Evolve Personal Training

1. Learn to identify your spot on the hunger scale

Do you really know what hunger feels like? Before you can rein it in, you must learn to recognize the physical cues that signal a true need for nourishment. Prior to eating, use hunger scale below to help figure out your true food needs:

Starving
An uncomfortable, empty feeling that may be accompanied by light-headedness or jitteriness caused by low blood sugar levels from lack of food. Binge risk: high.

Hungry
Your next meal is on your mind. If you don’t eat within the hour, you enter dangerous “starving” territory.

Moderately hungry
Your stomach may be growling, and you’re planning how you’ll put an end to that nagging feeling. This is optimal eating time.

Satisfied
You’re satiated, not full but not hungry either. You’re relaxed and comfortable and can wait to nosh.

Full
If you’re still eating, it’s more out of momentum than actual hunger. Your belly feels slightly bloated, and the food does not taste as good as it did in the first few bites.

Stuffed
You feel uncomfortable and might even have mild heartburn from your stomach acids creeping back up into your esophagus.

2. Refuel every 4 hours

Still can’t tell what true hunger feels like? Set your watch. Moderate to full-fledged hunger is most likely to hit 4 to 5 hours after a balanced meal. Waiting too long to eat can send you on an emergency hunt for energy—and the willpower to make healthful choices plummets. When researchers in the United Kingdom asked workers to choose a snack just after lunch, 70% picked foods like candy bars and potato chips; the percentage shot up to 92% when workers chose snacks in the late afternoon. “Regular eating keeps blood sugar and energy stable, which prevents you from feeling an extreme need for fuel,” says Kate Geagan, RD, a Park City, UT-based registered dietitian.

To slim down: If you’re feeling hungry between meals, a snack of 150 calories should help to hold you over. Here are a few ideas: Munch on whole foods such as fruit and unsalted nuts—they tend to contain more fiber and water, so you fill up on fewer calories. Bonus: They’re loaded with disease-fighting nutrients.

Avoid temptation by packing healthful, portable snacks such as string cheese and dried fruit in your purse, desk drawer, or glove compartment.

3.  Eat breakfast without fail

A recent study published in the British Journal of Nutrition tracked the diets of nearly 900 adults and found that when people ate more fat, protein, and carbohydrates in the morning, they stayed satisfied and ate less over the course of the day than those who ate their bigger meals later on. Unfortunately, many Americans start off on an empty stomach: In one recent survey, consumers reported that even when they eat in the morning, the meal is a full breakfast only about one-third of the time.
 
To slim down: If you’re feeling full-blown hunger before noon, there’s a chance you’re not eating enough in the am. Aim for a minimum of 250 calories and make it a habit:
 
Prepare breakfast before bed (cut fruit and portion out some yogurt).
 
Stash single-serving boxes of whole grain cereal or packets of instant oatmeal and shelf-stable fat-free milk or soymilk at work to eat when you arrive.
 
Eat a late breakfast if you can’t stomach an early one. “Don’t force anything,” says John de Castro, PhD, a behavioral researcher and dean of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Sam Houston State University. “Just wait a while and eat at 9, 10, or even 11 am. It will help you stay in control later in the day.”

4. Build low-cal, high-volume meals 

Solid foods that have a high fluid content can help you suppress hunger. “When we eat foods with a high water content like fruits and vegetables, versus low-water content foods like crackers and pretzels, we get bigger portions for less calories,” says Barbara Rolls, PhD, author of The Volumetrics Eating Plan and a professor of nutritional sciences at Pennsylvania State University. Bottom line: You consume more food but cut calories at the same time. Rolls has found a similar effect in foods with a lot of air. In a recent study, people ate 21% fewer calories of an air-puffed cheese snack, compared with a denser one.

To slim down: Eat fewer calories by eating more food:

Start dinner with a salad, or make it into your meal (be sure to include protein such as lean meat or beans).

Choose fresh fruit over dried. For around the same amount of calories, you can have a whole cup of grapes or a measly 3 tablespoons of raisins.

Boost the volume of a low-cal frozen dinner by adding extra veggies such as steamed broccoli or freshly chopped tomatoes and bagged baby spinach.

5. Munch fiber all day long

Fiber can help you feel full faster and for longer. Because the body processes a fiber-rich meal more slowly, it may help you stay satisfied long after eating. Fiber-packed foods are also higher in volume, which means they can fill you up so you eat fewer calories. One review recently published in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association linked a high intake of cereal fiber with lower body mass index—and reduced risk of type 2 diabetes and heart disease.

