7 Foods to Amp Up Your Metabolism

Your body uses metabolism to convert the food and drink you consume into energy. A complex process combines calories from food and beverages with oxygen to produce energy. While resting, your body needs energy for all its “hidden” functions, such as breathing, blood circulation, controlling hormone levels, and cell development and repair. 

CGM BIOS is a modern device to track your body’s glucose level changes. It is a device that can help you understand the unique relationship your body has with various foods. It becomes the doorway to the prevention of metabolic diseases. With its help, the HealthifyMe coaches can help you create better, more individualised diet programs based on real-time data and AI support. The coaches study the trend in blood glucose fluctuations over a stipulated period. As a result, the dietary interventions are unique to you and designed specifically for your needs. 

Understanding Metabolic Health

Your basal metabolic rate, or metabolism, is the number of calories your body uses to perform essential processes. The phrase “metabolic health” describes how human bodies use the energy obtained from their diet through cellular activities referred to as metabolism.

Your nutrition, metabolism, microbiome, exercise, stress, sleep, and mental health, as well as your age, sex, and genes, all have an impact on your metabolic health. According to some experts, metabolic syndrome indicates the absence of metabolic health. A metabolic syndrome is a group of risk factors that increases the risk of heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes, and other metabolic illnesses. 

Risk factors for metabolic syndrome include:

• High blood pressure
• Low levels of good cholesterol
• High blood fat
• High blood sugar
• A large waistline

Reasons for Slow Metabolism

Maintaining a healthy metabolism is essential for overall well-being. However, a few frequent reasons could cause your metabolism to slow down. In addition, regularly engaging in these behaviours may make reaching your fitness objectives challenging and increase your risk of future weakness. 

Hormones and Genetics

A change in hormone levels can slow down your body’s ability to use energy, which might wear you out. Some disorders, including diabetes and hormonal diseases, impact your metabolism. The ability to burn fat gets passed down from generation to generation. Therefore, genetics also play a part in metabolism. If your body burns calories slowly while you relax or sleep, your genes most likely come from your parents.

Lack of Sleep

For wellness, sleep is an important factor. According to a study, the risk of several diseases, including diabetes, heart disease, and depression may rise if you get less sleep than your body requires. In addition, sleeping during the day rather than at night exacerbates sleep deprivation. 

The circadian rhythms, or internal clock, of your body, are disturbed by this sleeping pattern. Sleeping well keeps your metabolism stable. Your body has a more challenging time utilising energy when you toss and turn daily, increasing your risk of developing illnesses like diabetes and obesity.

Strict Diets

It matters how you lose weight. Insufficient food causes your metabolism to slow down. Strict diets train your body to function on fewer calories, especially when combined with exercise. Although weight loss requires a calorie deficit, restricting calories too drastically might be hazardous. 

When you drastically cut back on calories, your body perceives that less food is available and slows down the process of burning calories. Unfortunately, that can backfire since your body will hold onto those calories, making it more difficult to lose weight.

Sedentary Lifestyle

One of the causes could potentially be a sedentary lifestyle. Studies show your daily calorie expenditure may significantly decline if you are inactive. Notably, many people lead lives that mainly entail sitting at work, which can harm metabolism and general health. 

Working from home has raised people’s time sitting still, further slowing their metabolism. Simple physical activities like standing up, cleaning, and climbing stairs can help burn calories. Exercising or playing sports can have a massive positive impact. 

Medication

Several medicines can slow your metabolism. For example, you should not use prednisone and other anti-inflammatory steroids for a long duration as they can stimulate hunger. It can also cause calorie intake to be excessive. They relate to increased blood sugar, fat storage, and insulin resistance. Numerous antidepressants and certain antipsychotics are among these, which doctors employ to treat schizophrenia. Other drugs, such as those that lower heart rate, can also have that effect.

