In the summer, when there's rather less clothes and things like beach trips are on one's mind, one has a tendency to eat lighter. We are not necessarily on a diet, mind you, but we are eating light and healthy as much as possibe. Also, we have always been fascinated by the concept of catabolic foods.
What are catabolic foods? Well, first off, they sound too good to be true.
Supposedly, catabolic foods burn up more calories than they supply. They require your body to work hard to metabolize them, so you're burning more than you're taking in. An apple, for instance, requires 99 calories to burn while only giving you 85.
We feel that there is probably more to it than that; our bodies are marvelously complex things, and food behaves in different ways in different bodies. And yet we are fascinated by foods like this that require our bodies to work a little harder. Most are high in fiber, which is good for you no matter what kind of calories you're taking in.
Any health and nutrition experts out there care to comment on catabolic foods?
You can see a whole list of high-grade and low-grade catabolic foods here:
• Catabolic Foods
Related: Low-Fat Pesto: Can It Be As Good As the Real Thing?
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Snopes has a good article on celery having negative calories. I should also note that every analysis of these that I've seen fails miserably at showing any noticable benefit unless they ignore one major thing: what we call "calories" in the US are actually kilocalories and thus the energy used to release the Calories (caps to indicate kilocalories) is calculated in calories and may look bigger, but actually needs to be divided by 1000.
Basically I think negative calorie foods are a load of hooey, but as Snopes points out, if you're eating them, you're not eating something else which probably has MORE Calories.
view Tiamat_the_Red's profile
Reminds me too much of an anorexic friend who wouldn't eat anything except catabolic foods...
view Michelle of Montreal's profile
I am also highly suspect, but fascinated by the idea.
One reason I'm a little suspicious is our bodies all burn calories at totally different rates-while the apple stays the same. Granted, burning the same ballpark of calories is still good news, but science it is not.
On the other hand, I think good foods are good foods-plain and simple. That aforementioned apple is high in fiber, which keeps less food from entering your tummy (in theory) which is a negative calorie in it's own right.
I've heard chewing sugar free gum expends more energy then the gum supplies.
view babylowe's profile
I'm pretty sure that a 85 calorie apple does not use 99 calories to digest.
That sounds like a diet gimmick.
view wunami's profile
I read the post title quickly and thought it said "What are Catholic foods?"
Whoops.
view B. Kate's profile
I recently graduated with a degree in nutritional science (with honors - hurrah!). Catabolic foods came up in my nutritional biochemistry class, and the professor said it's crap. Your body is incredibly efficient at breaking down food - especially carbohydrates, which the apple is full of - and using the macronutrients (which supply the calories) or squirreling them away for later.
With that said, the list of foods mentioned are all excellent foods. The fruits and vegetables, in particular, are chock full of antioxidants and you would do well basing your diet around eating these good things. It won't have a "negative calorie" effect, but it will give you a lot of vitamins, minerals, protein and phytonutrient bang for your caloric buck.
view ilovebutter's profile