New Year, New Regime

I had a wonderful holiday filled with lots of everything: family, friends, food, drink and desserts. It was a great time but I'm glad it's over now, because it was simply too too much. January is a time when I often do a short fast, or at least cut back on things like rich foods or the amount of food I'm eating. It feels like the right thing to do after so much excess. And it resets my routine to a more moderate way of eating which is closer to the way things should be.

With drastic obesity rates still on the rise, it seems that many of us are having a hard time being moderate. A study released this week offers some hope to dieters by showing effective ways of cutting calories from the diet to achieve weight loss.

The researchers put 24 women on regimes that required them to a. reduce the size of meal portions, b. to cut back on rich, calorie-laden foods or c. do both.The study found that of the three strategies, cutting back on portions and eating lower-calories foods resulted in an 800 calorie reduction in their daily intake. This could result in 2 pounds or more of weight loss per week. And eating low-cal foods was actually more effective than trying to eating smaller portions of calorie-dense foods (such as those higher in fats and sugars), in terms of cutting calories from the diet.

Those wishing to lose weight who want to benefit from this information would do well to eat lighter, smaller meals that contain lots of vegetables. Not very earth-shattering news, but it flies in the face of North American habits. We of the large plates and the heavy foods that assault the taste buds with flavour. Go to most places in the world outside our continent and you'll find plates filled with smaller amounts of food. We're programmed to want to eat food that's in front of us, and so most of us clean our plates, no matter what amount is on them. Apparently the study group had an easier time cutting back on the calories when they ate lighter foods: soups, salads, instead of trying to stick to smaller amounts.

My only concern with this plan is that when we cut back on fat, we tend not to feel satiated. And then we eat more than we should. Who's ever had a huge bowl of salad with light dressing and still felt hungry afterwards? Yet you feel stuffed after eating a bag of buttery popcorn at the movies, even though popcorn itself is a very lightweight food. It's the fat that makes the difference.

I really hope we don't see that diet pendulum swing from Atkins-mania back to the days of "low fat" everything. Eating moderate portions of vegetables, lean meats and whole grains, with a bit of good fat thrown in for good measure, is the best path. But then, our society is not generally known for walking the middle ground.

Note: Balancing doggie pic above created by Squirrell Designs UK