There's no secret to losing weight--you need to consume fewer calories than you expend for a sustained amount of time. Unfortunately, doing so is easier said than done, especially if you're not eating the right foods. While no food will magically melt fat away, there are some foods that will help facilitate fat loss better than others. On the other hand, there are also foods that can stand in the way of your weight loss by not filling you up, or worse, making you more hungry. You might even be surprised to find that foods you thought were healthy are far from it.
Muffins
As registered dietitian Susan Moores explains, muffins are often considered healthy because they come in varieties such as bran and fruit-filled. While those ingredients may be nutritious on their own, muffins as a whole are not. Moores notes that the average muffin packs in 20 g of fat and 500 calories, making them closer to meals than snacks. In addition, muffins often contain high levels of sugar to make them taste more appealing. This can make muffins void of nutrition, excessively high in calories and carbohydrates and not very filling.
Tuna Salad Sandwich
As the Fox News article "10 'Healthy' Foods That Aren't" explains, tuna salad has a reputation for being healthy thanks to the tuna, but you might find a tuna sandwich from a restaurant contains up to 700 calories and 43 g of fat. This is due to the mayonnaise, which adds 100 calories per tablespoon, according to the article. Fox News also notes that because tuna is so fine, more mayonnaise is used to fill the space compared to chicken salad. Tuna by itself, though, is a low-calorie, high-protein food source that may be suitable for dieting.
Olive Oil
While olive oil does contain mostly unsaturated fats--just 2 g of the 13.5 g of total fat are saturated, according to LIVESTRONG.COM's nutrition database--it is still high in calories. Healthy though it may be, olive oil contains 120 calories per tablespoon, with all of the calories coming from fat. Your body does need fat to survive, but fat is high in calories, and too many calories will stall weight loss or spur weight gain. In addition, you may not even realize you're overindulging, as olive oil is used for cooking and has a light taste. The liquid form may also make it less filling than solid food.
Soft Drinks
Soft drinks may be refreshing, but they can be diet disasters. By consuming liquid calories rather than solid food, your body may not feel as full. In addition, soft drinks are high in calories and devoid of vitamins and minerals, consisting of little more than sugar. According to research conducted by V.S. Malik and colleagues in the August 2006 issue of the "American Journal of Clinical Nutrition," consumption of soft drinks "is associated with weight gain and obesity" because of the sugar content and low satiety.
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