TIMING IS EVERYTHING
There is endless advice out there trying to encourage many different ways of eating to remain healthy. These include vegan, keto, low carb, calorie control, the list goes on and on. They all have proven benefits. The problem with any of these diets is being able to stick to them.
There is now a large body of evidence from expert research teams looking at a more simple approach.
This is called INTERMITTENT FASTING. In basic terms reducing the time that you eat to a window of 8-12 hours.
The benefits of this are potentially huge in reducing obesity, cardiovascular disease, digestive disorders, Cancer, and improving brain health. See below to find out more and watch the video lecture below from Professor Satchin Panda who explains in detail his research and the health benefits of this simple time restricted eating.
How we eat
Research tells us that the more time we spend eating in the day the less effective our body is at doing the other important things such as burning fat, clearing out damaged cells and fighting threats (autophagy).
Most people think the yeat 3 times a day but a huge worldwide study by Dr Panda has shown that we tend to eat randomly and many many times per day - typically over a 16 hour period and often just before bed.
If you would like to be part of this study and find out your eating habit and at the same time get advice on how to make changes to help prevent and reduce the effects of disease and obesity then click the link below.
Why do we have diets?
Most diets are based on two historical experiments from the beginning of the 20th century that developed the notion of calorie restriction. Essentially they started the simple idea that if you eat less you will lose weight and achieve better health.
More recent experiments have called into question the idea of simply counting calories and more relevant is the type of food you eat and when you eat it.
In a recent, large scale experiment a pair of genetically identical mice were fed two different diets with equal number of calories. One ate a healthy balance of carbohydrates simple sugars proteins and fats and one high in fat and sugar. After a few weeks the mice eating the high-fat high sugar diet became obese almost diabetic and had high levels of fat in their blood and dangerous levels of cholesterol. This finding drives home the notion that the quality of your food and its nutritional content matters significantly when it comes to your health.
What should we eat?
We know its important to eat a balanced diet. We like the dietary guidelines by the British Association for Nutrition and Lifestyle Medicine. They want us to eat the rainbow, and aim for 5 servings of vegetables and 2 fruit per day in many different hues and colours (see below).
Find out how to get healthy gut bacteria (microbiome) to prevent disease and help recovery
One of the key components of any diet is maintaining a healthy gut microbiome. The gut microbiome plays a very important role in your health by helping control digestion and benefiting your immune system and many other aspects of health. An imbalance of unhealthy microbes in the intestines may contribute to weight gain, high blood sugar, high cholesterol and other disorders.
Here's the down-low on fibre, what foods you get it from, why its good for your body and what your gut microbiome have to do with it.
The World Health Organisation recommends eating 400g (or 5 servings) of fruit and vegetables per day for adults. That’s about 30g of fibre. ]
In the UK, it’s estimated that men and women are only getting about two-thirds of the recommended fibre intake (17.2g and 20.1g respectively).
In fact, dietary fibre consumption is generally below-par in Europe and North America. Yet, this is not surprising considering the rise in processed and fast food consumption, both of which have exchanged high fibre for high sugar, fat, and animal protein.
However, fibre isn’t just a bulking agent to ease your (hopefully) daily bowel movements, it’s an essential cog in your body’s mechanics, and a vital source of sustenance for beneficial bacteria in your gut.
Watch the video podcast below from microbiome expert Dr. Will Bulsiewicz.
Why is fibre so important for healthy gut?
