Walk-To-Burn-Calories – Diet Aid

A US study suggests that a menu that displays the amount of exercise required to burn off the calories contained in the food may help people to consume fewer calories.

A team at the Texan Christian University found that when the menu displayed the amount of exercise required, the diners ordered lower calories. The trials were conducted with a group of 18-30 year olds, who were split into three groups. Some were given menus with no calorie information, some with the amount of calories displayed, and the final group had both the calories and the amount of exercise needed to burn the calories off. The results showed that the group with extra information consumed around 100 calories less.

The test is now to be taken further, and onto a bigger scale in order to confirm the findings.

This could be a very interesting find if it proves to be useful. It may just help a good number of people to eat that little bit less and to get in better shape. A lot of people are unaware of how hard it is to actually burn off the calories we consume so this could be very useful. It is also important to remember though, that just eating fewer calories does not necessarily mean that we are eating healthily.

To read the full article, click here.

Crash Diets and Why They Fail

Crash Diets – Why They Fail

What is a crash diet?

A crash diet, essentially, is a diet regime that lacks certain nutritional requirements in order to restrict the intake of calories and therefore help us to lose weight. The idea is to help achieve rapid weight loss, and to not last a long time.

These types of diet are typically not a healthy way of either living or dieting and are generally quite unsuccessful, certainly in the long term.

Why do crash diets fail?

Although it is often the case that people who partake in crash diets do see a loss of weight, it is extremely common that these people put that weight straight back on.

One reason for this is that when we lower our calorie intake, the body alters its metabolic rate. Once we increase our calorie intake again the calories are being burnt at a slower rate and so the weight can easily be put back on. Essentially, when we lower the calorie intake our body goes into a fat storage, as opposed to fat burner, mode.

Generally, crash diets shed muscle rather than fat and so our body shape will not alter very much, while all along we are burning off muscle that we want and need. This is due to the body storing the fat that it has for energy reserves. Essentially, muscle is more disposable to the body than fat. Therefore, although we are losing weight on the scales, it is not the right weight, and we will be just as flabby as ever.

Another reason as to why crash diets fail is that restrictions of foods are hard to stick to. If we do not allow ourselves a certain food, we are far more likely to crave it and then eat far too much of it! So by restricting a certain food to lose weight can often have the opposite effect.

What we should do to lose weight

Losing weight is not as difficult as some people make it out to be. However, people do have problems with it and a lot comes from the fact that there is too much conflicting information available. Burning more calories than we use is the way to go, but we need to do it in a healthy manner, that we are able to maintain. We must set realistic targets and avoid the yo-yo culture that seems so easy to get into. A healthy weight loss program should look to lose around 2 pounds of body fat per week. This is the healthy and right way to lose weight. We will be less likely to put the weight on this way.

What Are Calories?

What are calories?

I think that a major problem is that people simply do not know what a calorie is. I hear and see people looking to lose weight and they purchase ‘low fat’ foods, and foods with reduced sugar. I am someone who does not advocate low fat foods because we need fat for our body so it is important to know what calories are and from there we can alter our diet to get the best from our bodies.

So what are calories?

Calories are, essentially, a measurement of energy. The technical definition of a calorie is how much energy it takes to change the temperature of one gram of water by 1 degree Celsius. As a matter of fact, when talking about food energy, a calorie is actually 1000 times more than 1! On food labels we will find ‘kcal’ and this literally means 1000 calories. However, 1000 calories (1 kcal) is generally referred to as 1 calorie.

So calories are needed for us to complete our daily lives. We each have different calorie requirements and this number varies depending on what we do for our job, our hobbies and our social lives. For the average adult, calorie intake is from 1500 to 3000 on a daily basis. It is important that we know how many calories we need to consume and that we do not go over this amount, or indeed below this amount, as we will gain or lose weight and body fat accordingly. However, our body can only use so many calories at one time, so whatever energy is not needed is stored as fat. This means that eating too many calories is why people gain fat.

A calorie break-down

Overall calorie consumption is the key to weight control but here is a break down of the amount of calories in protein, carbohydrates and fats, per 1 gram of each:

• Protein – 4 calories
• Carbohydrates – 4 calories
• Fats – 9 calories 

So calories are units of energy and we depend on them to live! Different nutrients have different amounts of calories in them, but it is overall calorie intake that we need to be aware of in order to control our weight and body fat storage.

Drinks and Calories

I regularly listen to the Jillian Michaels Podcasts and there is a regular guest doctor who appears on the show. We all know that fizzy drinks/sodas/pop, or whatever else you may call them, are not good. However, the doctor suggested that what we drink has had a major impact on weight gain, and suggested another major drink that can really hinder with regards to calorie intake. The drink(s) in question is fruit juice. I decided to investigate all of this further and so this blog will look into drinks and calories.

Fizzy drinks/sodas/pop

Firstly, fizzy drinks/sodas/pop. A medium coke at McDonalds (this is based on UK data) contains a massive 170 calories. For a drink this is quite remarkable to me. Too many of these drinks and the calories really begin to mount. It is really important, with regards to weight control, to not drink too many of these drinks.

Diet fizzy drinks

When choosing diet drinks the calorie intake and sugar intake is reduced significantly. However, other additions to the drink maybe even worse for us! So in terms of weight control these are good, but there are many issues with other things added to diet drinks.

Fruit Juice

It is pretty common knowledge that fruits contain plenty of sugar. However, this is not really a problem as fruits contain a lot of vitamins and minerals to make them worthwhile eating, plus the calories are not that high. Fruit juices, however, contain a large amount of calories. For example, 200ml of orange juice can have around 90 calories in it. The main issue, in my mind, with fruit juices is that we automatically expect them to be good for us and so have no worries when drinking them, however, the calories can easily add up through drinking them.

Overall fruit juice is the best of these types of drinks as they have far more nutritional value to them than the others but it is important to watch just how much we are drinking because of the relatively high calorie amounts.

Calorie Listings

On Twitter I saw a post that claimed calorie listings can be up 20% wrong. I found this fascinating. I decided to look further into this and found many different reports (just do a search on Google) that make claims that back this up. It appears that in restaurants the calorie amount listed may be accurate over an average.

“On average, the calorie counts were accurate. However, the lab analysis showed that 19% of the foods tested had 100 or more calories in excess of what was on the website.” (CNN)

Another report, however, is even more damning. This report suggests that on average, the food measured ten calories higher than what the restaurant had claimed.

With much focus on healthy eating and ‘calorie counting’ this makes things slightly harder!