Metabolism is the process through which your body performs many crucial functions, including maintaining a healthy weight. Metabolism regulates blood circulation, digestion, body temperature and muscle contraction. Increasing your metabolism through the foods you eat requires a bit of planning. However, incorporating some key ideas into your eating choices and putting these into practice by including certain foods in your daily diet will allow you to eat to increase your metabolism--and in a healthy way.
Step 1
Start each day with a healthy breakfast. Don't skip this meal. According to Utah State University, breakfast is crucial in jump-starting your body's metabolism. While you sleep at night, you are not consuming food and your body is in a state of fasting. Eating enough of certain essential foods for breakfast will naturally start your body's metabolic process, helping to increase its function throughout the day. Whole grain toast, fresh fruit, and cereals containing plenty of fiber are solid options to boost metabolism while promoting a healthy digestive system.
Step 2
Eat healthy snacks between meals throughout your day. Don't go hungry between meals, since your body's metabolism can greatly decrease when it has no fuel to burn. Incorporate into your daily diet snacks such as granola bars and leafy-green, non-starchy vegetables rich in complex carbohydrates. Your body can use these healthy carbs to keep your metabolism burning, preventing periods of fasting during which your metabolism may slow significantly.
Step 3
Fill your daily meals with nutritious foods to increase your metabolism. Plan out your meals by writing down recipes and meal ideas in a notebook or notepad to help you shop right when you take a trip to the grocery store. Since you're snacking and keeping your body from fasting throughout the day, eat smaller portions at lunch and dinner, and ensure that the meals contain plenty of protein and healthy carbohydrates. Whole grain pasta with vegetables, lean red meat or baked fish and brown rice, and soups containing beans such as lentils will increase your metabolism by providing your body with energy as well as the protein building blocks for muscle and tissue repair.
Step 4
Spice up your meals with cayenne, crushed red pepper flakes or paprika. These spices contain a chemical called capsaicin, which is linked to increasing metabolism, according to Colorado State University. In addition, spicy foods can help prevent you from overeating and satisfy your appetite with smaller, metabolism-boosting portions.
Step 5
Drink plenty of water. Not only is staying hydrated essential to overall health, pushing the fluids will aid your digestion and help eliminate digested foods more rapidly. You should never allow yourself to feel thirsty, and replacing sugary soft drinks and dehydrating alcoholic beverages with fresh, clean water will go a long way toward increasing your metabolism. Carry a water bottle with you wherever you go during your day, in order to ensure that you stay hydrated as well as to remind yourself to drink plenty of nature's simplest metabolism-booster.
Tips and Warnings
- If you want to increase your metabolism with more significant results, you must also exercise regularly to keep the metabolic fire burning.
- Talk to your doctor before changing your diet if you have any dietary restrictions due to medical conditions such as cancer, heart disease or diabetes.
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