The Dr Louise Newson Podcast - 086 - Lockdown & Weight Loss - Emma Ellice-Flint & Dr Louise Newson

Episode Date: February 15, 2021

In this episode, Dr Louise Newson and Newson Health nutritionist, Emma Ellice-Flint discuss habits that might help with weight loss and general weight balance.   During the UK’s third lockdown, many women are finding it difficult to feel motivated to exercise and eat well. Many are having to home school their children; some are working harder than ever due to the pandemic. Plus the UK’s winter weather discourages outside exercise and movement.   Dr Newson and Emma discuss what a woman might do to try and help herself during this time. In particular they discuss the link between what a person eats and their mood and energy. Emma talks about prebiotic foods that help to feed the good gut microbes, such as rocket, garlic, onion, leek and more. They also discuss some healthy eating ideas and meals that the kids/teens at home might like too!  Emma's Three Take Home Tips for Weight Balance: Avoid snacking in the evenings - Eat a satisfying evening meal so that the craving for snacking into the evening is less. The habit of evening snacking is more likely to lead to weight gain, than at any other time.  Avoid alcohol - Drinking alcohol regularly can contribute to weight gain. Where possible, try to make your own food rather than buy in pre-prepared food. This way you can be in control of what exactly goes into your meals.  Emma is a Nutritionist and former chef. She works at Newson Health seeing clients for nutrition/food, weight balance and gastrointestinal health related issues. She runs monthly online food and health workshops, plus she shares her recipes regularly on social media and on her website.  Find Emma on Instagram here: @emmas_nutrition  Facebook: @emmasnutrition   https://emmasnutrition.com   

Welcome to the Newsome Health Menopause podcast. I'm Dr Louise Newsome, a GP and menopause specialist, and I'm also the founder of the Menopause charity. In addition, I run the Newsome Health Menopause and Well-Being Clinic here in Stratford-upon-Avon. So today I have a guest with me who has appeared twice before. So this is a bit of a world record for me. This is her third appearance on my series. And so I'm really delighted to reintroduce to you, Emma Ellis Flint. So hi Emma. Hey, hi, Louise. So as many of you know, Emma is a nutritionist and also a chef. And she's been working with me for quite a while now, actually, not long after my clinic opened. She started working. But we decided we would do a podcast now really to talk about losing weight and also not putting on weight during lockdown. So we're recording this now in beginning of February. 2021. And for the vast majority of us, certainly in the UK, we're very restricted in what we can do

because of coronavirus. And we're all getting a bit fed up. And we're more fed up because it's dark, it's cold. You know, we don't know quite how the future is going to be. And so a lot of people are comfort eating. And a lot of people are just a bit more sluggish as well. And actually when when your mood's low, you think, what the hell I'm just going to have another takeaway. I'm just going to reach for the biscuits or whatever. So I need Emma. We all need Emma in our lives because one of the things I've learned from Emma is that you can really enjoy food and I always do enjoy food but every time I watch Emma on her Instagram she's just making these gorgeous recipes and I just think I want to be in Emma's kitchen. I want her cooking for me all the

time but your enthusiasm of food is just fantastic Emma so can we just have your brain for half an hour please to make us feel happier about what we eat. Yeah, absolutely, good, thanks for that. The thing here is I completely agree with you. Great introduction. Even I was feeling it this last January, this last month with lockdown, has been very much a bit depressing, a bit, blah. And all my girlfriends I speak to have put on a bit of weight,

or at least they've become very kind of, they haven't moved around. Those that even exercise normally quite a bit have even stopped doing that a lot. And the whole thing in it, then it's the cycle of just a little downward spiral. So let's talk about this. And I think, first of all, I want to actually not, rather than get into specific foods, I want to talk about habits because, to be honest, it's really about habits here. And now we're at the very beginning of February.

I think it's just a fantastic time. I love that feeling. I almost feel, along with the buds in the gardens on the trees or wherever, I almost feel like there's just a little micro amount of optimism creeping in here. And so I think habits are extremely important. And there are some great habits that might be big or little for someone to really start thinking about adopting. And the absolute first one is evening, evening eating or evening drinking.

I wonder if a person listened to this, if they can just be honest themselves and think about what do they do, let's say they're eating an evening meal. I don't know what time that is. Everyone's evening meal varies. And what are they doing after that evening meal? Are they then just sort of quickly sorting themselves out or their kids out or something like that? And then they plonking themselves for the TV?