Stress

When stressed, your body produces the cortisol hormone, offering you a rapid energy boost. In conjunction with other hormones in your body, cortisol in normal concentrations can aid in fat burning. However, if you’re in a constant state of stress, your body produces cortisol because it believes you are under pressure and require additional energy. So that’s why it hangs onto calories. This hormone makes it more difficult for your body to utilise insulin. As a result, it slows down your metabolism, encouraging weight gain. 

The HealthifyMe Note

Maintaining a high metabolism is essential for weight loss. However, a few lifestyle mistakes could cause your metabolism to slow down. These activities may make it difficult for you to lose weight and raise your long-term risks of weight gain and physical weakness. Additionally, your metabolism will slow down if you restrict calories too much and for too long, making weight loss and maintenance more challenging. When you are inactive, you burn fewer calories throughout the day. Other factors that can lower metabolic rates and encourage fat storage include not getting enough sleep and consuming sugary drinks.

Impact of Food on Metabolism

Age, diet, sex, exercise, and medical conditions are just a few variables that might impact metabolism. The energy needed to maintain essential bodily processes like breathing is known as the metabolic rate at rest. Total energy expenditure, commonly known as daily caloric expenditure, is mainly driven by this. 

According to research, numerous foods and drinks speed up metabolism, the body’s internal processes that produce energy. The energy needed to digest various foods varies, and some foods may slightly increase basal metabolic rate. 

The energy needed to digest, absorb, and metabolise the food you ingest is known as the Thermic Effect of Food or TEF. For example, protein in a diet requires a lot more energy to digest than carbohydrates or fat. Additionally, the quantity of digested food impacts TEF.

Compared to simplified, processed junk food, it will typically be higher when you ingest healthy foods with complex components. Also, complex foods take longer to digest, yet they have little to no effect on metabolism. However, processed food relates to a higher risk of developing insulin resistance. Therefore, sugary drinks may be the worst for your health among all the junk food options. 

When ingested in excess, they may contribute to various health issues, such as type 2 diabetes, metabolic syndrome, obesity, and heart disease. Therefore, you must decrease your calorie intake to lose weight. On the other hand, certain substances, such as those found in coffee, green tea, and chilli peppers, may modestly increase metabolism.  Here’s an article on the top 10 foods that help boost your metabolism. 

The number of calories in your food isn’t the only factor to consider. The grade of the food you consume is equally crucial. First, eating healthy foods causes you to burn more calories than junk food. In addition, studies show eating foods high in protein burns more calories than foods heavy in bad fats and refined carbohydrates. High-protein diets may also decrease your appetite, stifle cravings, and affect the hormones that control your weight. Read this article to learn about other health benefits of protein-rich diets.  

Concentrating on the diet’s overall quality and macronutrient composition, rather than integrating or omitting certain meals, is crucial to developing and maintaining a healthy body weight. It is probably safe to consume small amounts of foods and drinks that increase metabolisms, such as spicy meals, ginger, and green tea. But this is unlikely to impact body weight or energy expenditure significantly. A diet with protein and fibre will support a healthy metabolism and advance general health.

Foods that Help Boost Metabolism

You could be looking for foods that can speed up your metabolism if you attempt to lose weight or keep it off. Some foods could indeed aid a little bit to raise your metabolic rate. It is the number of calories your body burns each day. If losing body fat or preventing weight gain is your aim, incorporating these foods into your diet may make it slightly easier to achieve. However, increasing your intake of these meals does not ensure weight loss. Instead, they support weight loss by supplementing a healthy, modestly calorie-restricted diet.

Protein-rich Foods

Foods with high protein, such as fish, meat, eggs, dairy products, legumes, nuts, and seeds, may temporarily speed up your metabolism. It is a result of the fact that they demand more energy from your body to process. Food’s thermic impact is responsible for this (TEF). 

According to research, diets high in protein boost TEF the greatest. For instance, compared to 5-10% for carbohydrates and 0-3% for fats, they raise your metabolic rate by 15-30%. By assisting your body in maintaining its muscular mass, protein-rich diets also lessen the metabolism decline that sometimes relates to weight loss. Additionally, protein might help you feel filled for longer, which might help you avoid overeating.

