You provide energy for your body to operate by eating food. Whether calories come from proteins, carbohydrates, fats or alcohol, they are converted into glucose and released into your bloodstream. The glucose you don't require for immediate energy needs is converted into fat and stored for later use. Some is converted into triglycerides and some into glycogen for temporary storage in muscles and in the liver. When your temporary stores are filled, your body converts the excess glucose into fat. Any food you eat, whether it is a protein, carbohydrate, fat or alcohol, contributes to your fat stores if you don't burn it in the operation of your body or through activity. In short, too much of any food makes belly fat.
Types of Fat
You have several different types of fat in your body. Abdominal or belly fat is stored in a sheet of fatty tissue called the omentum that hangs off your stomach and wraps across your abdomen. Subcutaneous fat is distributed all over your body under your skin. These fat stores are adaptive remnants of a time in our evolutionary history when we needed to store energy for times of food shortage -- like money in the bank for a rainy day. In wealthy, modern societies, we tend have an excess of food constantly available and we have become more sedentary, so we don't dip into these fat banks. We just get fatter.
These Genes Make Me Look Fat
Different people store their excess fat in different areas. Some pack the fat into the omentum, while others store it in subcutaneous fat in different parts of the body. Growing evidence suggests there are specific genes that cause fat to be stored in the belly or in other locations in the body, according to Dr. Barry Starr from the Standford School of Medicine. So, when you eat too much and your body converts food into fat, the most important factor that determines whether that fat goes to your belly or your behind is not the type of food it came from, but rather where your genes have determined extra fat should be deposited.
Junk Food and Drunks' Food
Though excess calories from any source find their way to your belly, certain foods are particularly egregious in their contempt for your profile. Foods that contribute to high triglycerides may tend to gravitate toward your belly, according to Real Age. Foods that contribute to high triglycerides include simple sugars and starches, including sweetened sodas, sugar, pastries, candy, processed white bread, crackers, sweetened cereals and processed foods that contain sweeteners, such as sucrose, fructose, corn syrup, honey, high-fructose corn syrup and glucose. Alcohol also elevates triglyceride levels.
Saturated and Trans Fats
Saturated and trans fats also may contribute disproportionately to the growth of your omentum -- you could say your "omentum momentum." Foods that make your belly bulge include fried foods, cream and creamy sauces, whole milk dairy products, salad dressings, cheese, butter, lard and fatty meats, including high-fat cuts of beef and pork, lunch meats, bacon, pepperoni, hot dogs and fatty hamburgers. Poultry meat is all right, but the skin is loaded with saturated fats. Potato chips and fast food also are high in saturated and trans fats.
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