Skipping meals? Avoid bread,go for an apple first

Have a habit of skipping meals? A new study shows that people who sit down to eat after an overnight fast are more likely to ignore protein,fats and vegetables and head straight for high-calorie carbohydrates and starches first

Have a habit of skipping meals? A new study shows that people who sit down to eat after an overnight fast are more likely to ignore protein,fats and vegetables and head straight for high-calorie carbohydrates and starches first.

The news may not come as a surprise to long-term dieters,or anyone used to bingeing on pasta or potato chips on an empty stomach. But the study also revealed some telling details about food choices and the order in which we eat different kinds of foods. When given the opportunity to eat a salad and a plate of French fries,for example,people who started with the starchy food downed significantly more calories per meal than those who did the reverse.

The findings have implications for people who regularly miss meals,whether because of hectic schedules or for the deliberate purpose of losing weight. Nationwide,about 15 percent of adults say they have fasted to slim down,and a number of popular diets encourage intermittent fasting.

I think this emphasises the importance of controlling your environment as far as types of foods youre exposed to when youre hungry and how much of them you can get, said Aner Tal,a postdoctoral research associate in the Food and Brand Lab at Cornell and lead author of the study,published in Archives of Internal Medicine. Because otherwise,you will mindlessly choose foods that are less healthy for you.

Previous research has shown that hunger influences the amount of food intake. But the researchers wanted to know whether hunger would also cause people to gravitate toward certain types of foods. To find out,128 Cornell students were split into two groups 8211; one group was told to fast for 18 hours while the other acted as a control group and was not asked to fast. The groups were then provided with a buffet.

Over the course of 12 weekday lunches,it was found that those in the group that had fasted were more likely to begin their meals with starches about a third of the time.

Importantly, the researchers observed,starting their meal with a particular food led all participants to consume 46.7 percent more calories of it compared with other foods. Those who went straight for starches ultimately ate about 20 per cent more calories over all than their peers.

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For people who frequently find themselves ravenous after missing meals,Dr Tal said the lesson is to keep high-calorie foods out of reach and salads and fruit should be made more visible and easily within reach.