Bananas – A Resistant Starch that Aids Weight Loss Tips

Bananas and Weight Loss

Resistant starch is a type of starch that doesn’t generally get digested by the small intestine and thus passes through into the large intestine where it can deliver similar benefits to fibre. These resistant starches act as appetite suppressants as it behaves very similar to fibre – it has the added advantage however of being able to be added to foods without affecting its flavour and is therefore found in lots of ‘off the shelf’ weight loss foods.
Aside from resistant starch being an appetite suppressant, it has also been found to affect metabolism rates. The resistant starch increases fat oxidisation after a meal, thus reducing fat accumulation and possible even burning fat. For those of you following the GI diet, resistance starch has a low GI and so is perfectly good to eat for this diet. Finally, it is also gluten free and can be used to replace flour and similar products for coeliacs.
So how can you get more resistant starch into your diet? One of the best ways that you can choose is adding bananas in your weight loss diet. When you get hungry and feel like eating a healthy snack, instead of heading for junk food, you should pick up a banana and aid weight loss. Slightly unripe bananas as the best to eat as they contain a respectable 12.5 grams of resistant starch, but a ripe banana is still pretty good at 4.7 grams. These will keep you going for quite a long period of time.
If you are thinking of serving bananas for weight loss, you’ll want some tips on how to eat them! First up, you can very easily replace your morning bowl of cereal with a banana, if you wish. The resistant starch in it will keep you full for a long period of time, probably better than your regular bowl of cereal would. However, it would be ideal if you could eat bananas during the 2nd part of the day, as they will maintain your fullness and help you avoid a rich dinner.
If you like smoothies then bananas are always great in them – you can throw lots of stuff into a blender, low fat yogurt being a good option, and chop up a bit of banana in there too and you’ll have the ultimate banana weight loss smoothie! Other good options for eating banana for appetite suppression are within a fruit salad or ice cream.