And do they have a little snack beside them? Or do they sort of, you know, think, oh, I wouldn't mind eating something. Oh, let me go and grab, you know, something rather. Or have they had a drink, alcoholic drink or something, say, with their evening meal? And does that creep on into the evening? Oh, gosh, it's lockdown. It's miserable. Oh, I'll just have another one.

It's this habit. And it could be easy to break. It could be hard to break. I can't help individual people listening to this. But this habit is absolutely crucial to many things. And it's not just about weight loss or weight balance. It's actually also about how you feel the next day or how much energy you've got. And this is why that time in the evening where,

you've had your evening meal, hopefully you've been satisfied from it, and you've got into the evening. And anything you eat then in the evening, it's just going to go to fat in your body. It's not going to be metabolized and used up. It's going to go to fat. It'll be much more likely to be deposited as fat

than if you ate extra, say, in the morning or something like that. So the same kind of, let's say, I hate calories, but let's say calories amount. If you eat it in the evening, it's going to go to fat in your body. If you eat it in the morning, it's less likely. to. So that's the first thing, but also that even eating means that your body has to continue to digest, and that's hard work. And actually, it means that when you wake up the following morning, it's more likely you're going to wake up with less energy or just not wake up so vital

because you're kind of creeping on that digestion, which means that digestion is creeping on into your sleep time. And actually, that's not good. So it doesn't help at all with the kind of energy and helping you clear your head the following day, especially the alcohol, of course, but also with that fat gain or loss. Yeah, and I think that's so important, is it? Because I think a lot of people say, well, I'm meeting really well, and their actual meals are really good, but it is that whole. And I think a lot of people at the moment think, well, I deserve a treat

because I've got through yet another day of this miserable life. And it's always sort of seeing food as a reward, isn't it? And I actually sometimes feel better about myself, because I haven't had an evening snack rather than feeling bad because I have. And there's nothing worse than making yourself feel bad about food because it gives all this negativity, doesn't it? And it should be... Absolutely.

Well, I mean, I often snack on nuts and I'm really bad because I have this sort of routine almost. I eat my lunch and then I always have some nuts. It's almost like as a dessert, but it's like this whole thing. But I don't mind because it's in the middle of the day. But if I did it after my evening meal, I would then feel quite guilty that I've just equally. something that I didn't really need.

Yeah. I don't want to deny myself nuts because I think they're good. So it is choosing when you can have your treat or your snack or whatever, isn't it? I think maybe is important. Okay. So, I mean, I feel like this is almost scripted, Louise, because you have segwed into my next point. So, beautiful.

Oh, my God, we should do this more often. Actually, no, actually, this is third time. So perhaps we're doing it well. Anyway, so this is the point. So here we go into snacks. So if someone generally wants to lose weight, I'd say to them, don't snack. If they love something sweet, you know, maybe you can do that, but attach it to a meal. So let's say you're saying after lunch, you might have some extra nuts.

That's fine, actually. That's funny. If you attach it to a main meal, it's fine. It's when in the middle of the afternoon or the middle of the morning or in the evening, you then go and snack, that snack is more likely to go to fat gain, to go to that abdominal fat, then if you attached it to your meal, it just is the way your body digest, the way it uses the fats,

the protein, the carbs in your meal, and also it gives your body that relief from digestion between the main meals, which actually enhances your metabolism overall. So it's actually okay, so if you want something sweet, say, I don't know, some dry fruit or something,

don't have it as a snack met afternoon, have it straight after your lunch, that sort of thing. So attach it to a main meal. And it's then just going, to lead to a lot less to the fat gain or it's going to lead to sort of fat loss in fact. So it's much better. So it's just trying to avoid this kind of snack mentality.

I'm actually not sure where it came about. No, but it's huge, isn't it? I think it's massive. It came from research, I think. You know, this whole balancing the blood glucose thing where I'll have five small meals. Yeah, I think there's that. And then there's also children, you know, my children, when they were going to school, my youngest daughter takes a snack to school, and I usually make something, and

it's in the freezer, so it's usually something sweet. So it's biscuits or a little cake, a cupcake, or some flapjack or something like that. And obviously they're not allowed nuts in school. And I keep saying to what do other people take? Because I always feel that I'm sort of the bad mother or not doing the right thing. She said, oh, no, they often have the packets of crisps or, you know, and I'm like, well, every day they're having a packet of crisp as a snack. They don't think about that. And then a snack when they come home from school, because they're hungry and then their supper and then a snack before they go to me. You can see how it just gets into this habit.

