A practical guide to set meals and diets

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Editor’s note: The latest scientific research shows that regular diet can prolong life and reduce the incidence of major diseases, including cancer and cardiovascular disease. That is to say, you can control your own by setting your daily eating time. health. Of course, the quality and structure of your diet is still important, but when you eat is more important than what you eat. This article is translated from medium, the author Andrew Merle, the original title When You Eat Is More Important Than What You Eat.

You may not believe it, but

Image source: erdikocak / Getty Images

Scientific research on fasting has drawn a lot of attention. Studies show that time-restricted eating (TRE) can prolong life and reduce the incidence of major diseases, including cancer and cardiovascular disease.

TRE refers to the daily intake of all calories in a specific period of time-whether it is food or drink-this period of time is called the “feeding window”.

It turns out that you can consciously control your health by setting your daily eating time. Of course, the quality of your diet is still important, but the success of TRE proves a point: when you eat is more important than what you eat.

Dr. Satchin Panda can be said to be the world’s top TRE expert. Panda is a professor at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies and author of The Circadian Code. He also analyzed the daily diet, sleep and activity patterns of thousands of people as part of his ongoing research.

Panda says in his book that setting up an eating window and sticking to it for a long time is one of the most important things you can do for health and longevity. This is because every timeWhat you eat — even if you take a bite — triggers a process of digestion, absorption, and metabolism that takes hours to complete. When your body is committed to processing food, it may not be able to focus on other things.

You need to eat at least 12 hours without any calories. (For example, overnight fasts from 8 pm to 8 am) but it seems that the shorter the meal (the longer the fast), the better. Panda explained: “Although the 12-hour reference may be a surprise, even a reduction to 8 hours is very good for your health.”

Hugh Jackman’s famous Wolverine Diet is an example of an eight-hour fast. Recent research has shown that reducing the length of time you do n’t eat to 6 hours may be a worthwhile goal, but reaching that goal may take some time.

No matter how long you fast, the most important thing is that you stick to it for a long time. TRE is not a short-term popular diet recommendation-it is a habit to follow for the rest of your life. According to Panda, “If you eat three times outside the fasting window of 12 hours, you violate the TRE principle.” His data shows that 50% of American adults often eat for 15 hours or more Meal.

Making a practical plan is far more reasonable than pursuing high goals in the first place. Pan recommends starting from a short period of time and then slowly improving.

So, is there a recommended fasting window period?

“I can’t predict from which point you should start the 12-hour fasting window,” Pan said. “Some people like breakfast and need them to start their day. Others wait until noon, so that It ’s relatively easy to shorten the fasting period. Anyway, no matter what you choose, you have to make your own decision. “

What about breakfast as the most important meal of the day? “Your brain really doesn’t need breakfast to provide extra energy,” Panda said.

However, he did point out that starting a fasting trip earlier in the day has more benefits, mainly because you don’t want to eat too much before going to bed.

“Eating late at night is by far the worst choice you can make,” Panda said. He suggested that it would be best not to eat anything 3 hours before falling asleep-so he personally recommends eating the last meal around 6 or 7 pm. In order to get better sleep, your body needs to digest the food first.

Panda said: “Sleep is the main time to clear damaged cell proteins. Only when you get enough sleep will your brain have more time to repair and clean up its waste.” This helps To prevent neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia.

That is, not before bedtimeTo drink. Panda says that if you want to relax with a glass of wine or cocktail, a better suggestion is to have a drink before or during dinner-if you have to drink that bite.

For the best overall health results, Panda recommends a balanced diet centered on fresh fruits and vegetables, lean protein and healthy fats. You don’t need to count calories, but you better limit your junk food intake. In response, Panda’s recommendations include staying away from sodas, juices, breakfast cereals, energy / protein bars, processed foods, corn syrup / fructose / sucrose, fried foods, and commercially processed nut butters.

If you are making sure your diet meets low-carb, sugar-free, vegan, Mediterranean diet standards, you better combine them with TRE. You can eat whatever feels best to you, as long as you limit it to a specific time period. If you have achieved good results in any particular diet, then stick to it, and you can further improve the effect by limiting the time you eat.

Panda is currently insisting on an 11-hour ban. He eats his first meal every morning around 8 am and finishes dinner at 7 pm-at this time there are still a few hours before he sleeps at 10:30 pm. He acknowledged that not every day would go perfectly as planned, but he would do his best to persevere. Even if he ends up having a dinner, he still tries to get his stomach to rest at least 12 to 13 hours before the next meal.

As for me, I like to fast every night between 12 and 8pm. However, I drink black coffee and tea during fasting, which helps me a lot.

There is some controversy as to whether tea and black coffee are technically “allowed.” Purists like Panda say that anything you eat or drink, except water, breaks the original purpose of fasting. However, other experts say coffee or tea (without cream or sugar) is acceptable and may magnify the benefits of fasting.

So the message is clear: Regular diet is an easy tool for everyone, and it doesn’t require you to make any major changes to what or how much to eat. What is the best reason to shorten your eating time? It is he who can extend your life.

Translator: Hi Soup