If you’re aiming to lose weight, it is no doubt that having the right nutrition strategy is the most important factor. Many think that it is simply eating less, since we know that in order to lose weight, you should be eating less calories than you burn. However, the problem with this simplistic model is that it fails to account for how the different types of food that you eat can affect both the amount of calories in and the amount of calories out.

If you feel like you are eating so little that you’re constantly hungry, your nutrition strategy might just be the wrong one. In fact, studies have shown that the biggest reason why people fail their diet is because of high hunger levels.

What you should do instead is to focus on the types of food you’re eating and how you’re eating them, which can make a huge difference to your hunger levels. And in this article, we will use a science-based approach to look at some ways you should be eating to lose weight without feeling hungry. Let’s dive in.

*If you’re always hungry, it’s difficult to adhere to your diet plan.*

1. Include more Satiating Foods in your Diet

Satiating foods can help suppress your appetite, which can help with adhering to the diet plan by minimizing excessive snacking throughout the day. Looking at the satiety index below which examines some of the most common foods, we can see that for the same amount of calories, there are some foods that can make you feel full much better than others.

It would be good to replace some of the foods that have low satiety index with others than have high satiety index and see how your hunger level responds. For example, based on the index below, eating potatoes instead of french fries can increase your satiety by about 100%! Choosing apples over bananas can also be another option to help curb hunger levels. But remember that we all respond differently to different types of food - trial and error to see what works best for you!

*A very useful chart to see which foods can make you full faster! Looks like white bread is bad option.*

Another type of food that is low in satiety is liquid calories, for example smoothies, fruit juices, or even shakes. For the same amount of calories, liquid foods are usually less satiating than solid foods. In fact, there was a study done in 2011 that compared hunger ratings of participants after eating a piece of solid chicken breast vs drinking the same chicken breast blended with water. The result? The hunger scores were lower after the solid meal compared to the liquid meal. Other studies and systematic reviews also show that when people consume a high proportion of their calories from liquids, they consume more calories overall.

Thus, it can be concluded that solid meals are better at suppressing appetite and hunger compared to liquid calories. So if you are dieting, it would be wise to eat more whole fruits, vegetables and solid protein sources and limit fruit juices, smoothies, sweet drinks, and shakes.

*Don’t be fooled by “healthy” fruit juices - they aren’t useful at suppressing hunger levels.*

2. Choose Low-Calorie Density Foods

Low-calorie density foods simply means food that has low calories but are high in volume. By choosing more of such foods, you will be able to eat more of it for the same amount of calories. This will lead to 3 main effects that can help with weight loss.

One, is that a higher volume of food will mean longer meal times and more chewing. This will allow you to feel full longer.

Two, low-calorie density foods are also usually quite high in fibre (e.g. fruits and vegetables), which again helps with making you feel full faster as it slows digestion.

Three, eating in high-volume will stretch your gut which will elicit a fullness response. This is beneficial as it can allow you to feel full without consuming a high amount of calories.

In fact, a study investigated the effects of this with 20 subjects eating as much as they want over 5 days, from a range of high-calorie density foods. After which they repeated the process from a range of low-calorie density foods. The result? The subjects only ate 1570 kcal on the low-calorie density diet vs. 3000 kcal on the high-calorie density diet, both of which they felt full. There was another study that lasted longer than 6 months, and participants that followed a low-calorie density diet had more than 3 times the weight loss compared to those eating a high-calorie density diet.

So we know that low-calorie density foods are the way to go. But what foods have low-calorie density? Let’s take a look at this chart of caloric density.

*Green: Vegetables, Red: Fruits, Yellow: Grains, Orange: Seeds, Brown: Nuts*

We can see that vegetables and fruits have the lowest calorie density, because they are high in water and fibre. Other foods that are not in this list which are also recommended include lean meat, fish, oats, air popped popcorn, egg whites and greek yogurt.

To incorporate these foods into your diet, try switching out carbs and fats with vegetables and fruits instead. This will increase the volume and fullness of your meals while reducing the caloric content. Don’t underestimate these small changes as they can actually make a significant difference accumulated over a long period of time.

