By: Chris Gates

A common struggle when setting up your diet is figuring out how to actually feel full and satisfied when your calories are low.

It’s not easy.

The foods you love may be processed and calorie dense, so you have to switch up your diet for a completely new set of foods that are probably a whole hell of a lot less satisfying. That’s not fun for anyone.

What’s worse, the diet recommendations you’re bound to find online or hear from friends and family are riddled with flaws. Someone will tell you “a high-protein diet makes you feel the fullest” while the next person will claim “a high-fat diet makes you feel the fullest.” You’re bound to hear that keto and carnivore and other elimination diets are the magic cure, too.

So what’s the real answer? Is there a type of diet, or a way to create meals that will make you feel the fullest?

A new review article by Eric Trexler titled, “Protein is Satiating, But It’s Not That Simple,” breaks down this topic in detail and offers some fantastic guidelines that I wanted to share.

Let’s dive into some of what the research says about different nutrients and meal composition, and then we’ll move into some recommendations and coaching cues regarding how you can set up a diet that will help you feel full.

What the Research Says

For starters we can look at Trexler’s review, which is on a meta-analysis centered around the topic of short-term and long-term impact of protein on appetite. This analysis found that protein generally decreased hunger in acute settings — meaning that high protein meals increased the feeling of fullness immediately after that specific meal. However, individuals who ate high-protein diets over the long-term tended to see the feeling of fullness reduce over time.

That’s not to say eating a high-protein diet over the long term is a bad idea. Quite the contrary. There are many health benefits associated with high-protein diets, including when using a high-protein diet to lose weight.

In fact, if your current diet does not include a high level of protein, bumping up your protein intake is likely to increase your feeling of fullness.

Side Note: For the general public, I consider a rough estimate of “high protein” to be 100 grams or more per day, as most people don’t seem to consume that much protein on a daily basis. That’s by no means a clinical recommendation — just something I operate with for coaching.

Moving on…

Trexler also cites an article by Dr. Anne-Kathrin Eiselt in which Dr. Eiselt explains that individuals aiming to increase their feeling of fullness should typically avoid hyper-palatable meals. We’ll explain what that means shortly.

There is also research evidence to suggest that building your meals with the following may be ideal:

• High protein
• Fiber
• Water content
• Unprocessed/minimally processed foods

As Trexler summarizes it, here are a few strategies that can help someone increase fullness and reduce hunger within their diet:

1. You should not be on a low-protein diet. A moderate- or high-protein diet is going to be more optimal.
2. Seek out food sources with plenty of fiber and water content.
3. Find a meal timing pattern that works for you.
4. Avoid hyper-palatable meals.

Coaching Cues

To me, it’s really interesting to look at meal composition and figure out what might work best. Personally, I get excited about tweaking certain variables of a nutrition plan or an overall fitness program to see what type of results it might present.

This topic falls right in line with that process.

Before we dive into specifics about what you can apply to your own diet, let’s talk about what hyper-palatable means.

Hyper-palatable foods are considered by many to be the types of foods that are driving the obesity epidemic in our country. They’re foods that have a mixture of ingredients (normally processed) that light up the reward centers in your brain and make you crave more. Dr. Eiselt’s article linked above goes into much more detail about the brain, so definitely check it out and the MASS Research Review if you want to learn more.

I’m not going to try and act like I can break things down to that degree. Rather, here’s how I describe hyper-palatable foods to anyone who asks…

Doritos.

That’s literally the best example I can give to people. You can’t eat just one of them. You don’t even really understand what’s in Doritos (what the hell do they put in that flavor dust and why can’t I stop eating it?!).

These foods typically fall into the categories of desserts, sweets, and the like, but they can also be consumed as your primary meal by way of fast food options. For example, if I make a cheeseburger on my own it’s probably going to be half the calories of what I’ll order at McDonald’s or Burger King, but it also doesn’t quite have the same taste or texture to it.

Hyper-palatable foods are addictive. They’re the exact opposite of what you want in your diet if you’re trying to lose weight. Honestly, they shouldn’t in there at all, but as we’re talking about reducing hunger it make the most sense to view this in the lens of being in a calorie deficit.

These foods are calorie dense, meaning you’re going to consume a very high amount of calories in one sitting for a relatively low volume of food (go back to that cheeseburger example I gave above again). If your food volume is low — meaning the size (not calories) of the food you eat — it’s likely you’re going to struggle to feel full.

So now that we’ve got that settled, what’s the best way to reduce the presence of these types of foods and promote a diet that is going to make you feel full?

For starters, you should be cooking your own food. By doing this, you’re removing a lot of the fatty cooking oils and excess sodium and preparing the meal exactly how you want it. The calories you’ll save by cooking your own food as opposed to dining out is massive.

From there, search for foods that are high in protein and make those the focal point of the meal. Have chicken or a nice steak and surround it with sides that aren’t highly processed or hyper-palatable like a cup of rice or mixed vegetables.

And if you’re in the mood for a taste explosion, you’re in luck! You can season these foods at virtually no expense to your daily calories.

Take a walk down the spices and seasonings aisle in your local grocery store. You’re going to find more options than you could ever imagine to make your food taste great! There are seasonings specific to each type of protein (they literally say “chicken” and “steak” and other names of meat right on the label) that can take a boring meal to something more exciting and palatable.

Here’s my personal favorite seasoning if you’d like to give it a try.

A repetitive diet can be hard, so having different seasonings allows you to prepare the same food in slightly different ways and it creates the variety you need to keep your diet in check.

I write about this all of the time, but a lot of being successful with fitness and nutrition is being consistent. It means finding routines and sticking to them. And in this case, with creating a diet that is sustainable, works towards your goals, and makes you feel full, repetition and routine are huge.

And now, thanks to the research we have a good idea of what those meals should look like in order to feel full and hit your goals.

—

I hope you enjoyed this article! If you’re interested in learning more about fitness and nutrition, I have hundreds of articles you can browse through. Additionally, if you’re interested in coaching to help guide you through a fitness plan, visit my coaching page and contact me if you’d like to discuss more!

Thanks for reading!

CGF