Does Toasting Compromise Your Desired Dress Size?

Does Toasting Compromise Your Desired Dress Size?
by Catherine Sissons, NOVA's Nutritionist and Personal Trainer

Making toast for breakfast and toasting your friends at the Christmas party can have a similar affect by compromising a healthy body weight. At NOVA you can learn how to toast and eat it too.

Toast is made from flour; even the multigrain varieties contain flour that binds the grains together. Flour in in its raw form was once wheat (or another grain) before it was harvested and milled into flour. Flour is a versatile ingredient
found in a variety of baked foods and products such as pasta, pastry, noodles, wraps, pita breads, mountain bread, cakes, biscuits and muffins.

One cup of flour alone is close to 1500kJ, if you eat too many kilojoules for your age, height, weight and live a less active lifestyle your metabolism can start to store the extra kilojoules as body fat. Kilojoules are a measure of food energy and is a metric equivalent to calories. There are about 4 kilojoules to every 1 calorie. The average kilojoule requirement of a main meal for women is between 1800kJ -3000kJ (this figure will depend on age, height, weight, activity level and metabolic rate of an individual).

Flour based foods are not very satisfying because they are low in natural fibre and water content. Fibre was lost in processing from grain to flour and water was removed upon harvest. Adding flour and water together is an old recipe for glue so imagine what it is doing inside your digestive system. Flour based foods are not usually eaten in isolation; they become satisfying based on what is added to them to improve the taste. Spreads usually consist of fats and sugars.

Not all is lost you can still eat flour based foods but it depends what size your portion is and how frequently you eat them. You can balance your meal that contains flour based food by adjusting the foods you eat at your next eating time and by adding fibre rich fruit or vegetables like apples, celery, coleslaw and asparagus to help promote healthy digestion.

Celebrating a toast with your friends
Alcohol is a food group of its own and diluted by water to give us the different alcoholic beverages with various alcohol percentages. The liver is the largest internal organ and responsible for metabolizing everything that enters the body. Drinking alcohol creates metabolic change within our digestive systems due to its toxicity so when alcohol is consumed the liver prioritises the processing of alcohol over other food groups.

If your liver is busy processing alcohol other food groups such as fat can be stored in the lower section of the liver. When the liver gets overloaded it can send the extra fat out to where it is stored best – in your fat cells. Fat cells can be duplicated to provide endless storage capacity of body fat so when one fat cell gets too full another will be made to house the extra body fat.

Alcohol also compromises absorption of important vitamins and minerals such as Vitamin B12 and other B vitamins that are important for energy as well as Zinc, Potassium, Calcium and Vitamin A. It is important to get all your required nutrients as part of balanced diet. It is possible however to enjoy a toast during the Christmas but it is important to eat foods rich in Vitamin B and C before you have alcohol.

Foods that are rich in B vitamins and could be included before drinking alcohol are carrots, potatoes, cabbage, kumara, broccoli, cauliflower, mushrooms, asparagus, plus salmon and chicken. Foods rich in Vitamin C are capsicums, strawberries, lemons, coleslaw, tomatoes and oranges.

Alcohol also is a diuretic causing water loss. The blood has about 90% water content so if a little amount is lost then the blood can become thicker creating more stress of the heart to pump it around. This can lead to increased carbohydrate requirement usually in the easiest form to absorb such as flour or sugar.

Other articles:
It's not what we are drinking, it's when we are drinking
Super foods for socialising

About Catherine Sissons
Catherine Sissons - BSc Human Nutrition 2005, PGDip Sports Med 2009, NOVA's Nutritionist and Personal Trainer, is a regular contributor to wisanow.co.nz

Catherine has now educated and supported hundreds of people throughout Dunedin, Christchurch, Hamilton and Auckland to their desired body weight by including the foods they love to eat. Catherine's qualifications and experience have helped her understand people of all ages and lifestyles.  Her clients have ranged between 9 - 70 years old and are both men and women.

Catherine says, "My experience as a nutrition and fitness specialist throughout New Zealand has taught me that one size does not fit every person and people want to include the foods and drinks they love, but still achieve weight loss."

Contact details:
Catherine Sissons -BSc, PGDipSportsMed
Nova Nutrition & Exercise Innovation
Level 1, 32 Market Place
Viaduct Harbour
Auckland
021528302
www.novanutrition.co.nz