10 Reasons Why More Vegetables Will Increase Weight Loss
One of the biggest objections I hear to eating vegetables is that they take too much time or that it’s easier to take a multi-vitamin. Multi-vitamins are great, and we actually have some very specific ones we recommend. But they are a supplement not a replacement for many reasons. Here’s ten reasons why vegetables are better than your multivitamin
Eating more vegetables almost always causes you to lose weight, but that happens for a variety of reasons.
- The vitamins and minerals in vegetables makes metabolism more efficient, which in turn raises metabolic rate. Vegetables also contain flavonoids, which help improve metabolism.
- The soluable fiber in most vegetables dampens the glycemic load of most carbohydrates, which reduces blood sugar spikes.
- The insoluable fiber helps you remove toxins and bacteria from you GI tract helping your excretory system to be more efficient.
- Vegetables have a very low calorie density, which causes them to fill you up. If you aren’t hungry, you are much less likely to make bad choices.
- Vegetables (for the most part) are a safe-don’t-even-worry-about-it diet food. Being on a diet always involves counting macros and calories to some degree… but if you’re reaching for the greens, you know you don’t have to worry.
- Most vegetables have a “negative calorie balance” meaning that it takes more calories to extract the nutrients than the foods have.
But weight-loss is the tip of the iceberg… vegetables also:
- help cleanse your liver, which is the organ responsible for causing fat burning,
- lower bad cholesterol,
- promote proper sleep… “Nonsense you say?” Many vegetables (like kale) contain tryptophan, a sleep-enhancing amino acid that helps the body make serotonin and melatonin (which help the body fall asleep). Other vegetables (like lettuce) contain lactucarium, which has sedative properties and affects the brain similarly to opium, and [1]
- vegetables help remove toxins. For example, vegetables like fennel and watercrest are jam-packed with antioxidants which help clear the skin and key minerals such as minerals manganese, carotene and potassium. Less toxins, better skin, more efficient digestion, more energy, etc. [2]
“OK, so which vegetables should I look for… I’m tired of lettuce, celery, and carrots.
There are tons of vegetables choices: my favorites for weight loss are:
- Asparagus,
- Bean sprouts,
- Beets,
- Broccoli,
- Cabbage,
- Carrots,
- Cauliflower,
- Celery,
- Collard Greens
- Cucumbers,
- Endives,
- Green beans,
- Jicama,
- Kale,
- Leeks,
- Lettuce,
- Radishes,
- Radicchio,
- Spinach,
- Swiss Chard,
- Squash,
- Turnips, and
- Zucchini
OMG, that’s way too much work to eat all of those.
It’s easier than you think. In ten minutes, I picked up everything I needed for the whole day from Whole Foods Alexandria.
Vegetables with Breakfast:
Vegetables with Lunch:
Snacks
All counted that’s about 10 servings of vegetables!
And we haven’t even discussed the squash and zucchini that I’m pairing with my flank steak for dinner… or the berries and Ormus greens I added to my protein shake. The point is to lose weight, you often have to eat more. And one of the best things on the planet to eat more of is greens.
So enough with the excuses about why you can’t eat them. Our Origin Nutrition system is included in many of the Get Steel Strong packages, so join the Sand & Steel community and let’s do this together.