Weight Loss: Try These Healthy Summer Foods to Burn Fat
Summer’s here and it’s the perfect time to
hang out at the beach or to experience the great outdoors. However, it’s
also the season where many of us tend to indulge ourselves in some
unhealthy foods – from ice creams to deep-fried seafood. Giving in to
these delicious comfort foods is easy but getting rid of the extra
pounds they bring is NOT.
So, if you are trying to lose weight this
summer, then apart from making sure you exercise right, you should also
add some healthy foods to your diet. But how do we begin? What foods do
we add? Thankfully, with most fresh fruits and vegetables reaching peak
ripeness in the summer, you have a plethora of options that will help
you burn those extra pounds. The ideal foods for weight loss in summer
should be light and nutritious and should fill you up without weighing
you down. Some of the summer foods mentioned below fit that bill.
1. Cherries
Cherries aren’t just delicious to eat; they
are also pretty low in calories and sugar. Moreover, they are a
low-glycemic fruit and will help with blood sugar regulation.
Cherries are also rich in resveratrol, an antioxidant that has been
proven to help reduce weight. Research conducted by scientists at
Washington State University, Pullman, showed that when mice were given
food that contained high doses of resveratrol, they ended up converting
the excess white fat from their bodies into brown fat, which can
increase metabolism and aid weight loss by burning calories.
2. Tomatoes
Tomatoes have high amounts of water and fiber and
are extremely low in calories. A medium-sized tomato, for example, has
just 22 calories. These juicy and versatile fruits are also packed with
antioxidants, particularly lycopene, that can reduce inflammation in the
body and hence help control leptin levels, a hormone that suppresses
food intake and thereby induces weight loss.
The great thing about tomatoes is that you can use them in a variety of
ways in your meals - in soups, salads, curries, or salsa. Just start
eating them regularly and reap their benefits for shedding weight.
3. Watermelon
90 percent of a watermelon's weight is
water, making it one of the best fruits to eat if you're trying to lose
weight according to health experts. Studies have shown that eating
fruits with high water content may help you shed extra weight. Being so
rich in water also makes these delicious fruits the best ones to have to
fend off dehydration-related hunger.
Furthermore, a 100-gram serving contains only 30 calories. More
importantly, watermelons are a great source of arginine, an amino acid
that stimulates the production of brown fat in turn helps burn fat
quickly.
Apart from being low in calories, watermelons are rich in fiber,
potassium, and antioxidants, like vitamin C, beta-carotene, and
lycopene.
4. Cantaloupe
Cantaloupes are always a hit during the
summer months, when these fruits are at their freshest and sweetest.
This nutritious food is loaded with vitamin C, fiber, potassium, along
with small amounts of zinc, copper, phosphorous, calcium, magnesium, and
other minerals.
This juicy melon is one of the most filling fruits you can eat and
having just half a cup of the fruit will squash hunger pangs for at
least a couple of hours. Further, cantaloupe doesn’t contain any fat and
has only 60 calories, making it a great addition to any weight loss
plan.
5. Beetroot
Beetroot isn’t most people's favorite food, due to its earthy and
slightly bitter taste, but this root vegetable is packed with fiber,
which reduces appetite and helps keep you full for a longer period of
time. Also, a 100 gram serving of cooked beetroot contains only around
37-40 calories and has virtually no fat.
If you don’t like cooked beetroot, try having beetroot juice instead.
Here’s the recipe:
Ingredients:
* 2 cups chopped beetroot
* Half cup water
* 5 tbsp. lemon juice
* A pinch of salt
* A few mint leaves
* You can even add other veggies such as carrot, apple, or lemon, to
improve the taste.
Method:
* Add the beetroots (and any other veggie you have chosen) and mint
leaves to a blender and blend them thoroughly.
* Add water, lemon juice, and salt.
* Stir well, and pour in a glass.
A fresh glass of beetroot juice every morning will fuel your body with
nutrients and will be ideal for keeping your weight under check.
6. Yogurt
Having a cup of yogurt during the summer months won’t just help you cool
down, it may also help burn fat and promote weight loss, according to a
study published in an issue of the International Journal of Obesity.
Researchers found that those obese adults who ate three servings of
fat-free yogurt a day lost 22% more weight and 61% more body fat than
those who just cut calories. The study also found that the participants
who ate yogurt lost 81% more fat in the stomach area than non-yogurt
eaters. "Not only did yogurt help the study participants lose more
weight -- the average weight loss was 14 pounds -- they were about twice
as effective at maintaining lean muscle mass," says Michael Zemel,
Ph.D., professor of nutrition at the University of Tennessee, one of the
researchers of the study.
Yogurt is filled with calcium, protein, and vitamins. Low-fat Greek
yogurt, particularly, contains twice as much satiating protein as
traditional yogurt and can keep you feeling fuller longer, thus
controlling appetite. Furthermore, research has associated calcium with
lower levels of abdominal fat as it may help increase fat burn, reduce
fat absorption, and slightly speed up metabolism. So now you have more
reasons to eat yogurt every day during summer.
7. Spinach
Spinach is popularly used in refreshing summer
salads and is easily one of the most nutritious foods you can have.
One
cup (30g) of raw spinach contains:
Calories: 6.9
Protein: 0.85 g
Fats: 0.11 g
Carbohydrates: 1.09 g
As you can see, this leafy vegetable is quite low in calories and is
high in proteins. It is also loaded with vitamin A, vitamin C, iron,
folate, calcium, potassium, and magnesium.
There's also some research on spinach's effectiveness in helping losing
weight. For instance, a study published in the US National Library of
Medicine - National Institute of Health found that women who were on a
three-month weight-loss plan and consumed 5 grams of spinach every day
registered 43 percent greater weight loss than others.
Spinach is also rich in insoluble fiber which is the key element that
aids in weight loss as we mentioned before. It’s low in calories and
very low in fats and can easily be added to your summer salad.
8. Chilled Soups
Cold soups can be amazing to cool down your
body when the weather heats up. Chilled soups like Gazpacho, Carrot
Summer Soup, or Cucumbers with Dill which consist of plenty of chunky
vegetables will make for great additions to a weight-loss diet plan.
Research suggests that having low-calorie, broth-based soups will help
fill you and hence reduce meal energy intake. This will ensure that you
don’t end up unnecessarily overeating or stuffing yourself with some
unhealthy foods.