Eating protein to lose weight is one of the best weight loss strategies you can use. Not only will it help you lose weight you will stay full longer. Oh and not forgetting my favorite part… eating protein allows you to eat more food:)!
Put simply protein is your best friend if you’re losing weight. Before I tell you why I want to point out that I’m not one of these lunatics who say eat only protein. As my regular readers will know I love and endorse diets that are sustainable. Diets that “real people” can stick to.
Anyway that’s the rant out of the way.
Why Eat Protein?
The first benefit of protein is that you actually burn off a lot of calories digesting it. That puts you ahead of the game before you even start.
It’s known as the thermic effect. Around 30% of the calories from protein are burned while digesting it. On the other end of the scale fats have almost no thermic effect as only 2% of the calories are burned digesting them. Carbohydrates sit in the middle at 10% or 20% for carbs with a lot of fibre.
Another way of putting it is that eating protein fires up your metabolism and burns more calories. Great news if you’re trying to shed some weight.
Another Reason Why Protein Helps You Lose Weight
As well as taking a lot of calories to digest protein is low in calories anyway. Fat has nine calories for every gram, but protein has only 4 calories. Carbs also have 4 calories per gram, unfortunately alcohol has 7 calories per gram:(.
So far Protein allows us to eat more because it’s low in calories per gram and because we burn 30% of the calories digesting the food.
But there is another huge benefit.
Protein has been clinically proven to make you feel full. As you probably know I don’t believe in diets that get you starve yourself, they never, ever work in the long run. If you use protein in a controlled way you don’t have to suffer hung pains 24/7.
Hey and we’re not finished yet.
Muscle Burns Fat
On most diets when you start to lose weight you also lose muscle. That’s a huge problem and not just for men.
First of all muscle looks good. It gives us shape and an attractive appearance. But it also has a huge impact on our diet success.
Muscle even at rest burns more calories than fat. A study at UCLA showed that muscle burnt up to 70 times more calories than fat. So muscle becomes a fat burning furnace for your body. That’s one of the reasons those huge body builders can each so much.
Protein the Super Food
I’m sure you can see why protein is so important when you’re dieting. It’s equally important when you’ve hit that target weight as it allows you to eat well and still maintain a great shape.
But do not go down the 99% protein diet route. It’s unhealthy and in the long term they are not one of the diets that work. You can lose weight with less pain and better breath:).
We’ll cover in future articles exactly how much protein you should be eating and what foods will give you your protein fix.