We can often hear and read the advice that we do not eat in the evening because it will make us fat. Then the situation happens when a person read it on a couple of news portals and stop eating after 18h and is starving and struggling until the next morning thinking it will lose weight. Such a situation does not last long, so it comes back to old habits.
In this article we go to see if the intake of food is associated with weight gain in the evening and can we safely eat it in the evening or still have to watch out when we eat.
What happens if we eat at night?
Nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
Until we are within our calorie limit, if we eat a meal in the morning, in the afternoon or in the evening, no mass increase will come. We can eat carbohydrates in the evening if we want, until we are within our caloric limit, body mass increase will not come – the insulin story has been defeated and it is proved that the energy balance is only the relevant benchmark.
Why people think that it will make them fat?
There is one thing that can cause weight gain and is associated with evening intake of food, but only with the time of day.
In the evening we are tired, and when we are tired or do something late in the night, we want to eat something, some side snack. Often we forget and an overdose our calorie intake that results in excessive intake of energy resulting in increased body mass.
This is the only way to get fat if we eat in the evening and late in the evening when we eat from boredom and over our calorie limit. It’s not anything to do with the day we eat, but we’ve simply eaten more than we need.
When to eat the last meal then?
Depending on personal preferences, it is more appropriate for someone to eat the last meal of the hour before bedtime, and for some two to three hours before sleep, determining the time periods when we eat is only important around physical activity, but for the rest of the day it really is not important or has no significant effect when we will eat.
It is important that at the end of the day we are within our calorie limit, that we have ate enough protein and filled the rest of the calories with the desired ratio of carbohydrates and fat with an adequate intake of vitamins and minerals.
What we eat in the evening will not make us fat.
Losing control over our food intake will.