Adding the right foods, rather than subtracting foods, is the easiest way to reduce your daily calorie count. High carbohydrate, low calorie foods are the best foods to add into your health-conscious diet. If you increase the number of high carbohydrate, low calorie foods you eat, your meals will be satisfying and filling, while the calories will remain minimal. To assist you in finding foods that meet these criteria, find a list of foods that offer you bulk and nutrition without a lot of calories. Look for foods high in carbohydrates but contain fewer than 100 calories for a minimum serving size of 4 oz.
Vegetables
Vegetables are an obvious choice for high carbohydrate, low calorie foods. The vegetables lowest in calories are: green or yellow snap beans, beet greens, beets, asparagus, balsam-pear, bamboo shoots, broccoli, butterbur, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, collards, watercress, cucumber, celeriac, celery, chard, dandelion greens, hearts of palm, kale, kohlrabi, nopales, okra, onions, peppers, pickles, pimento, pumpkin, leeks, lettuce, mung beans, mushrooms, mustard greens, radishes, rutabagas, taro, tomatoes, turnip greens, turnips, sauerkraut, spinach, summer or winter squash, peas, potatoes, and jicama. You can also include vegetable juices in this list, such as the juices of carrot, tomato, or mixed vegetable juice.
Fruits and Juices
Because fruits contain mostly water and natural sugar, they are also high in carbohydrates and relatively low in calories. All of the following fruits have less than 100 calories in a four ounce serving: pears, plums, apples, grapes, lemons and limes, melons, loquats, oranges, papayas, peaches, rhubarb, apricots, cherries, kiwifruit, pineapple, grapefruit, mulberries, nectarines, tangerines, watermelon, blueberries, raspberries, blackberries, gooseberries, loganberries, strawberries, boysenberries, prickly pears, starfruit, and of course, mixtures of these, such as are found in fruit cocktail or fruit salad. Most fruit juices are too high in calories, but a few of them still meet the criteria of high carbohydrate and low calorie, such as lemon and lime juice, acerola juice, blackberry juice and grapefruit juice.
Soups
Many soups, due to their high water content, also offer high carbohydrate, low calorie food choices. Some of these are specially made to be lower in calories, but many are just low calorie anyway, such as good old alphabet soup, chicken noodle and clam chowder. The options in soup choices are too numerous to name them all, but here is a selection of soups you might not have thought of: any broth or consomme, beef with vegetable, barley, chicken and dumplings, chicken gumbo, won ton, cream of celery, cream of shrimp, french onion, golden butternut squash, golden mushroom, Italian wedding, minestrone, oyster stew, pepper pot, tomato, or egg drop. All of these provide less than 100 calories in a 4-oz. serving, some in an 8-oz. serving.
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