Easter is undoubtedly one of the most "delicious" holidays. Eggs, Easter cake and well-cooked lamb please the palate and, more or less, we all go to extremes with the food. The days after the holiday are the most appropriate for losing 1-2 kg, and why not more.
GRReporter presents 25 easy and unusual ways offered by nutritionist Anastasios Papalazarou, published in ''Shape'' magazine.
1. Be careful with labels
Do not let epithets like "traditional" Easter cake, "homemade" pie or chicken with exotic mango sauce and Asian rice mislead you. It is merely chicken with rice, a pie and a cake with the same calories as all others. These epithets just make you eat more.
2. Serve directly from the kitchen
Leave the dishes on the cooker instead of on the table. You will consume 10% less in this way. Furthermore, put snacks in small vessels. If you eat something from a bigger one, you ingest 615 calories more.
3. Target the size
Buy yourself a dress that you would wear at your best weight and hang it somewhere in the bedroom to remind you of your goal.
4. Do not watch ads
Do something else while the ads are running on the TV. Get up to wash the dishes, call a friend, look through a magazine. According to a study carried out by the University of California, the appearance of weight gaining foods activates the brain centre that controls hunger and awakens the desire to eat something.
5. Feed your family
If you live with people who love to eat, just buy them delicious things you do not like.
6. Eat turkey sausage
After each piece of sweet, eat some turkey sausage or drink a cup of tea without adding sugar to it. This will chase away the desire to eat something sweet.
7. Do not go to extremes with healthy foods
Many people have chosen a healthy food, but consume it too much as a result of which it is no longer healthy. Determine your healthy food and stop buying it.
8. Learn to cook soups
Eat a bowl of vegetable soup before lunch. You will take in 20% fewer calories with your lunch.
9. Distract your attention
The craving to eat something usually passes away within 10 minutes. Distract your attention by calling a friend, going for a walk, meditating, looking at your profile on social networks, making love or having your nails manicured.
10. Quicken the pace
Listen to fast and energizing music. Studies show that when you train and listen to tracks with 180 beats per minute, your rhythm quickens effortlessly.
11. Clench your fists
Clench your fists when you feel the desire to eat something. A series of studies that were published in the Journal of Consumer Research in 2011 show that the participants were able to control their desires better after flexing a muscle for at least 30 seconds.
12. Reconsider your goals
Change your goal from "I want to lose 10 kg" to "I want to lose 1 kg 10 times" and reward yourself for each goal achieved.
13. Mix things (sometimes)
Diversity increases appetite. Limit the choice of fatty foods you buy to eat less. Do the opposite with fruits and vegetables so as to eat more of them.
14. Spread olive oil on your bread
You cannot stop reaching out for bread, can you? Use olive oil instead of butter. You will eat 23% less bread and ingest 16% fewer calories as stated by the authors of the study published in the International Journal of Obesity.
15. Imagine your "new" body
Imagine how you would look with a firm and trained body. Imagine this picture every time you eat something. Following the method of repetition, the brain will replace the desire to eat with it.
16. Do not peel fruits
Do not peel apples when you eat them or use them to cook a dish. A substance in their peel increases muscle mass and the brown fat layer that burns calories. This discovery was made by researchers from the University of Iowa and was published in the Plos One journal in 2012. You should prefer organically produced apples.
17. Breathe
Reduce eating caused by stress with the help of the breathing system 4-7-8: Breathe in through your nose and count to 4, hold your breath counting to 7 and then, slowly breathe out through your mouth counting to 8.
18. Add more vinegar
Consuming vinegar before a meal increases satiety. Eat a salad with 1-2 tablespoons of vinegar before lunch and dinner.
19. Eat consciously
Before you start eating, take a minute to figure out what the ingredients of the dish are and then try to taste each of them separately, for example salt, pepper, onion, tomato. You thus consume what you need.
20. Start your day with energy
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