By Laurel Leicht , Glamour
When you're out to eat, ordering a vegetable soup is a way healthier move than reaching into the bread basket. But it's not just about the calories you'll save. Hot liquids can also help you feel more full, so you'll actually eat less by the time your entrée comes. Since it's summer (and hot soup is not what you want right now) we found three additional appetite-reducing foods that will help you feel full and reach your weight loss goals:
Spinach Salad
Loading up with a plate of this leafy green for an appetizer could help you avoid overdoing it come entrée time. A dose of spinach extract made people feel fuller and reduced their cravings in a new study from the Journal of the American College of Nutrition.
Spinach also contains membranes called thylakoids, which up the release of satiety hormones and have been shown to reduce cravings for sweet stuff. The result? You'll be less tempted to chow down on dessert when you're done.
An Apple
Munching on one apple a day is a refreshingly simple diet strategy. Apples are packed with water and fiber to keep you full on relatively few calories. Plus, apples are one of the few fruits that contain pectin, which naturally slows digestion and promotes a feeling of fullness, according to research.
Additionally, a study in the journal Appetite found that eating a whole apple, as opposed to applesauce or juice, before a meal makes people feel more satiated and eat fewer total calories.
Avocado
Swap the mayo on your sandwich for a few slices of avocado. You'll get healthy fats and fiber that will help you stay full hours into the afternoon. In fact, women who ate half an avocado at lunchtime felt 22 percent more satisfied and had a 24 percent lower desire to snack three hours later than they did on days when they didn't consume avocado, according to research published in Nutrition Journal.
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