Podcast > Episodes

episode #59

Is Snacking Beneficial?

September 3, 2021 in Podcast

Intro

Trends in America show that in the 1970s people were mostly eating 3 meals a day — breakfast, lunch, and dinner. By 2004, people were eating closer to 5 to 6 times per day and the trend has continued to 2020. Controlling blood sugar and insulin is key to optimal health and having sustained energy throughout the day. Keeping glycemic variability to a minimum will help prevent type 2 diabetes and avoid crashing throughout the day. Here are some common food cravings and what they could mean for you: When you crave something crunchy like pretzels or potato chips, you could be yearning for salt, which could indicate you are thirsty and need to drink more water. Sugar releases serotonin, the feel-good chemical, which fires off in your brain. If you’re craving sweets, you may actually need a mood boost. If you want starchy white carbs like bread, pasta or crackers, your craving comes from the same place as your craving of sweets; your body treats them the same way. If you’re mentally or emotionally exhausted and need a boost, you may crave these calorie-dense foods. When you’re feeling down, you may crave the foods your parents made for you when you were sick or sad as a child. Chicken noodle soup, meatloaf, lasagna, mac and cheese and mashed potatoes are all examples of heavy comfort foods that you may still believe will make you feel loved. TIPS To Help with Snacking: -Eat nutrient-dense satiating meals (as mentioned above). It will be easier to wait longer for your next meal. -Don’t buy senseless snack food, drink mineral water between meals and close the kitchen between meals. -Make it a habit to eat your meals at a table. That way you are not eating in the car, movie theatre, on the couch, and anywhere else. -Drink Mineral or Sparkling Water when feel hunger coming on. -Distract Yourself — Go for a walk, play a game or read. Bottom line is if you want to gain weight eat 4-6 meals per day or if you want to lose weight eat 1-2 meals with minimum snacking. The main idea is to eat less often, not to eat less. Also, by avoiding frequent snacking and not eating till you are actually hungry, you can normalize your ghrelin levels (hunger hormone). If you love the Get Lean Eat Clean Podcast, we’d love for you to subscribe, rate, and give a review on iTunes. Until next time!