And then your poor gut microbes don't know what they're doing because they're not having time to replicate or do anything. And right you say, I think to go to bed, we all know we have to rest our brains and our body, but we don't think about resting our guts in the same way. Absolutely. I think once you realise it's a living, there's living organisms in our guts that need looking after.

And we've spoken about this. Obviously, we've done a podcast before about gut microbes and how important that is to boost and have your good bugs. But actually, it's not just because they'll help you with your metabolism, but they help you with your mental health as well. And any way we can boost our mental health with our food, especially at the moment, that's got to be a good thing, hasn't it? This is it.

So this is the other thing. So our mood plays a big, big factor in what we eat and what we choose to eat, the foods that we choose. and there's that love of self-talk going on, oh, I'll just give this to myself because it's a reward or maybe it'll even make me feel better, or whatever your self-talk is. So that's not helpful, in fact.

But you're absolutely right about the mood. The mood is fundamental, in fact, in that positivity that goes with eating well and eating well in your timings. And then there's this link that you're talking about, the link between keeping your gut microbes well-fed and healthy and your gut in a good place. and also your mood.

And it's in the correlations there now, fortunately in science, the research is backing it up. What we feed ourselves and what we feed our gut microbes affects our well-being and our mood and our health. And it doesn't just mean ferment food are fabulous. They're fabulous. They're not for everyone, though. There's a small percentage of the population that actually can't tolerate fomentous foods. But most people can, so they're fabulous, mostly. But there's also all those foods that also feed the gut microbes.

It's terms as pre-biotic foods. They're also fabulous, and most people need more of those, and they're generally plant foods. It's as simple as that. It's eating more plant foods. I mean, there's really specific ones, garlics, onions, cauliflower, leeks, broccoli, beech root, those sorts of foods. However, some people can't tolerate all of them. That's, once again, a small percentage of the population, so that's fine. They don't eat those.

They eat other plant foods that they can tolerate. but most people can so it's about doing that and if you start focusing on that and anyway eating more plant foods you've got less room for the rubbish foods and it's most likely you're starting to make your own meals because you're focusing on that and if there's less room for that process food your body is just going to feel so much better anyway so along comes this weight balance anyway without you even barely thinking about it yeah no it's so important so one of the things i was going to ask you and put your brain. So most of us are stuck at home working. Our children are around. They're not at school. And so that's another meal we've got to think about. But we've got to do a meal

really quickly. So for me, I literally have 10 minutes sometimes less between, you know, meetings or consultations, but then I've got three hungry children and sometimes my husband around. So, you know, it would be very easy for me to just give them some sandwich every day of some sort of bought bread with some cheese and that's it. That's your lot, you know, a packet, crisps. Well, actually, I don't do that. We don't have christen our house and we don't have that sort of bread. But give us some inspiration, Emma. What is it really easy things for teenagers and, you know, because they eat more than I do and also younger children. It's just, I find lunch hardest, actually. So have you got any good tips. Yeah, okay. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah,

I have. And teens as well. Teams tend to want more cards than perhaps we as adults, but that's still okay. You can do it. So either I tend to suggest someone always makes extra vegetables in the evening. And so they put them in the fridge. So they've got this kind of cooked veggies in the fridge. They might make extra, say you're using brown rice or something in the evening, you've got extra brown rice in the fridge as well. As long as brown rice is kept cold in the fridge and it's only like, say, 24 hours old, then it's actually safe to use. And then what I tend to do an easy one is I just throw them all into a fry pan together with some extra version of oil and make like this kind of warm rice salad. It takes minutes.

makes minutes. And for the kids, I just add, I mean, the extra virgin olive oil. So it's more of like a, like a fried rice. Fried rice with a little bit of onion. Spring onions, because they're quicker to cook, rice thrown in, some leftover veggies just tossed through so they can kind of like, you know, it's in there and we know it's being healthy. Extra veggies for me, more rice for them, that sort of thing. And then I would just, literally, I'd fry maybe a couple of eggs or an egg and I'd pop it on top. And maybe like a crispy fried. egg, fried in extra version of olive oil. And it's easy. You know, if they like a little bit, you can add a bit of a chili sauce on top of that if you want. You can I have a Worcesters

sauce if you want, you know, something like that, soy sauce, definitely. Add, you know, ginger if you want, just quickly grate it in if you want that gingeriness. That doesn't even take 10 minutes to make. It really doesn't. And it's based on having it in the fridge, definitely. That's one of my favorites. Sometimes I get, I literally pick up. a couple of veggies that are like really simple veggies. So I get a cabbage. I just really kindly, finely shave it.

