Why to eat small frequent meals for health?

Why to eat small frequent meals for health?




Right from infancy, our mothers feed us frequently and constantly. This is how our body is accustomed to eating small frequent meals right from our inception health about. The need to eat small, frequent meals stems from the fact that we need to keep the digestive system working constantly. This further finds it basis in a simple rule of thumb that the moment we eat, our fiercely active digestive system starts working and only rests once the digestion is complete. This is a kind of an involuntary workout going on inside the body. This is the reason, substantiated by research that we need to eat frequently to be able to burn more calories at regular intervals of time.



Apart from the aforesaid reason, there are quite a good number of objectives and goals that are met due to frequent nibbling (on healthy snacks).They are:

It definitely gears up our metabolic rate. Our body is assured that it gets something every two hours, hence our metabolic rate increases.

It keeps the glucose levels in the blood constant. Better still, there is not much load on the pancreas to secrete insulin as the blood sugar levels are constant and not too high. It is only when there are excess sugar levels that our body needs more insulin to store it in the form of fat. Hence, constant sugar level means less insulin production and eventually less fat storage and weight gain it health

When we eat every two hours, our body stays satiated and therefore we do not tend to overeat when eating after long gaps. Also, not eating for long; pushes our body into starvation mode, in which it tries to capture whatever we eat and store it into fat for future crisis.

The two hormones leptin, ghrelin work in tandem to keep us fit and are released in response to eating or not eating or after the food is digested. Leptin is a hormone which sends the satiety signal to the brain. Ghrelin sends hunger signals to the brain. When we eat frequently, our body secretes adequate levels of leptin and therefore our body stays full and satisfied throughout the day.

However, there are several things that we should ensure to reap the best benefits of eating frequently. First and foremost is that we need to eat something which our body takes time to digest and as a result has to burn more calories to digest the foodstuff. These foods include the fibrous foods which have more roughage like salads, vegetables, fruits and whole grains. Proteins like milk, dals, meat and eggs raise the metabolic rate by as high as 30% while the fibrous foods up it by 10%.On the other hand, the simple and refined carbohydrates take very less time to digest and hence use up lesser calories. Another thing that we need to ensure is that we should take snacks that provide from 100 – 200 calories and the meal from 300-500 calories. The food taken over and above gets stored as fat. So, go ahead and eat the entire day, now that you know what to eat and how much to eat to be able to maintain excellent health.

courtesy : sanjeev kapoor

No comments: