What is a negative calorie food, anyway? Is it just another diet gimmick, or can they really help you lose weight and keep it off? First of all, there is no such thing as a “negative calorie” – all foods have calories.

When people talk about “negative calorie foods” they are referring to foods that require more energy expended to digest them than you ingest when eating them. Example: water. Water isn’t technically a food, but it has zero calories. When you drink water, your body has to expend energy to absorb and process the water, so you now have a “negative calorie” effect, where you have burned more calories than you ingested. (more…)

When losing weight, it’s important to consider the quality of the food you eat rather than going by calorie count alone. A 100 calorie cookie and a 100 calorie serving of antioxidant-rich berries are miles apart in quality. A cookie may help satisfy your craving for sweets but it’s not going to provide quality fuel for your body.

Below are four foods that are delicious and nutritious, providing high-quality fuel to keep your energy and vitality up as the numbers on the scale go down. (more…)

By Zara Buckley

People have been saying that vinegar is good for you for generations. In ages gone by, grandmothers used to wash the children’s hair in vinegar to get rid of lice. If you drink it, it’s supposed to be even better. People say it moves toxins out of your body, cures fungus on the skin, eases constipation and helps with the common cold.

Vinegar also has a reputation for taking charge of our blood sugar levels, stops us from wanting to eat sugar and gets our appetite down to a healthy level. Some say it also breaks down fat in the body. You will also find that there are scientific studies that seem to indicate that vinegar helps promote that full feeling while we are eating, which hopefully means we stop eating when we are full. (more…)

When you’re trying to lose weight, every calorie counts. The problem is that sometimes it can be hard to reduce calories without sacrificing taste. Below are some great ideas for healthy substitutions that can help you reduce calories and fat but still enjoy great flavor: (more…)

Fat. The very word makes most dieters cringe, due to overzealous “experts” who made us believe that ingesting a single fat molecule would keep us fat forever. Luckily, we know better now. The truth is that certain fats are crucial in maintaining good health. They contain fatty acids to help keep skin healthy, they help lower “bad” cholesterol (LDL) and raise “good” cholesterol (HDL) contributing to better heart health, and it helps keep you satiated so you eat less overall.

When it comes to health and weight loss, there are “bad” fats and “good” fats. (more…)

By John L. Phillip

Research from the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition indicates that resveratrol has a powerful effect on our metabolism and our ability to effectively lose weight. This is great news for the millions of Americans who are overweight or obese and need help dropping pounds to reduce their risk of heart disease, stroke, diabetes and many types of cancer. (more…)

There are many foods and food choices that are often overlooked in their effect and in their aiding character when it comes to weight loss. There seems to be the tendency to avoid things that people don’t know or haven’t heard about. An example of this idea would be the use of coconut oil. You may wonder now, but don’t worry over the course of this article we will explain to you how coconut oil helps in weight loss. (more…)

1. An Easy Way to Eat More Fruit & Vegetables

If you’re not a big fan of vegetables and fruit but you are trying to stick to a weight loss plan, you’ll be glad to know that there are plenty of easy ways to “sneak” in your daily requirement of produce. One of these is by whipping up some liquid smoothies.

A “smoothie” is simply a blended mix of liquid, fruit, and vegetables that you can drink. That may not sound very exciting, but there are so many creative possibilities that once you start experimenting you’ll never look at fruit and vegetables the same way again!

Most nutrition experts agree that the average person should be consuming 2-3 servings of fruit per day, and 4-5 servings of vegetables per day. A “serving” of fruit would be about a half cup of chopped or sliced fruit, or a whole small apple, peach, banana, or orange. One cup of raw chopped or leafy green vegetables would constitute a serving, and more like a half cup for cooked vegetables like broccoli or cauliflower.

To make a smoothie, you need: (more…)

One of the simplest “diet plans” you can adopt is a whole foods plan (sometimes referred to as “clean eating”). Clean eating means eating foods that are as close to their natural state as you can get. Highly processed and refined foods, including manufactured pseudo-food monstrosities born in a laboratory, would be out. Whole, natural, organic fruit, vegetables and meat would become the main staples of your diet, plus moderate amounts of whole grains.

Before agriculture became such a booming business, people in most cultures ate very simply; their diets consisted of whole, fresh foods that were locally grown and raised. Fast forward a few centuries and suddenly we’re chugging down vast quantities of refined sugar, artery-clogging trans fats, and chemical preservatives that are doing who-knows-what to our bodies. (more…)

Most of us don’t think about it much, but food portion sizes have grown way out of control. When you eat out at a restaurant, have you noticed the heaping plateful of food they deliver to your table? It’s enough to feed three or four people, not just one.

This may not sound like a bad thing to you, because most of us love to eat. Give us lots and lots of food and we feel secure and comforted. It’s an emotional thing.

The problem is that our bodies are NOT comforted by all this food – they are being overloaded with far too many calories, and this is true even when we eat at home. We’ve gotten used to eating such large quantities of food that we believe it takes that much to satisfy us, but more often than not much less will do.

Here are the recommended serving sizes according to the USDA: (more…)