Timing is everything

Experts encourage weightwatchers not to skip meals, writes Sipokazi Fokazi

HAVE you ever had a crazy day at work that involved skipping breakfast or you end up munching an energy bar or muffin just to keep you through the day… and after a full day of little eating you come home and feel like feasting on a king-size dinner just to reward yourself after a hard day?

If this is your pattern of eating, you are not alone. With so many different food concepts trending – with some eating dinner foods for breakfast, some trying intermittent fasting, and others making breakfast the largest meal of the day and dinner the smallest – it’s hard to keep up.

We’ve asked our experts if timing really matters when you want to maintain a healthy weight, and what time of the day is allowed to indulge, and here what we found out.

Nutrition experts seem to differ on the issue, with some suggesting that timing may not be so important, but portion sizes and the nutritional value of meals is the most important. Others, on the other hand, say while leisurely eating at home feels like the best thing, this pattern of consuming all your kilojoules late in the day can leave you not only feeling awful, but it can be an enemy to your weight loss efforts.

Lila Bruk, a registered dietitian and Association for Dietetics in SA (Adsa) spokesperson, says while skipping breakfast may work in your favour when you want to lose or maintain a healthy weight, ideally one should eat regularly to maintain energy and improve digestion.

According to Bruk, heavy meals should be eaten at lunch rather than dinner as this has a better effect on digestion and metabolic function while breakfast should be eaten within one hour of waking up to help boost metabolic rate and improve concentration.

“Ideally more carbs and kilojoules should be eaten earlier in the day, so they can be best utilised for energy during the day. Eating regularly assists with weight loss and maintenance by keeping hunger levels and blood sugar more stable…thus preventing unnecessary snacking,” she said.

Renny Letswalo, chairperson of Cambridge Weight Plan South Africa believes that keeping one’s metabolic rhythm steady by eating nutritious calories rather than focusing at meal sizes, is the most important strategy.

“The point here is that you want your body to have nutrients throughout the day as well as when you are sleeping. If one is going to adopt the heavy and light meals strategy, rather than consistent portion sizes at different meal intervals, then one is probably better eating medium sized meal at breakfast, a little heavier at lunch and keeping dinner very light. It’s not the strategy that I would recommend because it’s really difficult at face value to know the total calories intake per day,” she said.

Letswalo also suggests intermittent fasting of one day a week as the body organs need a rest from the mechanical process of digesting food.

She also believes that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and the earlier you start the metabolic system, even just starting by drinking water, sends signals throughout your body that it’s the day time.

“Skipping breakfast is not fasting, and fasting should not be used as a strategy to lose weight either. Losing weight is very scientific in nature and combination of factors helps the body to get into a stage of burning its own fat and skipping breakfast is not one of those. Eating breakfast will remain the most important meal of the day,” she said.

Irene Labuschagne, a dietitian at Nutrition Information Centre Stellenbosch University said while there is no limit on the total daily nutrient intake for a single meal, breakfast should be one meal that we never skip.

“Breakfast is regarded as an important contributor to the daily nutrient intake. A good breakfast fuels you up and gets you ready for the day. In general, kids and teens who eat breakfast do better in school.

“Without breakfast, people can get, restless, and tired,” she said.