To slim down: Aim to get at least 25 g of fiber a day with these tips:

Include produce such as apples and carrots—naturally high in fiber—in each meal and snack.

Try replacing some or all of your regular bread, pasta, and rice with whole grain versions.

6. Include healthy protein at each meal

When researchers at Purdue University asked 46 dieting women to eat either 30% or 18% of their calories from protein, the high-protein eaters felt more satisfied and less hungry. Plus, over the course of 12 weeks, the women preserved more lean body mass, which includes calorie-burning muscle.

To slim down: Boost your protein intake with these ideas:

Have a serving of lean protein such as egg whites, chunk light tuna, or skinless chicken at each meal. A serving of meat is about the size of a deck of cards or the palm of your hand—not including your fingers.

Build beans into your meals Black beans, chickpeas, and edamame (whole soybeans) are low in fat, high in fiber, and packed with protein.

(via healthyisclassy)

onesizejonah:

Stay satisfied with protein
Gram for gram, protein has the same number of calories as carbs (and half that of fat), but takes longer to digest, so you feel full longer. It also seems to help lower levels of the hormone ghrelin, which is known to stimulate appetite. In a Danish study of 60 men and women, those following a diet that included 25% of calories from protein lost nearly twice as much fat after 6 months than those eating a diet with 12% protein. Include a serving of lean protein with each meal and snack—eggs for breakfast, a turkey sandwich for lunch, low-fat or fat-free yogurt or milk for a snack, and grilled fish and vegetables for dinner.

(Source: hellahealthyhealthnut, via fromgymtoslim)

yogi-health:

Top 10 banana health facts:

1. According to a physiological psychology professor at Community College of New York, the expression “going bananas” derives from bananas’ effects on the brain.
2. Bananas contain three natural sugars: sucrose, fructose, and glucose along with fiber, which provide an instant sustained and substantial energy boost.
3. Just two bananas provide enough energy for a strenuous 90-minute workout.
4. Bananas are known to have a positive impact on everything from depression and PMS, to anemia, high blood pressure, constipation, hangovers, heartburn, morning sickness, mosquito bites, ulcers, and nerves.
5. The potassium in bananas is also known to improve brain power in students, making them more alert.
6. Bananas can help lower blood sugar levels and reduce stress, helping alleviate the desire to gorge on comfort foods.
7. Bananas can help lower the physical and emotional temperature of expectant moms.
8. The natural mood enhancers bananas contain, tryptophan, can help those dealing with Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD).
9. The magnesium, potassium, B6, and B12 in bananas can help smokers trying to kick the habit recover from the effects of nicotine withdrawal.
10. Regular banana consumption can cut the risk of death by stroke by up to 40 percent!

(via fromgymtoslim)

(via fromgymtoslim)

It’s raining on the coast tonight, what a way to have dinner a lovely vegetable roast freshly picked from the garden. The combination of beetroot, pumpkin, mild chili,capsicum combined with butter beans,green beans herbs and feta cheese.

Yummy Summers almost here and this looks great after an early PT session, extremely high in anti oxidants and filling enough to take you through to that mid morning protein snack

A cup of muesli or oats,small serving of almonds crushed,apple,strawberries,blue berries,res-berries and any other fruits you like, just add milk!

Allow the milk to soak into the grains.

(Source: healthierways, via fromgymtoslim)

Fruity Antioxidants Trifle

I don’t know if I’m the only one who’s like this, but I feel fuller and more satisfied if I eat something that’s healthy but also LOOKS vibrant. So I made this little dessert tonight =] Here’s how:

• Cut a small apple into cubes (keep skin on, for fibre) and stew in a small saucepan in apple juice for 10 minutes. You can add some nutmeg, like I did =)
• Dice up a few strawberries…and don’t do anything to them. Keep them raw and nutritious! They taste great without cooking =)
• Grab some frozen blueberries and replace the apples in the pan, with them (the blueberries). Cook them a bit so that you get a bit of a sauce (2 mins? Since pan is still hot…)
• Layer this up in a nice glass and Voila! 
• I didn’t have any, but if you have some thick vanilla or fruity yoghurt, add it in the trifle layers and on top. Don’t use the thin runny yoghurt…it won’t taste as luscious…But you can if you want to of course =)

You like? Follow Healthysnax for more pretty food =)

(via healthysnax)