Hey guys. I've been recommended a low calorie diet (not for weight, but for health), which I started last week. But I have a problem because this food can'r keep me full for long. Well except maybe for beans, but I can't eat it everyday you know why. I tried dividing meals into smaller portions and nibbles, but I still feel really hungry for most of the time. So I'd appreciate any suggestions, from veggies, meats, salads, sauces, etc. Thanks.
I like raw peeled carrots a lot, for snacks with a glass of water. 'Course we eat lots of fruits and vegetables so gas isn't an issue. Once your intestines have acquired sufficient of the proper bacteria to digest those veggies, gas is not an issue, and the right bacteria ride in on the raw vegetables. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Any calorie-based diet that is based on restricting intake will make you feel hungry more often than usual - but that said, there was a study done that showed if you eat your meals as a thick soup it will keep your stomach fuller than if eaten as a meal + water. E.g. If you take your normal meat+2 veg and glass of water and instead mixed them all into a thick soup, the soup version of the same food will keep you fuller for longer.
Soups are excellent. Make one with celery and onion (hardly any calories) carrots, parsnips and pot barley. Green peas with a little carrot and parsnip, and rice. Or a thick lentil soup, with finely chopped carrot and celery and a bit of garlic. Diced mushrooms, onions and tomato. For each of these soups, you may want to sautee the onions in a little vegetable oil, toss in chopped parsley and thicken with a tablespoon of flour before adding the other vegetables and water. In any soup, you can add tofu - I usually cut a bar of extra firm into 1/2" cubes and throw them in a deep skillet with a little vegetable oil, a sprinkle of black pepper and cayenne and a squirt of soy sauce, brown them and use like croutons. Mushrooms - boiled, baked, stir-fried or grilled are excellent. Spaghetti squash with low-fat meat or vegetarian tomato sauce. For an emergency snack: yogurt, Cheerios, toast, apple slices. Unsweetened tea (green or herb) instead of water; hot skim milk - warm fluids feel more satisfying than cold ones.
I think the benefit of a "low calorie" diet is that you don't get too fat, even if not doing all the exercise needed to keep trim with normal diet. So I don't understand your "not for weight, but for health" Health, comes not from calories but what foods you eat and recent studies also show that for good, cancer preventing, health, you need some daily intense exercise - developing a sweat can be done in 15 minutes. Eat a wide variety of items and your body will take what it needs. No solid fats, but some oil is useful. I have (after 40 or more hours of research at PubMed), developed a "Therapeutic Diet Supplement" TDS, for helping control my prostate cancer. (My prostatectomy, 7 year ago was not a cure.) The TDS has three time shown a "dose effect." Most dramatically when 6 aspirins in two days taken to reduce severe swelling in an injured wrist caused a bleeding ulcer and I did not take my TDS for 31 days while treating the ulcer. Its absence caused my PSA to increase 38% in that month. My TDS is: About 15 grams of Red Pepper (capsaicin), chopped fine* with 5 grams taken with each meal. I use Malagueta pepper which is a small, very hot (Scoville scale between 100,000 & 60,000 or at least 12 times hotter than a jalapeño). It is used in Brazil, Portugal and Mozambique, mainly to make a hot vinagar spice liquid for adding to restarunt food. In a few weeks as the dose increases, your tolerance increases to only slight almost pleasant "burning" and your stools will become soft, but it does not cause diarrhea. Too much can provoke "cold sweats" as capsaicin stimulate heat sensing nerves. (Your body "thinks" it is being slow cooked, and sweats to protect itself.) Because of the clear dose effect, my dose, is now just below this "physiological limit." An equal volume of ground moist raw garlic, (Organosulfur agents) avilable in 1 Kg tubs in Brazil, plus an equal volume of cooked tomato sauce or paste (for the Lycopene). These three fill a small glass in which they are mixed, and last two or three days, eaten with each meal. I also eat raw but washed, a head of Broccoli (for the isothiocyanates) each week (or 10 days if head is large). * Original idea was to cut the seeds where most of the capsaicin is, but that is not effective, so chewing it is better.
I can't eat beans either but because they give me a headache. I have split peas daily instead. Rather than small meals, I just eat a big multi course mostly vegetable and fruit meal that takes a long time to finish. I eat each course after it is done and then prepare the next one, except for the split peas, which require six or more hours hours to soak and then over an hour to cook. I have them ready well in advance. I begin the meal with fruit which is only at the beginning. I eat the split peas and oatmeal near the end. Generally, I recommend beginning with low calorie density foods and progress toward the somewhat denser ones. Definitely calorie dense foods should be kept in strict moderation.