Once again, I get spring onions, if this is lunchtime, rather than onions, because they're quicker to cook. I get some green leaves, and I just chop them in a big fry pan. I fry them off quickly,

and they just wilt in a second if you finally cut the cabbage up. And that's a really, really easy one. And then I get some maybe pre-cooked chicken. Then I'd shred it in there. and I might open a can of just some lentils, drain it off, and I toss it in there. And for the kids, if you serve it in like a bowl, as if it's kind of like just an easy,

with a four, easy meal, and it's warm. And you're adding kind of a flavor that's a little bit salty. It tends to help. And they really like it then. I mean, I use soy sauce sauce quite often or a gluten-free soy, someone can't tolerate regular soy. And that's really, that's just a really easy one as well. With the shredded chicken, there's some protein. Obviously, crumbled up tofu is just great as well.

Some kids like it, some don't. That's another great one. So it's being prepared is really good, isn't it? Can you freeze rice once it's cooked? Absolutely. So you cook up lots, freeze it off in portions, in little snap lock bags. It's just totally easy. And it's really great, and you can get it out,

and you can kind of almost crumble it in its frozen state into a pan and go for your life. And you can add nuts and seeds to that as well. My kids like crunch. I haven't got teenage kids at home anymore, but as they were growing up, we do this kind of quick stir-fried rice thing, and we put lots of nuts and season for crunch, and they loved that. Yeah, I mean, my daughter's going to university next year. Well, this year now in September, so she's now thinking about how to cook,

and so she's got a student cookbook, and she was just doing something, frying some mushrooms with garlic, and then adding some crem fresh and putting it in a jacket potato, and then sprinkling some herbs on top. And she was going, Mommy, this is really easy. And she said, well, this would be really expensive? I said, no, actually it's dirt cheap. You know, mushrooms are cheap.

And some cram fresh or some cream or, you know, whatever's there, or some muskopony or some cream cheese or anything, really. Absolutely. And then she grated some cheddar on top. So, you know, it is. Yeah, that's right. So I think, because it is expensive. You know, my food bill's gone up with the children being at home.

Of course it has. But it's trying to be wise on how you spend the money. And, I mean, I always cook twice of what I need and then freeze it because then that's another meal I'm not thinking about. That's exactly it. It's having to be really organised and it's so crucial now. And especially at the end of the day, you just say, oh, I don't feel like cooking. But then if you don't cook, you can't eat, but you want to have something that's easy. Yeah, that's right.

And the more you cook yourself and the less takeaways or processed food or food that some other big conglomerates has made, the more you have your own food, actually, in fact, the more your weight will balance. It's actually, it's completely statistically proven. The less of that processed food you eat, the more you will have that balanced abdominal of fat, and it's really good. I was just going to come back to, like, student food and that sort of thing. And kids, because you wanted a quick meal for lunch, I mean, that was why I mentioned what I did, but do you know what, that humble sweet potato or, you know, big jacket

potato, white potatoes, it was absolutely fantastic. fantastic food. If you can kind of think an hour before lunchtime to put it in the oven. So a whole sweet potato in its skin is just gorgeous. Open up, mash it with extra virgin olive or salt and pepper. And yes, just fry up quickly for off some mushrooms true. Or you can even open a can of some legume or pulse and chickpeas or something and put that in a fried pan really quickly with some spring onions and some garlic and open a bit of a can of tomatoes. And you get like a tomato-y, quick tomato-wee bean warming dish, and you're by all means, you know, going great over cheese over the top

or tear up some sort of soft fresh cheese, something like that. It's just really easy and really tasty. Yeah, and I think it is. It's having warm food is really nice. I roasted some butternut squash recently, and I scooped out the inside and added some cheese and also some nuts, actually. I chopped some nuts and put it in as a Sarah Ravens recipe. put it back in the oven for a little bit. And it's something about this sort of warm

