How the speed of our eating determines our weight. According to the British Medical Journal, people who switched from wolfing down their food, to eating at a more relaxed pace, consistently lost weight. So how slow do you have to go? Aim for about 30 chews per mouthful. The average person chews their food only 15 times before swallowing. Or stretch your eating time from 11 minutes, which is the average time it takes to finish a meal, to at least 20 minutes.
And here are a few other tricks for slowing down your eating from registered dietician Toby Smithson:
- Choose “active” snacks. That means snacks that take work to eat……Like shelling peanuts. Having to crack nuts creates a delay……and seeing the shells is a visual reminder of how much you’ve eaten, making you more mindful.
- At meals, eat more vegetables. They’re harder to chew. But chewing more, until food is mushy in your mouth, allows the body to absorb more nutrients. So fill half your plate with vegetables.
- Finally, give yourself a pausing point, by putting down your fork between each bite. And don’t pick it up again until you’ve chewed 30 times and swallowed.
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