By Pav Bryan
A subject that causes quite a bit of controversy is Negative Calorie Foods. Whether you believe they exist or not we can all agree that the foods that often fall in this category are pretty good options for filling you up without the risk of making you fat - at this point I'd like to point out that this isn't a ticket to gorge on some of the suggestions below; nothing replaces a balanced healthy diet.
To be truly negative calorie a food has to have a thermic effect of 100% or more, thermic effect being the measure of the amount of calories used in digesting versus the amount of calories the food actually gives. So a food that has a thermic effect of 10% would cost the body a tenth of the calories the food actually provides, for example a food with a thermic effect of 10% would provide the body with 100 calories and would burn 10 calories to digest.
Celery is probably the most famous of all the negative calorie foods. A stalk of celery contains only about 6 calories. So for celery to be negative calorie it would need the body to burn at least this amount. Celery in fact only burns around half a calorie digesting it. So not quite a calorie deficit then...
And there's a common theme to this whole food list. They tend to be fruits and vegetables that are low in sugar and high in water. Grapefruit, lemon and lime are often touted as negative calorie. Anyone who wants to test these out is welcome, just remember no added sugar to lessen the face inverting sourness you are about to endure! Please send all pictures and videos directly to me!
Lettuce, broccoli and cabbage are a few more vegetables wrongly advertised as negative calorie. In their respective orders they contain 15, 34 and 25 calories per 100 grams and burn approximately 1.5, 3.4 and 2.5 calories digesting them - again nothing negative about that. You may see a pattern here; this is because most carbohydrates have a thermic effect of around 10%. In case you were wondering; fat has a thermic effect of about 5% and protein about 30%.
So from this you can see that the closest any food comes to being negative calorie, at least based on the thermic effect, is protein. But even protein isn't that close to being negative calorie.
So sadly no evidence exists to back up the claim of there being any negative calorie foods out there. So no eating yourself thin I'm afraid (back to exercising - sigh!). So be careful what people, and the internet, may tell you. But don't let that stop you eating the foods mentioned above. Green vegetables and low sugar fruits are still very nutritious and good for you.
But let's finish on a positive, there is one saving grace that the experts tend to agree is negative calorie. Ice Cold Water is perhaps the only truly negative calorie food, or in this case drink. The reason behind this is waters lack in calories (that would be zero) and the body having to warm the water in order to digest it. But don't go necking pint after pint of water just yet. Even if you drink a glass a day it would take a while to lose even a single pound of weight (that would be about a year - sighs again!). But that's not to say that it won't help. Getting your 8-10 glasses of water a day is still recommended!
Pav Bryan - Owner & Coach
Pav Bryan Cycling Coach
Advanced Wattbike Cycling Performance & Fitness Testing, & Coaching
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