Protein can increase metabolism, but can you slim down?

The speed at which the metabolism is slow is often used as a determinant of a person's weight. Fast metabolism is said to be able to help you lose weight. Well, from various ways to increase metabolism, foods high in protein are included in one of them.

Boosting metabolism helps you lose weight

Increasing the body's metabolism is one of the main steps to lose weight. The reason is, the higher or faster the body's metabolism is, the more calories it will burn.

When you burn a lot of calories, your weight will automatically decrease. Therefore, increasing metabolism is an important trick for a diet program.

Apart from losing weight, increasing your metabolism will also help give you the energy you need each day so you can stay active.

Is it true that protein-rich foods can increase metabolism?

Protein is an essential nutrient that is used as a source of energy. Among other types of nutrients, protein has the highest thermal effect. The thermic effect is the amount of energy used to digest, absorb and process nutrients in food.

Quoted from Healthline, protein was able to speed up the metabolic rate by 15-30 percent. This means that consuming foods and drinks high in protein helps the body burn more calories because of a high enough metabolic rate.

To determine how protein works to increase metabolism, researchers from Pennington Biomedical Research conducted a study on 16 healthy adults. Participants were asked to undergo a high-calorie diet with different protein intake, namely 5, 15, and 25 percent for 8 weeks. All participants were asked to consume 40 percent more calories than needed to maintain body weight.

The result, people who consume higher protein, namely 15 and 25 percent save 45 percent of the excess calories as muscle. Meanwhile, those with a low protein intake of 5 percent actually store 95 percent of excess calories as fat.

Researchers don't know exactly how protein changes the way the body stores calories. However, research shows that protein has a large impact on body fat percentage. Researchers have also seen that high-protein foods increase metabolism, which in turn increases muscle mass.

However, not only does it increase metabolism, foods and drinks high in protein are proven to make you feel fuller. That way, you avoid eating frenzy which can add to the pile of fat in the body. Therefore, it can be concluded that protein-rich foods help the body to lose weight.

The various sources of healthy protein are chicken and lean beef, milk, sardines, eggs, cheese, yogurt, and kidney beans. Try to combine these protein sources with other nutrients in a balanced way so that the calories that enter the body remain under control.

Another way to increase metabolism

Apart from eating protein-rich foods, you can also increase your metabolism by:

1. Drink green tea or oolong tea

Based on research in the American Journal of Physiology, green tea and oolong can actually increase metabolism by 4-5 percent. Both of these teas help convert some of the fat stored in the body into free fatty acids. This acid can increase fat burning by up to 17 percent.

2. Drink coffee

Research shows that the caffeine content in coffee can increase the body's metabolism by about 3-11 percent. Just like green tea, the caffeine in coffee also helps burn fat in the body.

3. Cook with coconut oil

Coconut oil is a medium chain fatty acid. This type of fatty acid can increase the body's metabolism more than long chain fatty acids.

A study found that medium chain fatty acids can increase the body's metabolism by up to 12 percent. Meanwhile, long chain fatty acids are only 4 percent.

Therefore, replacing vegetable oil with coconut oil can be an alternative for those of you who want to lose weight.

4. Drink lots of water

A study published in The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism states that drinking 500 ml of water makes your metabolism increase quite high, which is about 30 percent.

This increase occurs after 10 minutes and will reach its maximum level after 30-40 minutes. The energy used is around 100 kJ. So the researchers concluded that drinking 2 liters of water per day can burn energy up to 400 kJ.

How much protein should be consumed?

From the results of research conducted at Pennington Biomedical Research, to be able to increase metabolism, the amount of protein that needs to be consumed is 25-45 percent of total calorie intake. For example, when you are on a 2,000 calorie diet, the protein intake that should be consumed in a day is 125-225 grams.

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