Jan
28
4 tips on eating less
Filed Under (Diet, Dieting, Food, Weight Loss) by 
Cris Harshman on 28-01-2007
Tagged Under : Diet, Dieting, eating, fitness, Food, health, Weight Loss
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Loading ...It all boils down to less calories and moving your body. Easy enough, right? Yeah, not for me either. As a follow-up to my previous post on taking small bites, here’s my personal top four tips on eating less.
- Take smaller bites, portions.
This tip makes everyone’s list, usually in the form of “leave food on your plate.” I don’t know about you, but sometimes that’s just way too hard. Instead, I’ve learned its better to just serve myself less food to begin with than tempt myself at the end of the meal. If I’m at home, this means using small plates and reminding myself I can always go back for seconds; if I’m at a restaurant, it means boxing part of my meal up at the beginning of the meal. - Measure and weigh your food, learn proper portion sizes.
I’ve learned my eyes lie to me. I used to eyeball portion sizes based on volume of food. Since then, I have learned to base my portion sizes on caloric value instead - articles like this one gave me a good starting point on reliably judging portion sizes; sites like this one are useful with pictures showing portion sizes based on 200 calories. Now I’ve got a scale, and always measure or weigh something the first few times I use it, and check sites like CalorieKing or Calorie-Count to check on what a 200-calorie portion should be. Yogurt, chicken, pork tenderloin, agave nectar, rice - these are all things I have measured recently and can now reliably eyeball proper portion sizes in restaurants. - Drink water with fiber.
I eat 5-6 meals a day and try to restrict each meal to around 200 calories. Drinking water, while important for many other body functions, also helps keep my stomach full. Combined with fiber, which expands in the stomach and has been shown to help lower cholesterol and keep the digestive system regular, I can make sure my body is full after consuming my 200 calories. - Chew gum before, after meals.
Snacking used to destroy any attempts (feeble though they may have been) I made at controlling my diet. A few bites and an appetizer while preparing dinner, a few bites after dinner during cleanup, and I would have racked up a whole meal’s worth of calories just in snacking around dinner. Even worse, these are calories I didn’t count, as I didn’t pay attention to how quickly a bite here and a bite there could add up. To prevent snacking before and after meals, I now chew sugar-free gum so my mouth is occupied.
How about you? Tell me some of your tips for eating less in the comments.
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In the same vein as drinking water and chewing gum - hot tea has helped me greatly. I was in such a habit of snacking while watching tv that I instantly crave yummy/tasty food when I go into the tv room. I’ve started making myself mugs of herbal tea or *lightly* sweetened black/flavored tea and it helps satisfy my need for the yummy, without ingesting tons of calories. And since it’s hot, you’ll be more likely to drink it slowly, so you’ll be able to savor it over time, and it often leaves me feeling full. I have finally broken the psychological connection to snacking in that room by using the tea method.
I can’t do the chewing gum trick since my jaw gets sore really quickly, but I’ll ocassionally suck on a piece of low calorie hard candy as a way to occupy my mouth for 30-45 minutes and get a flavor/snacky craving out of the way.
It was important for me to find a low calorie vegetable I really like and eat a lot of it. As I am in the process of getting used to eating fewer calories, I find that following the rule of “half of your plate should be fruits and or veggies” allows me to feel full, consume a similar amount of food, and drastically reduce my calories.
Finally - and this one is huge for me - don’t shy away from eating fat. I feel much more hungry after a fat free meal. If I have a moderate amount of fat in my food I find I am more satisfied after the meal and that feeling lasts much longer.
I was just hearing today that it’s better to drink hot liquids than cold because it creates the sensation of being full sooner. It’s nice to see the same thought elsewhere!