According to Nutritionists–
The right approach to daytime eating will help curb late-night cravings.
Are you a night nibbler? Does it feel like you eat healthy all day and then your hunger demons come out in the evenings?
The following written content by Kaitlyn Pirie via Prevention
Are you a night nibbler? Does it feel like you eat healthy all day and then your hunger demons come out in the evenings? That’s fine and dandy if you’re reaching for a banana or an ounce of walnuts, but a completely different story if you have a habit of busting open a 10pm bag of chips.
“The issue is not so much the time, as the quality of food,” says Joan Ifland, Ph.D., founder and CEO of Food Addiction Reset. “Unprocessed foods nourish and promote stability in terms of mood, sleep cycle, energy, and appetite while processed foods do the opposite.” A tendency to snack on unhealthy foods well into the evening can stem from a variety of reasons. To curb your nighttime binges, follow these tips.
Set a cutoff time.
“I generally eat dinner with the kids around 6, so I made sure that we were all done by our 7pm cutoff,” says Judy Koutsky, a writer who went on a mission to curb late-night eating for a whole month.
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“Instead of a more vague, ‘no snacking before bed,’ a hard rule of ‘no food after 7pm’ was actually easier to follow because it was so rigid.” Your cutoff time may be earlier or later depending on your schedule, but it’s still helpful to have one in mind.
Schedule your meals.
“Waiting too long before your next meal can cause you to become “hangry” and more likely to binge so set up regularly scheduled meals throughout the day to keep your blood sugars level and prevent ravenous hunger in the evening,” says Lauren O’Connor, M.S., R.D.N., owner of Nutri Savvy Health. If you need a snack between meals, she recommends keeping it to 150 calories and trying to hit two food groups. “A good example is an apple (fruit) and up to 1 tablespoon of peanut butter (healthy fat),” says O’Connor.
Look at what’s around you during the day.
“A source of overeating which is often missed is cuing,” says Ifland. “If there are addictive processed foods out on display in your workplace or home, they can trigger cravings just by being available and those cravings can build up through the day and erupt as bingeing in the evening.” Read more from Prevention
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