Health & WellnessBeginnerPreview
Anti-Inflammatory Eating
This course teaches you the science of dietary inflammation and how food choices directly affect your body's inflammatory response. You will build practical, Mediterranean-inspired meal patterns that support joint health, sustained energy, and long-term wellness.
Anyone looking to reduce chronic fatigue, joint discomfort, or disease risk through evidence-based changes to their daily eating habits.
Course content
Workbook & downloads
Put the course into practice — a printable workbook plus editable templates you can fill in and reuse.
Preview the workbook
This workbook accompanies the Anti-Inflammatory Eating course and gives you structured exercises, worksheets, and templates to translate the course content into your daily life. Each section maps to one course module so you can work through it alongside the lessons or return to it as a reference. All content is for general educational purposes only and is not a substitute for medical advice.
Understanding Inflammation and Food
Assess your current dietary inflammatory load and identify your highest-priority pro-inflammatory habits.
Exercise: Inflammatory Food Audit
Over three typical days (two weekdays and one weekend day), record everything you eat and drink. Then use the prompts below to evaluate your pattern against the Dietary Inflammatory Index framework covered in Module 1.
- Which of the five pro-inflammatory categories (refined grains, industrial seed oils, processed meats, trans fats, excess alcohol) appeared most frequently in your three-day record? How many servings per day on average?
- Which DII-positive foods (omega-3 sources, fibre-rich foods, colourful vegetables, spices) were present in your record? Which were absent entirely?
- On a scale of 1–10, how confident are you that you can identify added sugar under its common aliases (dextrose, corn syrup, cane juice, maltose) when reading an ingredient list? What would increase your confidence?
- What is one pro-inflammatory food or ingredient that appears in your typical day that you are most motivated to reduce first? Why that one?
Worksheet: Three-Day Food and Inflammation Log
Complete one row for each meal or snack across three days. Use the DII categories from Lesson 2 to score each entry: +1 for any pro-inflammatory pattern, -1 for any anti-inflammatory pattern. Total each day and compare.
- Day (1 / 2 / 3)
- Meal (Breakfast / Lunch / Dinner / Snack)
- Foods and drinks consumed
- Pro-inflammatory elements present (list)
- Anti-inflammatory elements present (list)
- DII direction for this meal (+1 pro / -1 anti / 0 neutral)
- Notes or observations
Checklist: Week 1 Inflammation Awareness Checklist
- Read the ingredient list on every packaged food you consume this week before eating
- Identify at least 3 products in your current pantry that contain industrial seed oils (soybean, corn, cottonseed, sunflower)
- Track your fibre intake for one day using a free app (Cronometer or MyFitnessPal) and note whether you reach 25 g
- Replace your cooking oil with extra-virgin olive oil for all low-to-medium heat cooking this week
- Drink at least one cup of green or herbal tea daily as a polyphenol habit
- Notice and record any correlation between specific foods and energy levels, joint discomfort, or bloating
The Mediterranean Framework
Score your current diet against the Mediterranean Diet Score and build your personalised anti-inflammatory plate model.
Worksheet: Mediterranean Diet Score Self-Assessment
Score yourself honestly on each of the 9 Mediterranean Diet Score components. Award 1 point for each component where your consumption meets or exceeds the median for your population. Total your score and note your 2 lowest-scoring areas as priority targets.
- Component
- Your current frequency (servings per week)
- Score (0 or 1)
- Priority target? (Y / N)
- Specific change you will make
Exercise: Build Your Anti-Inflammatory Plate
Using the plate model from Lesson 2 (half vegetables/fruit, quarter protein, quarter whole grain, olive oil as cooking fat), design three complete meal ideas you would genuinely enjoy eating. Then evaluate each against the eat-the-rainbow rule.
- For each of your three meal ideas, list the specific colours represented (red, orange/yellow, green, blue/purple, white/brown). Are any colour categories missing? How would you add them?
- Which protein source in each meal provides omega-3s or significant plant-based fibre? If none, what could you substitute or add?
- Could any of these meals be batch-cooked efficiently? Which components could be prepared once and used across 2-3 meals?
Checklist: Mediterranean Pantry Transition Checklist
- Purchase a bottle of cold-pressed extra-virgin olive oil with a harvest date within 18 months (check for a peppery finish — this confirms oleocanthal content)
- Stock at least 3 varieties of dried or canned legumes (lentils, chickpeas, white beans)
- Add 2 cans of wild-caught fatty fish (salmon or sardines) to your pantry
- Buy turmeric, black pepper, garlic powder, and dried oregano if not already stocked
- Replace at least one refined grain in your kitchen with a whole-grain equivalent (white rice → brown rice or farro; white bread → 100% whole grain sourdough)
- Purchase a bag of mixed nuts (walnuts and almonds are highest in omega-3 ALA and polyphenols)
- Add frozen mixed berries and frozen spinach for convenient anti-inflammatory ingredient access
Labels, Supplements, and Gut Health
Practise label decoding skills, evaluate your supplement choices against evidence grades, and set a gut-health diversity target.
Exercise: Label Detective: Pantry Scan
Select 5 packaged foods currently in your kitchen. For each one, read the full ingredient list and nutrition panel. Use the five red-flag patterns from Lesson 7 to evaluate each product.
- List every sugar alias you find across all 5 products. Which product has the most aliases? Does any product list more than one sugar in the first 5 ingredients?