0 (1s): Hello, and welcome to the get lean and eat clean podcast. My name is Brian grin. I'm a certified health coach, trainer and author. And this podcast is for middle-aged men and women looking to optimize their health and get their bodies back to what it once was 10 to 15 years ago. I will give you simple, actionable items to get long-term sustainable results. Thanks for listening and enjoy the show. 1 (32s): All right, welcome to the get lean eat clean podcast. My name is Brian grin, and I hope you had a wonderful weekend. I'm looking forward to this week. It's not only my birthday week, but it's also the U S open is this week. If you're a golf fan and then father's day is on Sunday. So it's going to be a great week. And I hope you're enjoying these micro podcasts. I do every Tuesday just to give you actionable tips that can get your results. And then obviously on Friday are the longer interviews with different hugs, health experts from all over the country. So hope you're enjoying the podcast. I am, I love meeting new people and just laying some tips so you can get results. 1 (1m 13s): Now this week, I want to touch on actually a topic that came up with Megan Ramos and Megan Ramos was the guest of mine a few weeks ago. And you know, typically at the end of the interview, I asked, what's your one tip to get your body back. Maybe if you're in your fifties or sixties or forties, and you want to get back to when you were in the twenties and what was her one tip, not snacking. And I said, you know what? This is going to be worth doing a podcast on because I really think it can be that impactful. Not only just for your health, but just mindset throughout the day. You know, if you're only going to have three meals a day, which is completely fine, because back in the 1970s, 60 seventies, when obesity wasn't around, really not as much as it is today, people didn't really snack are three whole meals. 1 (2m 4s): And that was it. Now because of all these food companies and snack companies, they tell you, you got to eat 5, 6, 7 times a day. Obviously they want you to, because they're saying you need more energy and you needed to get glucose for your brain and feed your brain. Well, none of this is true. It's all been debunked. You don't need to be snacking throughout the day to have energy. I actually find I have more energy when I have nothing in my system. And when you're fasting and you do stuff and you do that for a while, you realize, yeah, God, you know, even if I eat a really healthy meal, it's still sort of weighs you down a little bit, but I've been trying to eat lighter and lighter first meals of the day. 1 (2m 47s): So the rest of my day, I feel that energy. And then towards the end of the day, I typically have a bigger meal, but that's when I don't have anything really much else to do for the day. Is that, is that difficult? You know, I try to do all my, let's just say all my producing activities in the morning and early afternoon. And then in the, after that is when I typically have my meals. So either way, if you can get in the habit of not snacking, I'm going to talk about it today. Because us, as in, you know, in the United States and in the world has gone to this trend of, you know, there's a Starbucks on every corner and do you need to snack five, six times a day? 1 (3m 30s): And that is just not true. So if you can take one thing from this, let's leave snacking to a minimum. Now, if you're getting food cravings, there's a lot of things you can do. I'm going to give you some tips to get over snacking. But I, I th I found some cool information on if you're having certain cravings, what is this, what this might mean? So if you crave something crunchy like pretzels or potato chips, you could be yearning for more salt. So this could indicate that you were thirsty and need to drink more water. Now I would recommend adding a quality sea salt, maybe a Redmond, sea salt to your water, or like a mineral drop as well. You could do mineral drops in your water, or just by mineral water, or even sparkling water, which has minerals in it. 1 (4m 17s): So this will really help if you're craving things that are, you know, sort of salty. Now, sugar is another big one sugar releases serotonin, and we all know it can be very addicting. That's sort of the feel good chemical. So that'll fire off in your brain and it just becomes addicting. So if you're craving sweets, perhaps you need a mood boost. Now a mood boost could be yoga, could be going for a walk, some type of meditation. I like to do both of those. And so if you're, if you're craving sugar, perhaps, maybe, maybe it needs a little bit of a mood boost and try some meditation or yoga. 1 (4m 58s): Now, if you want something starchy, like white carbs, bread, pasta, crackers, that'll come from the same area that the sweets will come by. Cause that'll just turn to sugar really quick. So again, we'll talk about it, but if you're craving those things, a lot of times, you're not having a satiating meal in itself. And if you're eating nutrient dense foods, which I'm gonna talk about in a second, that will really help. Now if you're feeling down and a lot of times people eat just it's like comfort food, right? So this could be like meatloaf. I dunno, chicken noodle, soup, lasagna. And maybe these are things that you had when you were a kid. So if you're having these heavy comfort suits, maybe need to feel a little bit more loved, or perhaps you need to talk to someone never hurts to talk to a third party. 1 (5m 45s): If you need some help with that. But maybe you just need to give out a little bit more love and get it back from the universe. So those are just some fun things. I found that if you're having these cravings, this is what it could mean. Now, let me give you some tips to help. If you're snacking all the time. One, like I mentioned before, eat nutrient dense satiating foods. I can't stress this enough. This is make protein. The, the staple of your meal. I've talked about this a lot on podcasts, and then it'll be easier to not snack. If you're having something that really fills you up instead of having pizza. And you're having a, I don't know, let's having your eggs, maybe with a little bit of ground meat in there or eggs and avocado something, you know, something with some healthy fats and some good protein that will be more satiating. 1 (6m 39s): You'll be, you won't be, you won't have, you won't want to snack as much. And you'll also have better blood sugar maintenance. Secondly, don't buy senseless, snack food. Gosh. I mean, if you don't buy it, you won't eat it. You know, this is so important. And I try to stress this with all my clients. Thirdly, make it a habit to eat all your meals at, at a table. I know sometimes we're on the go and we're eating in our car or eating at a movie theater. You really want to make it, make sure that you're eating at the table. And that way you'll avoid snacking because a lot of people snack when they go out to the movie or they're in the car, or I'm trying to think of somewhere else, but let's just say a ballpark. 1 (7m 27s): Okay? If I go to a ball game, that's fine. If you want to splurge every once in a while. But for the most part, I'm just going to drink water. Because a lot of times the Cubs games, especially in the summer, it's hot. And I don't think you need to be snacking on pretzels and nachos. So I know it's boring, but sorry, a fourth drink, mineral sparkling water. This is a big one. I think sparkling water is such a great one. You could even do some tea or coffee every so often with no sweeteners in it and that, and that'll sort of help your hunger come around. So, so when you start get that inkling for hunger, another one is distract yourself, go for a walk. I think this is so key after if you can, after every meal, go for a walk because a lot of times snacking will happen right after you eat. 1 (8m 12s): That's what I do a lot of times, especially in the evening, have dinner, go for a walk. By the time you get back, you probably don't have any more cravings and just close the kitchen. So those are some tips. Take a few of them, implement them in your life. Bottom line. If you want to gain weight, eat four or five, six meals a day. Do you want to lose some weight and feel lean and light throughout the day? Shoot the eat one or two meals with minimum snacking. It really will go a long way. So the main idea is to eat less often, not to eat less. And that's a good point to eat less often, but not to eat less. So you can have a nice satiating meal that fills you up and, you know, eat the same amount that you normally eat, but just don't snack. 1 (9m 1s): So like, for example, if you'd love beef jerky, okay, I'm a, I'm a big fan of beef jerky. We started making it ourselves. Well, you could, let's just say, if you're going to snack on something, that's not a bad thing to have. If you want to sort of wean off your snacks, but eventually you want to just have a nice satiating meal and then wait four hours or whatever it is before your next meal. So I hope this helps. Let me know if you have any questions, have a great week. It's my birthday, actually. It's my birthday today, June 14th, when I'm recording this, but have a great rest of your day and I will talk to you later. Thanks so much for listening. Hey, get lean equally nation. Are you a man between the ages of 40 and 60 years old looking to lose inches around your waist have significantly more energy throughout the day and gain muscle all while minimizing the risk of injuries? 1 (9m 52s): Well, I'm looking for three to five people to work one-on-one with in my fat burner blueprint signature program, which I've developed by utilizing my 15 years experience in the health and fitness space. This programs designed specifically for those committed to making serious progress towards our health goals. Over the next six months, we will focus on sleep, stress, nutrition, meal, timing, and building lean muscle. If this sounds like a fit for you, email me@bryanatbriangrin.com with the subject line blueprint. That's brian@briangrin.com with the subject line blueprint. 0 (10m 35s): Thanks for listening to the get lean eat clean podcast. I understand there are millions of other podcasts out there and you've chosen to listen to mine. And I appreciate that. Check out the show notes@briangrin.com for everything that was mentioned in this episode, feel free to subscribe to the podcast and share it with a friend or family member. That's looking to get their body back to what it once was. Thanks again, and have a great day.

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