Is there any such things as the best food to eat to lose belly fat? Sure, there are fat burners that we can eat to increase our metabolism and curb appetite. But, if you are like me who does not like to rely on supplements, there are actually some other things that we can eat in order to lose belly fat.
Meet Vegetables And Protein
If I were to give the title of the best food to eat to lose belly fat, I will give it to vegetable and protein. Notice that I do not specify what type of vegetable or protein here. Basically any vegetable and protein (non-fat parts of the meats) can be used. On average, people are getting more carbohydrates in their daily meal than protein and vegetables (think pasta, breads, burger and fries). Carbohydrates is a very good source of energy as it supply glucose to our body. But in order to lose fat, we need to “mobilize” or burn the fat by using it as energy source. This can only be achieve if there is no to little glucose in our blood. So what we should do is to reduce carbohydrate intake, to reduce glucose in our blood stream and force our body to use our fat as energy source.
So You Say We Should Starve Ourselves?
Well, if you can. Lol. Reducing carbohydrate intake to very low levels will trigger ketosis, where our body will just use body fat as its main energy source. Fact is, most of us are working or doing some activity all day and that would require some energy, which has to be supplied by calories from our food. The fat metabolism is not so efficient and too slow. I’ve personally tried a zero carbohydrate and low calorie diet and I can barely even make it past 2 days. True, there are some people who can survive on zero carbohydrate alone but for me, I just cannot function properly without carbohydrate.
One Third Carbohydrate, Vegetable, Protein
Which is why I’m suggesting to eat more vegetables and proteins. By eating those more, and reducing our carbohydrate portions in every meal (not zero), we can reduce glucose in our blood stream, and help mobilize fat. My rule of thumb is to eat one third of carbohydrate, vegetable and protein in all our meals. That way, we will be able to strike a balance. The carbohydrate is much lower (typical meal will have 80% or more carbohydrate), meaning we will burn more body fat for our energy.
I’m personally still using this rule. As mentioned earlier, when I tried to reduce carbohydrate intake to zero, I just don’t have any energy to do anything. But since I’ve been eating following this rule, I can feel my energy level is up (since there are more carbohydrate) and my fat is reducing bit by bit. In my opinion, this is the perfect balance that we should strive. Forget about the food pyramid where carbohydrate is the biggest portion of our meals, and we should eat vegetable and protein lesser. That is just bullshit.
The Key Is Moderation
Another point that I would like to stress is moderation. You can eat using the one third rule above and not seeing any difference IF you keep eating excessively. Limit yourselves to only 3 meals everyday (breakfast, lunch and dinner). There should not be any snacking whatsoever in between the meals. Meaning no tea break, brunch, supper etc. For most of us, this will be quite a challenge but trust me, it will be much easier once you are a week or so into this new diet philosophy. I’ve also made a post before on the tactics to use smoothies as a weight loss tool. Do check it out.
No Sugar!
There is another carbohydrate source in our diet besides breads, pasta and rice and that is sugar. Sugar is basically glucose and fructose. The difference between sugar and natural carbohydrate is that is much faster to enter the blood stream. Carbohydrates need to be processed by our digestive system before it become glucose but since sugar is basically glucose, it can enter the blood stream straightaway.
And we all know that is not what we want right? We certainly don’t want any more carbohydrates inside our body. Not only that, sugar can also cause insulin spike and if taken in large amount for prolonged duration can cause insulin insensitivity. This will jeopardize our body’s natural system and make losing body fat a much tougher obstacle.
My suggestion then is to stop taking sugar in any form (drinks, cakes, store bought fruit juices, biscuits, etc.). Start drinking plain water or tea/coffee without sugar. This will truly make a huge difference in your body.
Conclusion
In closing, I would like to remind everyone to reduce our carbohydrate intake and increase more vegetable and protein in our mission to lose belly fat. Avoid sugar as if it is a disease (it is the main cause for many diseases btw. Lol). And lastly, eat everything in moderation. That’s all folks. Please share your questions, opinions or success stories below so that others can benefit from it. Alternatively, you can write an email to me at isaac@everythingsmoothie.com.
Stay healthy!