- Which industrial seed oils appear and in which products? If soybean, corn, or sunflower oil appears in the first 3 ingredients, what alternative product could replace it?
- Do any of your products contain carboxymethylcellulose, polysorbate 80, or carrageenan? If so, what is the product used for and is there a whole-food substitute?
- Using the Nova Classification system, categorise each of your 5 products as Group 1, 2, 3, or 4. What proportion are Group 4 (ultra-processed)?
Worksheet: Personal Supplement Evaluation
List every supplement you currently take or are considering. Use the evidence grades from Lesson 8 (A/B/C) to evaluate each. Note whether you are meeting the same nutrient through food first.
- Supplement name
- Current dose
- Evidence grade (A / B / C / unclear)
- Primary dietary source of this nutrient
- Are you meeting this nutrient through food? (Y / Partially / N)
- Action (continue / discuss with GP / deprioritise in favour of dietary source)
Checklist: 30-Plant-Foods-Per-Week Challenge
- Count every distinct plant food (vegetable, fruit, legume, grain, nut, seed, herb, spice) you eat this week — each variety counts once regardless of quantity
- Add at least one new plant food variety each week for 4 consecutive weeks
- Include one serving of a fermented food daily for 7 days (yoghurt, kefir, kimchi, sauerkraut, miso, or tempeh)
- Increase dietary fibre by 5 g this week compared to your baseline (add one extra serving of legumes or vegetables per day)
- Replace at least one emulsifier-containing product (check for CMC or polysorbate 80) with a whole-food equivalent
- Drink at least 8 cups of water daily to support increased fibre fermentation and microbiome health
Building a Sustainable Anti-Inflammatory Lifestyle
Design your personal weekly meal template, social eating strategy, and long-term tracking system.
Exercise: Weekly Meal Template Design
Using the rotation structure from Lesson 10 as a starting point, design a meal template that fits your actual schedule, food preferences, cooking time, and budget. Focus on structure and principles, not specific recipes.
- Which 2-3 evenings per week do you have at least 30 minutes for cooking? Which evenings require a no-cook or 10-minute meal solution? How does this shape your template?
- What is your target weekly spend on food? Using the budget strategies from Lesson 9 (legumes, frozen produce, canned fish, batch cooking), estimate how many anti-inflammatory meals you can produce per $20-25 of grocery spend.
- Which of the six Sunday batch-cooking tasks (grains, roasted vegetables, legumes, sauce, eggs, leafy greens) could you realistically complete in 90 minutes? What equipment would you need?
- Write one implementation intention for your anti-inflammatory eating using the if-then format from Lesson 12 (e.g., 'If it is Sunday at 4 pm, then I will prep my batch-cook items before watching TV').
Worksheet: Progress Tracking Baseline
Complete this baseline assessment now. Return to it in 6 weeks and again at 3 months to measure your progress. Be honest — the baseline is only useful if it reflects your current reality.
- Date
- Average daily energy level (1-10)
- Morning joint stiffness (minutes; 0 if none)
- Afternoon energy dip — severity (none / mild / moderate / significant)
- Sleep quality (1-10)
- Number of plant food varieties eaten in the past 7 days
- Mediterranean Diet Score (0-9, self-scored)
- Fermented food servings per day (average)
- Most recent hs-CRP result and date (if known)
- Most recent fasting triglycerides and date (if known)
- Notes on current dietary pattern
Checklist: 30-Day Anti-Inflammatory Kickstart Checklist
- Complete the Three-Day Food and Inflammation Log from Module 1
- Complete the Mediterranean Diet Score self-assessment and identify your 2 priority targets
- Conduct the pantry scan: remove or use up the 3 most pro-inflammatory products identified
- Complete the pantry transition checklist: stock the Mediterranean staples
- Design your weekly meal template and write it out
- Write one if-then implementation intention for batch cooking
- Complete baseline tracking worksheet and store it for comparison
- Add one fermented food to your daily routine
- Achieve 30 plant food varieties in at least one week
- Book a GP appointment to request a baseline hs-CRP and fasting lipid panel if you have not had one in the past year
- Schedule your 6-week and 3-month progress review dates in your calendar now
Your Action Plan
- Complete the Three-Day Food and Inflammation Log before making any dietary changes — your baseline data makes every subsequent step more targeted
- Score yourself on the Mediterranean Diet Score and identify your two lowest-scoring components as Week 1 priorities
- Conduct a pantry scan using the five red-flag ingredient patterns; remove or use up identified products and replace with Mediterranean staples
- Upgrade your cooking fat to extra-virgin olive oil (harvest date within 18 months; peppery finish indicates oleocanthal content)
- Implement the 30-plant-foods-per-week challenge for four consecutive weeks, adding at least one new plant variety each week
- Add one fermented food serving per day for seven consecutive days (yoghurt, kefir, kimchi, sauerkraut, miso, or tempeh)
- Design your personalised weekly meal template using the rotation structure and write one if-then implementation intention for batch cooking
- Complete the Sunday batch-cook protocol (grains + roasted vegetables + legumes + sauce + eggs + leafy greens) at least twice in your first month
- Fill out the baseline progress tracking worksheet and schedule a 6-week review and 3-month review in your calendar
- Request a baseline hs-CRP and fasting lipid panel from your GP if not tested in the past 12 months, so you have objective biomarkers to track alongside subjective improvements
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