Dine early, dine well

With our busy lives and lots of activities, we tend to eat later, but there is a good argument for why you should eat an early dinner, writes Sarah Berry.

Eating an early dinner might be better for you than skipping breakfast, new research suggests. Breakfast may have been dethroned as king, deposed to pauper status, but courtiers of the first meal of the day needn’t lament.

There is a good argument for standing by your breakfast bowl and eating an earlier dinner instead.

The breakfast debate has been a hot topic of research and news recently for a couple of reasons.

It was once proclaimed to be the most important meal of the day – an idea that came from cereal manufacturers, perpetuated by marketing campaigns. However, reviews of the evidence have shown that skipping breakfast doesn’t stop our metabolism in its tracks, nor does it lead to weight gain or brain fog.

As breakfast myths are being debunked, an emerging line of research has revealed that time-restricted eating (TRE) – eating all our food in an 8- to 10-hour window each day, then fasting for 14-16 hours – can optimise our metabolism and metabolic function. Studies suggest that even if we consume the same number of kilojoules, TRE can lead to weight reduction and improved metabolic health.

This is because our circadian rhythm – the 24-hour body clock that controls our hormones and metabolism (and virtually every other bodily function) – is set each day by light signals and eating signals. To reset itself and work efficiently every day, it needs a break from light and food.

Our body clocks are ‘‘strongly sensitive’’ to food, says Professor Leonie Heilbronn, an obesity and metabolism researcher with the University of Adelaide.

‘‘As soon as you eat, genes are turned on, driving a downstream suite of changes,’’ she says. ‘‘As you enter the fasting state, another set of genes takes over and genes are switched off.’’ Given our cultural shift towards eating meals later in the evening, some experts have suggested the easiest way to get in a fast of at least 14 hours is to skip, or at least delay, breakfast.

But there is an equal, if not better argument for enjoying your breakfast and eating an earlier dinner.

Humans are made to be active and to eat when it’s light and to rest and fast when it’s dark.

As the sun goes down, our melatonin rises, typically peaking a couple of hours before bedtime.

‘‘It’s a signal to the body to sleep and so whenever anyone is eating when melatonin is high, you tend to see a poorer metabolic reaction,’’ says Sean Cain, a circadian rhythm expert at Monash University.

‘‘This is part of the reason there’s more metabolic disease in shift workers who are eating more at night and less in the day.’’

Heilbronn says our bodies are better geared to metabolise food in the morning.

‘‘If you eat a meal at 7am, the pancreas secretes more insulin, cells are better able to take up glucose, you have a smaller glucose response versus eating that same exact meal at 7pm,’’ she says.

‘‘So it makes sense that early is better than late.’’

Professor Amanda Salis, University of Western Australia weight loss researcher, says it is too early to say if eating in one particular routine is better than any other.

‘‘But one thing is for sure: if eating at a particular time helps a person to avoid excess energy intake (for example, kilojoules from foods and beverages), that has proven health benefits.’’

That means that if you skip breakfast and are then so ravenous that you end up smashing junk food, then any fasting benefits are lost.

If, on the other hand, skipping dinner leads you to snack on chocolate or chips instead, then that may not be good for you.

At any time of the day, what we eat is important. Provided we pay attention to our diet, it’s up to us when and how we fast, Salis says.

Cain echoes the sentiment that the fast itself is what is important, but says the same fasting windows may affect people differently.

Among early birds, melatonin typically starts to rise earlier in the evening and decline earlier in the morning.

So people who naturally like to wake early and go to bed early may be better off having breakfast and eating earlier, or skipping dinner altogether.

Night owls may be better to skip breakfast and eat dinner, as their melatonin is likely to peak later at night, and decline later in the morning.

However, we may all benefit from bringing dinner forward a little as our bodies are trying to wind down.

– Sydney Morning Herald