Brooke Alpert is a nutritionist and the founder of B Nutritious, a private nutrition counseling practice based in New York City. She blogs for us about how to stay healthy, fit, and centered during even the craziest of work weeks.
Think that a long leisurely lunch will help you eat less for the rest of the day? Some new research suggests otherwise. A study published last month in the Journal of Nutrition found that people who had a two-hour meal didn’t eat less over the rest of their day than those who spent just 30 minutes eating.
Having a long lunch (or any other long meal) can lead to different outcomes for different people. For some of my clients, long work lunches lead to eating more calories from multiple courses that they otherwise wouldn’t have had. For others, the leisurely speed of the meal allows them to be more aware of their hunger levels and feel more satisfied than they would be if they’d just been shoveling in food at their desk.
Although this particular study focused more on what (and how) people ate after their meals, I think an important message here is the meal itself. I’m just as guilty as anyone of eating at my desk. In fact, I happen to like eating there, in part because of the control it lends me. I only have exactly what I ordered, and I don’t have the option of the breadbasket or perhaps a latte or cookies at the end of the meal. For me, that works.
For others, eating at their desks means hurrying to meet a deadline and paying no attention to hunger levels or even what they’re eating. That’s hardly ideal. Lunch should be a time to get refreshed, and that’s why the idea of Take Back Your Lunch is so appealing to me and other nutritionists who help busy working people.
So what works for you–and how can you make it work even better?
If you tend to eat leisurely lunches in restaurants, try to:
1. Avoid the free stuff: skip the bread basket, the rolls, the biscotti, etc.
2. Have an idea of what you want to eat before you’re sitting down and handed the menu. Sites like menupages.com can help you plan ahead and avoid impulsive ordering.
3. When you’re done with your plate, ask the waiter to remove it so that the remaining food isn’t there to tempt you to eat more.
4. Excuse yourself from the table briefly–taking a break often helps prevent overeating.
If you usually eat at your desk, try to:
1. Lay out your food and make an assessment of how much you’ll eat.
2. Try to take a few minutes to just enjoy your food without working. That break will make a difference in how satisfied you feel.
3. Take breaks as you eat. Put down your fork or sandwich, and take some time between bites.
What kind of lunch do you have most often? Is there anything you’d like to change about the way you eat?
[Photo: Gisela Francisco/flickr]
