Carnation Instant Breakfast is a powdered or prepared shake that is intended to act as a dietary meal replacement or supplement. Most people who use Carnation Instant Breakfast employ it as a calorie-control strategy to help achieve weight loss. As part of a balanced, low-calorie diet, Carnation Instant Breakfast can help people gradually lose weight and improve their health.
Types
The original form of Carnation Instant Breakfast is a powder packet that consumers mix with a glass or milk or water to form a shake. The powder comes in five flavors: milk chocolate, French vanilla, chocolate malt, dark chocolate and strawberry. Sugar-free and lactose-free varieties of the powdered drink mix are available. Carnation also sells ready-to-drink bottles of Instant Breakfast in chocolate and vanilla flavors.
Benefits
Meal replacements such as Carnation Instant Breakfast can be very effective in healthy weight loss plans. In an article for the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center website, Dr. Monica Zangwill writes about a Columbia University study that recorded greater weight loss in a group of subjects that used meal replacements than in a group that followed a low-calorie diet. As a diet food, Instant Breakfast is high in vitamin and mineral content and low in saturated fat and cholesterol.
Nutrition
The Carnation Instant Breakfast website states that one packet of drink mix contains 220 calories when combined with 1 cup of skim milk. The resulting shake contains 1 g fat, 120 mg sodium, 260 mg potassium, 27 g carbohydrates, 19 g sugar and 5 g protein. The product is also fortified with more than a dozen vitamins and minerals. From a perspective evaluating caloric content, Instant Breakfast is an especially useful weight control option because it prevents overindulging by limiting a meal to a set, small number of calories.
Uses
Although Carnation Instant Breakfast has many nutritional benefits and is low in calories, part of the reason for its success in weight loss plans may be due to its use as a breakfast food. According to the Mayo Clinic, people who regularly have breakfast are at a lower risk for obesity than people who tend to skip the meal, and they are also likely to be more physically active and make healthier eating choices. Drinking a breakfast shake in the morning can stave off hunger later in the day and help curb cravings and total calorie consumption.
Considerations
Carnation Instant Breakfast can be a useful product to help with weight loss, but it needs to be combined with healthy, nutritious whole foods to satisfy nutritional needs safely and reliably. As the Mayo Clinic states, losing weight is a gradual process that involves burning or saving 3,500 extra calories to drop each pound. Before starting any new diet or weight loss plan, speak with a physician or medical professional to discuss details and potential complications.
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