[/caption]There is a large discrepancy when it comes to eating frequency and weight-loss. At Hilton Head Health, we emphasis eating every two to three hours to stabilize blood sugar levels and portion control using visual cues. Starting as simple as setting up your plate ¼ starch, ¼ protein (about the size of your fist), and ½ fresh vegetables. We base our entire nutrition plan on eating often, but with moderation. Most of our guests find that a 1200 calories diet is actually quite satisfying and most nights can’t even get to their 3rd metabo meal (100 calorie snack).
What’s interesting is that some people even go so far to think that eating less at meals is ineffective because people compensate by eating more at other meals. This is not the case.
A small study was recently reviewed in the October Issue of the Journal Appetite. For two weeks, researchers had 17 men and women eat all their meals and snacks, as much as they wanted, at a buffet where portions consumed could be weighed and caloric intake calculated. After the first two weeks, participants then ate a 200-calorie lunch, but the rest of the day they ate whatever they wanted from the original buffet.
Participants consumed 1,568 calories on days they had the 200-calorie lunch and 1,560 calories on days when they did not – very insignificant. However; overall when the 17 participants had the 200-calorie lunch they consumed 245 calories less on those days. Unsurprisingly, the result was an average of 1.1 pounds lost per participant in the two weeks.
What’s the take-away? Lower calorie meals will do the trick as long as you eat frequently. If you’ve never implemented the 6 meals a day approach, give it a shot! When we don’t eat often enough, we’re putting our bodies into starvation mode, which can set us up for portion control fatigue later in the evening. If you never let yourself get hungry – you’ll not only feel good, but the results will be imminent.
Source: "A Low Calorie Meal is Shown to Pay Off"