Mineral-rich Foods

The roles that the minerals selenium and iron play in the health of your body are distinct but equally significant. However, they do share a characteristic. Both are necessary for the thyroid gland, which controls your metabolism, to function correctly. 

According to research, eating too little iron or selenium may prevent your thyroid from producing enough hormones, which could cause your metabolism to slow down. Therefore, include foods high in selenium and iron, such as meat, fish, legumes, nuts, and seeds, in your regular diet to aid your thyroid’s optimal functioning.

Chilli

By slightly increasing the pace at which your body consumes calories, the chemical capsaicin, which is present in chilli peppers, may help you have a faster metabolism. Additionally, capsaicin might have appetite-suppressing qualities. Read this article to know how. 

Similarly, eating cayenne pepper, especially after a meal high in fat, may boost the amount of fat your body burns for energy. However, those not used to eating spicy food may not experience this fat-burning impact.

Coffee and Tea

Research shows coffee contains caffeine, which could speed your metabolism. Additionally, caffeine enhances your workout performance and may help your body burn fat for energy. Tea contains catechins, which are health-promoting substances that may increase metabolic rate in conjunction with caffeine. 

Oolong and matcha green tea may boost fat oxidation and aid calorie burning when combined with an activity programme. Furthermore, these two teas may improve your body’s efficiency in using the fat that has been stored as fuel, upping your capacity to burn fat by up to 17%. 

Beans and Legumes

Compared to other plant foods, lentils, chickpeas, peas, black beans, and peanuts are abundant in protein. Additionally, legumes provide soluble and resistant starches that your body can use as a prebiotic. It helps to nourish the good bacteria in your large intestine. Short-chain fatty acids, created by these helpful bacteria, may aid your body in using stored fat for energy and preserving normal blood sugar levels.

Ginger

It’s believed that ginger and closely related spices have outstanding metabolism-boosting qualities. Hot ginger tea may also help people feel more satisfied and less hungry. Another herb from the ginger family called grains of paradise might have comparable results. However, each person experiences the impacts differently.

Water

An excellent way to stay hydrated is to consume enough water. Some research indicates that consuming water could momentarily increase metabolism by 24–30%. According to another research, the extra calories required to bring the water to body temperature, or water-induced thermogenesis, account for around 40% of that increase. The effects may vary from person to person, but they only seem to endure for 40 to 90 minutes after drinking water.

The HealthifyMe Note

Your metabolism can rise after eating for a few hours; this is the thermic effect of food (TEF). Protein produces higher TEF than fats and carbohydrates because it takes longer for your body to burn and absorb it. Increased protein intake supports weight loss and maintenance by preserving metabolic rate. People can speed up their metabolism by consuming a lot of protein (25%-30% of their daily calories). Furthermore, eating mineral-rich foods, chillies, coffee & tea, beans & legumes, ginger and drinking plenty of water can help fix the body’s slow metabolism.

Some Recipes that You Can Try

For Breakfast 

Poha

Preparation Time: 25 minutes

Serves: 2 servings

1 cup: 300 g

Ingredients

• Poha (flattened rice): 2 cups
• Mustard seeds: ⅓ tsp
• Cumin seeds: ½ tsp
• Curry leaves: 8-10 
• Green chilli, finely chopped: 1
• Turmeric powder: 1 tsp
• Hing (asafoetida) : ½ tsp
• Lemon juice: 1 tbsp
• Oil: 2 tsp
• Salt: as per taste
• Coriander leaves: ½ tbsp
• Onion (optional): ½ 
• Potato (optional): ½ 
• Peanuts (optional): 1½ tbsp

