The Nutrition Diva's Rules to Break!

This is a post from Monica Reinegel, the Nutrition Diva. She's pretty down to earth with her nutrition advice and this is a list of rules alot of nutritionists believe in that she feels are breakable. She calls the list 5 Dumb Nutrition Rules Worth Breaking!


Rule 1: Eat every 2 to 3 hours to prevent metabolism slow-down

Your body doesn't go into starvation mode every time you go several hours without eating. In fact, it takes about three days of fasting or serious caloric restriction for your body to respond with any sort of metabolic adjustment. It’s also not necessary to eat every few hours in order to keep your blood sugar steady. In fact, spacing your meals out more can have some very beneficial effects on your blood sugar and on other aspects of your health. So if you’ve gotten stuck in the waiting room at the pediatrician, you can give your kids all the Goldfish and not worry forgoing a snack means you’ll wake up two pounds heavier.



Rule 2: Don't eat late or you'll gain weight

Calories consumed after 9 p.m. won’t make you gain weight any faster than calories consumed earlier in the evening. Research shows that what matters most is how many calories you eat over the course of the day, not when you eat them! If you’re putting away a second dinner’s worth of calories before bedtime, that could certainly end up on your hips. But you don’t need to worry if a crazy schedule means a late supper.



Rule 3: Don't consume caffeine because it's bad for you


There are a lot of negative claims about caffeine, most of which are not true. Caffeinated drinks are not dehydrating, caffeine isn’t bad for your heart, it doesn't cause benign breast lumps, and it doesn't weaken your bones. In fact, caffeine has a lot of health benefits: Not only does it stimulate the brain and central nervous system, but it appears to protect against Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s.



Rule 4: Choose chicken! It's is always the healthier choice

There are cuts of beef and pork that are just as lean as a boneless, skinless chicken breast. And, by the same token, there are cuts of chicken and turkey that have just as much fat as a well-marbled steak. If you were to replace a serving of London broil with a roasted chicken leg, for example, you’d end up eating three times more fat! Additionally, if you compare lean ground turkey with lean ground beef, guess what? Both have the same amount of fat and calories; but the ground beef has almost twice as much iron, zinc, and vitamin B12 as the ground turkey.



Rule 5: Avoid high-fructose corn syrup because it's the devil!

Biochemically-speaking, high-fructose corn syrup is no more fattening or harmful than regular table sugar. The problem is not the type of sugar we’re consuming these days but the amount! So the solution to our obesity epidemic is not to replace high-fructose corn syrup with a different type of sugar but simply to reduce our consumption of all concentrated sweeteners -- even the “natural” ones! Do continue to read those labels and keep a lid on the amount of added sugar in your diet. But you don’t have to worry about a little high-fructose corn syrup any more than you’d worry about a little cane sugar, honey, or maple syrup.