Fight Flab With Fibre - A Diet Plan That Is Healthy and Effective

Fad diets come and go, but one has stood the test of time. Not only that, it is a diet that is recommended by many dietitians because of the benefits it brings to your general health. Compare that to many of the recent fad diets that encourage you to cut out food groups and are widely criticised for being unhealthy. You really can fight flab with fibre and get a range of other health benefits at the same time.

fibre is essential in our diet. Insoluble fibre will help your digestive system to work efficiently by ensuring food passes through the gut. Insoluble fibre will also help your digestive system, but at the same time it will absorb cholesterol. Lower cholesterol will mean lower risk of heart disease and stroke. Some claim the healthier gut action will also protect you from some cancers.

So how do you get all those health benefits and use a high fibre diet to lose weight?

It is really fairly simple. If you increase your fibre intake to around 20g -30g each day and go for low calorie options your body will begin to use the energy reserves it has saved and your fat will begin to burn away.

There is even more good news. High fibre diets will help you to feel full for longer. This is because fibre remains in your stomach for longer, leaving you feeling satisfied. You also have to chew high fibre foods more and this will slow down your eating making it more likely you will notice the signals that your brain sends to tell you that you have eaten enough.

By making some fairly easy choices you can increase the amount of fibre that you eat. Try to choose "brown" rather than "white", brown rice and pasta, wholemeal bread. Wherever you can leave skins on vegetables. Add a few high fibre top-ups by scattering seeds onto your pasta sauce or adding dried fruit to cereal and yogurt.

This list of high fibre foods will give you a good start.

Baked Jacket Potato
Beans
Pulses such as lentils and peas
Bananas
Apricots (particularly dried)
Oats
Wholegrain cereal
Fresh and dried fruits
Nuts
Seeds

The great thing is most of the high fibre foods are also very low in fat. So it really isn't that difficult to make high fibre and low calorie/fat choices. Use these high fibre suggestions to accompany low fat meat choices such as skinless chicken and you will easily hit the target amounts for fibre and low calories. If you include one or two meat free days each week you will boost your weight loss still further. There is plenty of protein in beans, nuts and seeds.

To make this diet really effective make sure you also drink plenty of water, around 6-8 glasses each day. One word of warning try not to go over 40g of fibre each day as this can make food pass too quickly and can lead to mineral and vitamin deficiency.

If you would like more detailed advice go to burnflab.org burnflab.org where you will find example diet plans and a list of food with their burnflab.org Fiber and Calorie Content