Do the positives out-weigh the bad?
It feels a little fake when a celebrity goes out of their way to demonstrate that they eat fast food or gorge on pizza.
With clean-eating taking over from “nothing tastes as good as being skinny”, it feels like honesty has paraded the industry. Fewer people are pretending that they don’t work out or simply eat whatever they want.
I think of dieting, then I eat pizza – Lara Stone
And the Instagram clean eating – despite its pretences – encourages good living.
Before signing up to create an account, I read repetitive magazine interviews. Lunch is fish and vegetables – dinner is chicken and vegetables. Snacks are a handful of cashew nuts or a piece of fruit.
But now – I can feel confident in my plant-based diet. There’s so many ideas out there that have inspired me.
I’m healthier, happier and with more energy. I’ve made fantastic friends in the fitness community and I’ve read the most inspirational stories on people who have changed their lives.
I don’t know anyone in my life on the same diet as me. So, I go on Instagram and I connect. Genuinely, I enjoy my vegetable stir-fries and porridge with pumpkin and banana. When I go on my account, I want to inspire myself.
I want to say – look at all this healthy food you have made – keep going on your journey.
What’s the answer?
Remember one thing.
Instagram’s clean eating is the same as fashion, beauty and lifestyle. It’s about prettiness. Beautiful, artistic photography.
Salads and fruit are easy to present to a good standard. I can’t muster up a single dish on MasterChef, but you better believe my smoothie is creating goals.
When people discuss their progress, there’s not much admittance in ‘falling off the wagon’ once having progressed
The influencers – unless trained, are not experts. Source people like The Body Coach. He is promoting a good lifestyle and that includes – shock horror – bread.
I don’t believe choices like veganism should get categorised in a clean eating trend. There’s plenty of sugary and salty food in the lifestyle, and secondly, not everyone takes up the diet for health.
Instagram’s clean eating hashtag has now risen to 37.7 million. What are your thoughts?
Your smoothies look yummy . Omg what camera do you use please? Great post
It’s stock image from Unsplash.com. I put the photographer’s name under each photo. I wish I could take images like these though!
Oh yes , you can all you need is a good camera dslr and a software for editing. I am working on it myself , I don’t want to use stock images. I want to make my own and even sell them. Lol, I am tempted to use them but they are terms and conditions that I might break if I do . Honestly, they look amazing keep the good job
It’s definitely top priority for me to get a good camera this year. I had a look at your photos and they look amazing! Really high standard so hopefully you can sell soon 🙂
Thank you for sharing where you got the images. I will definitely check them out those images are the bomb.com
It’s the best place for free stock images in my opinion. 🙂
I can tell
I definitely prefer to drink my smoothies. The bowls look so much more photogenic that’s for sure. I’ve never heard of or orthorexia before, very interesting. I think there is a point when clean eating can become detrimental. Health to me is all about balance and sustainability and that means eating unclean every now and again and not beating myself up for it afterwards. Good points to bring up Laura!
Thank you Paolo! I guess with smoothie bowls you can really decorate them and show all these colours etc. Maybe the answer is to take a photo in a bowl and then pour into a glass!
Health is definitely balance. I think it’s easy to get caught up in wanting to eat clean 100%. But giving in every once in a while keeps you sane and on track.
This was such an insightful and informative read. I love your writing style, I’m sure I’ve told you that before but IT’S JUST SO GOOD. Anyway, I love how you tackled this subject. While I think that this trend of promoting healthy eating isn’t necessarily bad, it is attached to quite a bit of toxic negativity online. A few years back I knew some girls who got obsessed with the idea of “clean” eating. When they ate it would be a salad or something like that, which definitely wasn’t giving them enough calories, proteins etc. It got to the point where one of them actually fainted because the “healthy” eating she was doing actually wasn’t healthy at all. Loved this post, Laura!
Thank you!! Being complimented on my writing means everything to me!
I use to be so obsessed with every single thing that went in my body. I was even fearful of putting butter on my bread.
I love showing my journey now and uploading the healthy food I’m eating, but this has made me realise that I need to be careful to not obsess or to not give the image that I live on salads and smoothies. I’ll never forget at Christmas, one girl uploaded her roast dinner which was literally 90% vegetables, and wrote how she had indulged and now needed to hit the gym. xx
This was a really interesting read! Personally, I try to just eat everything in moderation and get all things I know are good (like my fruit and veg) in xx
Moderation is the best way. It’s a hard balance to grasp. xx
That’s the thing. I think it’s great that people want to be healthy and I like being healthy and showing that, but there is this hidden fear to only post a salad or an array of fruit, otherwise it’s not nutritious.
I’ve really cut down on processed food and much prefer cooking from scratch. I think it’s great that health is being promoted because when I was teenager, it was all about dieting and trying to look like Kate Moss.
Not that there’s anything wrong with her figure.
But health has become extreme and people are losing the meaning of what it actually is. Thank you for reading! xx
I think the aesthetics outweigh all reality on Instagram. And I think people need to accept that and not use the app as a kind of review or portrayal of how life should be.
I use the clean eating hashtag a lot because I know it’s popular, but it made me realise that it only reflects the idea of health as being fruit and veg. And in reality, people suffice on a lot more! 🙂
Very interesting reading your thoughts. Healthy eating doesn’t necessarily mean denying oneself a guilty pleasure once in a while. I think some people get carried away with diets and fads. I tried to do the South Beach diet once, I had headaches everyday.
I think the important word in diet/food is balance. Like everything else in life balance is the key to eating healthy and not feeling deprived of the things we like. Balance will insure we are eating healthy, and I believe it helps keep us on track (especially in hopes of not falling off track from our goals)
You do an excellent job of keeping yourself in shape. No doubt because of exercise and healthy eating. Do you deprive yourself of a guilty pleasure like a scoop of ice cream or a chocolate, or whatever your guilty pleasure is?
What’s the South Beach diet? The worst I did was a calorie counting book. It would read like: 30 grams of porridge with water, one slice of bread with no butter, etc.
I feel that I would love to get more toned and it’s one of my goals at the minute. I try not to eat processed food or refined sugar, but I do love bread and a good bowl of pasta.
South Street diet has a fad in the early 2000s. No carbs and heavy on the meats and proteins. I had headaches everyday.
Haha. I have the same weaknesses for bread and pasta.
It sounds like the Atkins diet. All celebrities say that they eat chicken and vegetables for lunch and dinner. I tried to do that a couple of years ago and gave up after two days.
Yeah, similar principle to the Atkins. I think it will always go back to exercise and a balanced diet.
interesting read! <3
Thank you 🙂