If you've set the personal goal of losing weight, you can still enjoy food while following a fat- and weight-loss diet plan. Losing weight involves eating fewer calories than your body needs to remain the same weight, and by adding exercise to your weekly routine you can still eat ample portions while slimming 1 to 2 lbs. a week. Fresh, canned or frozen vegetables should provide the bulk of your diet plan as they contain the nutrients you need for optimal health as well as zero-calorie fiber, which slows the digestion of carbohydrates and moderates your body's release of insulin, a hormone that contributes to body-fat storage.
Reducing Calories
If treating yourself to dessert once a week helps you stay focused on weight loss, you should certainly do it, although refraining completely from the empty calories in sugar and alcohol will be more efficient. The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign recommends eliminating the needless calories from sweets and fatty foods but keeping your portions of protein, fruit and vegetables the way they are. Stop eating the trans fats in fried food and the saturated fat in red meat as these types of fat are very unhealthy and unnecessary in your diet.
Healthy Fat
While dieting, continue to eat healthy unsaturated fat from plant sources such as avocado, olive oil, nuts and seeds as well as oily fish. Choosing unsaturated fat over saturated or trans fat will especially help you become healthier if you're losing weight due to hypertension or heart-related reasons. According to the Harvard School of Public Health, replacing excess carbohydrates with unsaturated fat, especially monounsaturated fat, such as the fat found in avocado and olive oil, can lower blood pressure as well as the risk of cardiovascular disease. Eating fat will not prevent you from losing weight unless you eat too much of it.
Lean Protein
Regardless of the source, protein provides your body with four calories per gram, according to McKinley Health Center. Although replacing carbohydrates with unsaturated fat can be beneficial, replacing some of them with protein can help keep your calories low since even healthy fat provides more than twice the calories of protein at nine per gram. Egg whites, lean red meat, poultry and seafood contain the essential amino acids your body needs to build muscle tissue, hormones and enzymes, but they don't have as many calories as fattier cuts of meat.
Considerations
By reducing your calories to between 500 and 1,000 below the amount you need daily to maintain your weight, you can lose 1 to 2 lbs. per week. Exercising helps reduce calories without sacrificing the food you eat, and cardiovascular exercise burns off body fat along with carbohydrates in your diet. Weekly resistance training increases muscle mass, which raises your metabolism and the number of calories you need to eat every day. Exercise together with dieting can help you achieve your weight-loss goals much more quickly.
References
- Linus Pauling Institute at Oregon State University: Fiber
- University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign: A Diet That Works
- Harvard School of Public Health: Fats and Cholesterol--Out with the Bad, In with the Good
- McKinley Health Center: Macronutrients--The Importance of Carbohydrate, Protein and Fat
- Harvard Health Publications: Glossary of Exercise Terms
Member Comments