Method of Preparation

• Put poha through a big strainer. Wash 1-2 times under running water by gently sifting it with your fingertips. Through a sieve, remove any extra moisture. Sprinkle salt and sugar, mix it well, and set it aside.
• Heat two teaspoons of oil in a pan and put mustard seeds. 
• When the mustard seeds start sputtering, add the cumin seeds, curry leaves, green chillies, peanuts, and a pinch of hing. About 30 to 40 seconds should pass while they sizzle and the chillies get crisp.
• Add the minced onions and cook them until they are translucent. Include potatoes in the mixture.
• Mix the potatoes covered until they are soft. It will take 3 to 4 minutes. Stir occasionally to avoid sticking. 
• Add soaked poha and turmeric powder and combine well.
• Cook for 2 to 3 minutes. 
• Turn off the flame and add lemon juice and chopped coriander.  Mix well
• Serve hot. 

Scrambled Eggs

Preparation Time: 15 minutes

Serves: 2 servings

1 cup: 150 ml

Ingredients

• Eggs: 4
• Milk: ¼ cup
• Butter: 2 ½ tsp
• Salt and pepper: As per taste

Method of Preparation

• Crack eggs in a bowl. 
• Beat the eggs lightly before combining them with milk, a dash of salt, and pepper in a bowl.
• Heat butter on a non-stick pan. Pour the mixture into the pan. 
• Gently pull the eggs across the pan with a spatula as they start to solidify, creating big, soft curds.
• Cook the eggs (pulling, lifting, folding) until they are thick on medium flame
• Allow some time for eggs to form lumps. 
• Wait for the eggs to be completely dehydrated. 
•  Serve fresh.

For Lunch

Spicy Paneer Bhurji

Preparation Time: 25 minutes

Serves: 3 servings

1 cup: 300 g

Ingredients

• Paneer: 250 g
• Turmeric powder: ½ tsp
• Salt: 1 tsp
• Oil: 2 tbsp
• Red chilli powder: 1 tsp
• Coriander powder: ½ tsp
• Cumin seeds: ½ tsp
• Methi: ½ tsp
• Lemon: 1 
• Onion (optional): 2 
• Grated ginger: 1 tsp
• Tomato: 1
• Coriander leaves: 2 tsp
• Green chillies: 2

Method of Preparation

• Crumble fresh paneer and set aside. 
• Heat the oil in a non-stick pan. Add grated ginger, cumin seeds and chopped green chilled. 
• Add the chopped tomato and onion. Saute the vegetables until the onion turns translucent or the tomatoes get mushy. 
• Add salt to taste and all the powdered spices. Mix it well.
• Stir in the crumbled paneer.
• Include Kasuri methi, lemon juice and coriander leaves to finish. 
• Enjoy with multi-grain or wheat rotis. 

Rajma Pulao

Preparation Time: 15 minutes

Serves: 2 servings

1 cup: 300g

Ingredients

• Rajma, soaked overnight: ½ cup
• Rice: 1 cup
• Butter/Ghee: 1 tbsp
• Ginger-garlic paste: 1 tsp
• Green chillies: 1-2 
• Clove: 3
• Green cardamom: 2-3 
• Black cardamom: 1
• Cinnamon: 1 inch
• Jeera (cumin seeds): ½ tsp
• Ghee: 1tsp
• Chopped Onion: ½
• Chopped Tomato: 1
• Salt and Pepper: As per taste
• Chilli powder: 1 tsp
• A few coriander leaves 

Method of Preparation

• Heat 1 tbsp of ghee in a pressure cooker. Add pepper, cinnamon, cloves, and jeera and saute for about a min on low flame. 
• Add the chopped tomato and onion. Saute the vegetables until the onion turns translucent or the tomatoes get mushy. 
• Add ginger garlic paste, other spices and salt and mix. 
• Add the soaked rajma and mix it well
• Sauté on low flame. Add 1 cup of basmati rice and sauté thoroughly. 
• Add coriander leaves before closing the pressure cooker.
• Cook for two whistles on medium-high flame. 
• Serve hot.

