Feeling hungry dooms diets, says Barbara Rolls, professor of nutritional sciences at Pennsylvania State University and author of The Volumetrics Eating Plan. Her solution: Fill up on big portions of low-calorie foods.
"We were surprised to discover that the weight of food consumed is what turns off the urge to eat and creates a feeling of satiety, or fullness," Rolls says. Researchers once thought the number of calories consumed triggered satiety.
Generally, a person eats about the same quantity of food daily, she says. Simply eating foods that weigh more but are low in calories--"low caloric density"--staves off hunger.
Best bets: food high in water content, because water has zero calories but weighs a lot. (A fat gram has 9 calories; a gram of carbohydrates has 4 calories.)
Rolls has found that water-bulked foods help block appetite and calorie intake.
In one test, people who ate 3 cups of a low-calorie garden salad (vegetables have lots of water) before a pasta main course ate 100 fewer calories than a salad-free meal. The salad filled them up, so they ate less, Rolls says.
And in a year-long study of 200 overweight men and women, those who ate two bowls of soup daily lost 50% more weight than those who ate the same number of calories in two calorie-dense snacks daily.
Copyright 2004 Jean Carper. Printed first in USA Weekend. All rights reserved.
For more information from Jean Carper, go to www.Jeancarper.com
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