*Fruits and vegetables can make you feel full fast without adding much calories.*

3. Be Mindful of Fat Intake

Although fats are essential for survival and we need to include healthy fats in our diet, it is the macronutrient with the highest calorie density. While the ratio of fats to carbohydrates doesn’t really matter when it comes to fat loss, studies have shown that fats have the lowest impact on fullness as compared to carbs and protein. This is because foods that are high in fat are often lower in weight and volume - 1 g of fat has more than twice the amount of calories than 1 g of carbs or 1 g of protein.

Let’s use examples to better see what I mean. In terms of calories:

1 tablespoon of olive oil = 1 full bowl of white rice
1 handful of almonds = 1/2 bunch of broccoli
1 piece of avocado = 6 wedges of watermelon

It is quite clear that the latter can make you much fuller than the former, right? Therefore, it would be good to try limiting your fat intake to the minimum of 15-25% of your daily caloric intake as mentioned in my previous article, and then allocate the rest towards carbs and protein. This will make you feel full faster and longer, which means eating less in general.

However, remember that adherence is still the most important factor when it comes to dieting. If you do better with high-fat, low-carbs diet, feel free to do so. But be mindful of your fat intake as it is very easy to unknowingly overeat them.

An example on how easy it is to overeat fats is pouring oil directly onto the pan. It’s hard to tell if you’re pouring 1 or 2 tbsp of oil, which is a difference of more than 100 kcals! Instead, you should use a spoon to measure.

4. Focus on Less Processed Foods

Less processed foods such as brown rice, wholemeal bread, and oats have shown to help with weight loss better than its more processed counterpart white rice, white bread and cereal, calorie for calorie. This is because 1) Less processed food generally provide more nutrients 2) Less processed food suppresses appetite better.

Another very important benefit of minimally processed foods is that they have a higher thermic effect of food, which is the amount of calories your body uses to metabolize food. This means that your body burns more calories digesting less processed foods like brown rice compared to more processed foods like white rice. But how much more? Is it really that significant?

In this study, one group of participants ate a meal of white bread and processed cheese, while another group ate multigrain bread and cheddar cheese which is less processed. Although both meals consisted of the same amount of calories, the group that ate the meal with less processed food burned 50% more calories from digestion than the other (137 kcals vs 73 kcals).

In another study, the group that ate mostly whole-grain food burned an average of 100 kcals more per day compared to a calorie and macronutrient equated diet consisting of more processed refined grains. That is equivalent to jogging 1 mile per day by simply switching your grain types!

So although eating less food will influence the “Calorie-in”, you can further optimize your weight loss loss by increasing the “Calorie-out” through swapping highly processed foods with less processed foods.

*I definitely would rather eat whole grains than jog a mile a day!*

5. Eat a Heavier Breakfast

Although it is still the total amount of calories that you consume that matters the most for weight loss, the way you distribute your calories throughout the day can have a big influence on how much calories you consume each day.

In this study, one group of participants ate a high-caloric breakfast and lower-caloric lunch and dinner, while another group ate a high-caloric dinner and a lower-caloric lunch and breakfast, with the same amount of total calories consumed. Researchers found that the first group experienced less hunger levels, less cravings for sweets and higher energy levels. This means that they will be able to adhere to their dieting more easily and will burn more calories from higher energy levels.

Another randomized study over 12 weeks found that the group that ate a 700 kcal breakfast, 500 kcal lunch and 200 kcal dinner showed greater weight loss and waist circumference reduction compared to the group that ate a 200 kcal breakfast, 500 kcal lunch, and 700 kcal dinner.

Therefore, we can see that there seems to be some indirect fat loss benefits by allocating more calories to breakfast instead of dinner. You should try experimenting it as it will vary between individuals due to preferences, lifestyle, and workout timings.

*Try eating a heavier breakfast with high protein. That might work for you!*

Conclusion

We all know that to lose weight, a calorie deficit is key. However, some of these swaps and changes can be useful to reduce hunger and to help speed up the process. But most importantly, you must be able to adhere to and be consistent with these changes. Experiment on what works best for you and stick with it!

Need a more personalized nutrition strategy? Drop me a message!