“I don’t know whether the food industry figured this out or stumbled into it accidentally, but when you put more varieties of flavor into food and conceal one with the other, you turn on more appetite and people eat more,” [David L. Katz, author of The Flavor Point Diet] adds. And while this may be a good thing for food sellers, it can feel like sabotage for those watching their waistlines.

“The bottom line is that I believe there’s an overwhelming body of evidence that suggests that we’ve created a food supply with an incredible amount of variety available all the time, both among foods and within foods. And if your appetite is in overdrive, portion control is very tough; you’re going to be hungry and unsatisfied,” he says.

“And then there’s the obvious fact that the single most important thing about food is taste,” Katz explains. “That’s how we interact with food. If we know that limiting food to a simple flavor causes people to fill up faster, it really makes sense that having a wide variety of flavors engineered into foods would make people fill up slower and need to eat more. If you are choosing simpler foods and are arranging them in a reasonable pattern, you will fill up on fewer calories.”

The Flavor Point Diet describes how to eat by utilizing flavor categories so that your appetite isn’t turned on unnecessarily by eating salmon with a citrus vinaigrette, cheesy broccoli, and a salad with ranch dressing. However, Katz emphasizes that the concept’s substance isn’t so much in which flavors to put together; it’s the overall simplification of flavors that matters. “Avoid excessive variety in a given meal or a given snack,” he says. “For example, if you’re snacking during the day or you’re snacking in the evening, don’t cruise from one food to another.

“In terms of meals, try to have a harmony of flavors,” he continues. “Don’t have a different sauce and a different dressing on everything. If you are having grilled chicken or fish with a marinade, have a salad dressing that’s very similar to that marinade. A citrus marinade over fish works nicely if you have a citrus vinaigrette dressing over your salad. So simplify and harmonize.”

When trying to search for fewer flavor profiles in processed foods, Katz says the shorter the ingredient list, the better. “The closer you get to nature, the fewer unnecessary flavor additions there will be in that food, the more wholesome it is, and the fewer calories it takes to fill you up,” he says.

Source: Today’s Dietitian

Did you know that eating highly processed food desensitizes your taste buds? If you were to bite into an apple, you wouldn’t be able to detect the inherent sweetness of it because, on a highly processed diet, your taste buds are used to the hypersweetness of those foods. Furthermore, the more you eat a certain food, the more you begin to crave it. So what if you could retrain your palate so that you not only enjoy the taste of, but also crave healthy foods?

It is possible. The first step is to remove all the processed and refined foods from your diet and introduce whole foods in their most natural form. Keep fruits & vegetables accessible and easy to grab. Be patient and persistent: keep on eating healthy foods every day (the more you eat something, the more you want it!). And finally, try eating unliked foods with liked flavors. This type of training will help you begin to like those unliked foods.

Over time, your preferences and cravings will change. The old cravings will never go away, but the new cravings will be much more dominant. As long as you aren’t exposed to the old foods you used to crave and enjoy, you will have successfully retrained your palate to like healthy foods over the processed stuff. Once you go healthy, you never want to go back.

Source: Today’s Dietitian

Thank my sister for bringing up this topic. During lunch today she told me, “Did you know that watermelon actually helps you burn fat?”

Actually no, watermelon does not have that capability. In fact, there is no evidence supporting the claim that certain foods can ”burn fat.” Some may help boost your metabolism, but not to the extent of some serious fat-burning you can achieve with a good sweaty workout.

So what does help burn fat? A calorie deficit. You gotta be burning more calories than what you take in. Burn an extra 500 calories a day, and by the end of the week you have achieved a 3,500 calorie deficit. Boom. 1 pound of fat, gone.

How do you achieve a calorie deficit? You should consider doing a combination of healthy eating and exercise. Aim for modest but satisfying portions of the good stuff: low-glycemic carbohydrates like whole grains, beans, vegetables, and fruits; lean proteins; and small amounts of healthy fats, found in fatty fish, avocado, olive oil, nuts & seeds. As long as you eat a variety of whole foods in its natural, unrefined form, you’ll be fine. Limit the foods that can derail a healthy diet: refined/packaged foods, sugary treats, etc. Eat based on your hunger only! You don’t want to let yourself get too hungry between meals; stay satisfied with small meals every 3 or 4 hours. Eat slowly to allow the sensations of fullness from your stomach reach your brain {it takes about 20 minutes}. Stop eating just before you get that “full” feeling; it’s at that point that you are satisfied and no longer hungry, could eat a little bit more but don’t need to.

The second part is to infuse more physical activity throughout your day. Start out by increasing your general physical activity: spend more time up on your feet rather than sitting at the computer desk. Cook. Clean. Garden. Play outside. Whatever you love to do that gets you up and moving. Then add in a few sweaty workout sessions each week. Find fitness activities you really enjoy, and stick with it. Incorporate strength training a few times a week. Up the duration and intensity of your workouts so that you’re doing at least an hour of moderate physical activity most days of the week.

If you haven’t been seeing results after a few months, you may need to up the exercise to 90 minutes most days of the week. As long as you’re consistent with this healthy lifestyle, you will be burning fat and dropping any excess weight. It may seem like a lot of effort at first, but once you become accustom to this lifestyle you really start to enjoy it! You will feel awesome!

For more information, read this. 

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