I was fairly surprised when I saw this article on oatmeal helping reduce stomach fat. Oatmeal is great for your heart, but I wasn’t aware how helpful it could be for loosing weight. So I did a little research to see if I could find some truth behind it all.
Oatmeal is in the family of complex carbohydrates. For those of you not so savvy in nutrition talk- there are two forms of carbs, complex and simple. All are made of sugar, but the complex ones form a chain in your stomach, that is harder to break up into fat.
Because there are so many simple carbs (and they are very tasty), those who are looking to lose weight sometimes tend to cut carbs out of their diets completely. While I have never agreed with trying to quit food cold turkey, those on the anti-carb diets may generally see progress before most likely crashing and burning into a several plates of pasta the following week.
Carbs are important for you though! As long as you’re smart and eating the right ones, they can be beneficial in your trek to weight loss. Carbs are our main source of energy, plus while working out they help fuel our muscular contractions which means that your baked potato for lunch is actually helping you in the gym.
Therefore- oatmeal really does help you lose fat. But so do many other complex carbs. Stick to cornmeal, barley and oatmeal because they are great carbs in their most natural state (without being broken down or added to in order to produce another food). You can also eat potatoes, brown rice, bagels and pasta (however I recommend eating whole wheat instead of white in both the pasta and bread departments- but that’s another article for another day!)
What are your carb weaknesses? Do you have favorite oatmeal recipes?