For Dinner

Spicy Tomato Soup

Preparation Time: 40 minutes

Serves: 4 servings

1 cup: 300 g

Ingredients

• Tomato: 5-6
• Olive oil: 1 tsp
• Onion (chopped): 1 
• Garlic cloves, crushed: 1
• Small red chilli: 1 
• Jeera (Cumin seeds): 1 tsp
• Coriander powder: 1 tsp
• Vegetable stock: 1 cup

Method of Preparation

• Heat oil in a saucepan. Add onion, and sauté it while stirring for 3 to 4 minutes, or until it softens. Add spices, garlic, and chilli; stir for another minute. 
• Over high heat, add the vegetable stock and tomatoes and bring to a boil. Simmer for 20 minutes on low heat and a somewhat ajar cover. 
• Place aside to cool down.
• Blend the soup in batches, stopping to add water if necessary to achieve a smooth consistency.
• Once more, add salt and freshly ground black pepper to the saucepan. Place in a medium-hot pan and stir until thoroughly warmed. Serve warm

Grilled Paneer Sandwich

Preparation Time: 15 minutes

Serves: 2 servings

1 cup: 300g

Ingredients

• Paneer: 1 cup
• Capsicum: ½ 
• Boiled/Steamed Carrot: ½ 
• Boiled/Steamed Corn: ¼ cup
• Paprika: 1 tbsp
• Cumin powder: 1 tsp 
• Salt: As per taste
• Bread (brown/wheat/multigrain): As per choice 
• Mint/Coriander chutney
• Butter: As per taste

Method of Preparation

• Take 1 cup of grated paneer and place it in a big mixing basin. Add corn, carrot, capsicum, and coriander leaves. Add salt, cumin powder, and chilli powder. Mix well. 
• Spread the prepared stuffing over two slices of bread, followed by the green chutney. 
• Spread butter on toast and grill till brown. When it is ready to serve, cut it in half.

For Desserts

Healthy Ice-cream

Preparation Time: 10 minutes

Servings: 2

1 cup: 300 g

Ingredients

• Strawberries: 1 ½ cup
• Banana: 1 
• Milk of choice: 1 cup
• Berries for topping

Method of Preparation

• Roughly chop the strawberries and bananas. 
• Blend the fruits with milk in a high-speed blender until no fruit bits are left.
• Pour the thick mixture into a bowl. 
• Freeze for a couple of hours. 
• Serve chilled. Add berries before consumption. 

Food Storage Tips

The best way to consume the food is to eat it fresh. However, if that is not possible, keep it in an airtight box. Refrigerate the food for up to 6-8 hours. Ideally, you shouldn’t consume it after that, but if it is, microwave it or warm it up on a pan. The food should ideally not be defrosted or frozen as the nutrients cease to exist. Also, some food items can get soggy and not taste good after one point. Avoid storing food under the sun as it can potentially change the taste of the food. Store foods in a cool and dry place. 

Foods to Avoid

While people know how certain food items help scale up their metabolism, there are food items that are popular for bringing it down too. Unsaturated fats are one type, often known as trans fats or trans-fatty acids. They can be present in both organic and synthetic forms. Trans fat is a known contributor to metabolic slowdown in addition to causing heart disease. Along with trans fat, substances are popular to reduce metabolism. 

A couple of popular and unpopular items responsible for metabolism reduction are:

• Refined flour
• Sugar
• Fried and junk food
• Soda and aerated drinks
• Alcohol and cigarettes
• Red meat
• Canned fruits, vegetables and juices

Conclusion

Maintaining a healthy lifestyle depends on having a healthy metabolism. The types of food you eat have a profound effect on your metabolism. Therefore, frequently incorporating them may aid in weight loss and long-term weight maintenance. However, these items won’t make up for a high-calorie or low-quality diet. Anyone wishing to increase their metabolism should consider their diet as a whole rather than concentrating on particular foods. Protein and whole-food-rich diets may boost energy expenditure, which may support the maintenance of a healthy metabolism.