texture that, oh, it's just really lovely. So, but also just thinking about bread. So, I mean, I often think back, I was born in 1970. So I grew up in the 70s and no one was fat then. Everyone was just a normal weight, no, very few overweight people. But we had bread, we had cereal in the morning, we had butter, we had full fat milk. But we didn't have any processed food, obviously. And I'm thinking back about the bread, because we used to, I don't know, if you, you know, you remember, but we used to have different colours for the plastic that would seal the bread, and it would be different colour for different day of the week. And so the bread would come out of date really quickly,

so after two days you'd know, you probably wouldn't want to sandwich out of it, but it might be a cane, the toaster. Whereas now, wartbread just seems to last forever. So there must be a difference in the bread that we ate then and now. And I've actually got a breadmaker that I was bought, oh, I don't know, 20-odd years ago when they first came out, but it still goes. And actually, the children are at home, I've been using it. And, you know, it's got a teaspoon of sugar, teaspoon of salt in the recipe,

and just some bread flour, and I mix it with some, my children would have white bread every day, but I don't. I put in whole meal flowers, sometimes with some seeds, and the yeast and some butter and water. That's all it is. Yes. So that's got to be better, hasn't it, than the bought bread? Yes, I mean, bought bread is proved really fast, and you're right. They put a few little, like, kind of preservatives and things in that to keep it fresh and longer.

and generally speaking your homemade bread is better. But there are some bought breads you can get that are great, that are just those ingredients that you just listed, and that's all they are. And yeah, they will go off faster. The thing with bread, I don't know what flour use, but white flour generally is, it might be okay for sort of, you know, an active child

or something running around a lot. But white flour for an adult, for instance, is just a useless kind of calorie. It's not going to give you any nutrition. value and if it's going to fill you up as opposed to having extra sort of vegetables or or something like that or extra legumes or pauses or whatever it is I would much rather a person didn't have the bread and had this this other food the plant food vegetables for instance and really filled off on that because after all this is about weight loss or weight balance and I think

it's important to think about that you know where are you getting your energy from and your food what's filling you up most is it white flour products and if you're If it is, try and swap them out and get some products that have a lot more fiber in them and a lot more nutrients that also are going to fill you up. And it's just great to sort of really have a hard look at that because those white flower products nutritionally are just a waste of time. They're not providing anything. No. So sometimes patients will, you know, because a lot of people are very addicted to bread. You know, bread is something they have all the time.

And so sometimes I'll say, well, have an open sandwich. Don't have the top. Yes. You're having half. And seeing what you're, you're, you know, you're having half. seeing what you're eating and it is the variety, isn't it? But it doesn't mean that you have to have fresh organic vegetables every day. I love the way you're selling opening a tin. And so for a lot of people think, oh my goodness, but you know, opening a tin of something, it's absolutely

fine, but also having some dried products as well. So lentils are actually cheaper, aren't they? If you buy a lot and then you cook them. So it's being clever, isn't it, so that you're having a variety, but it doesn't mean you have to go out shopping every single. all day. You can, you know, stock up on a lot of things, can't you? Yeah, no, that's exactly right. So, funny enough, often, when you start cooking yourself at home, if you start using sort of legumes and pulses, say, from dried, and you, like, I just get a bag of chickpeas dried, which are cheapest chips, actually. Although that phrase is funny, isn't it? Anyway, just a bag of dried chickpeas and I soaked them all, the whole lot overnight, pop them.

in a big saucepan with lots of water, boil them up until they're cooked, and then I freeze them in portions. It's just really inexpensive. It's a bother to do it just that initially, but it actually pays off because it lasts for several weeks. So it's fantastic and you're absolutely right. And those sort of things work well. onions, garlic, tin tomatoes, usually, you know, the basics here, just any old greens, but you don't have to get all the little bags of baby spinach, which are more expensive. you just get a big bunch of fairly cheap greens that's in season. And that's actually really good. All those basic ones, courgettes or broccoli. Don't go for the kind of imported, fancy ones.

Don't go for the ones out of season. Just go for what's fresh in season. And just sort of just base a meal around them. And you can really layer it up. And the nuts and seeds, you can buy them online in bulk if you want. They're much cheaper online than buying them in the little packets from the supermarket. It's much cheaper. Store them in the freezer.

if you're worried about their longevity because nuts cities can go off and go around and sit quite fast. And do it like that, it's really worth it. It makes a big difference, actually. It's fantastic. Yeah, so buying in bulk, because nuts are very expensive in supermarket.

They are really expensive. Yeah. In this country, they're outrageously expensive, funny enough. I'm not sure why, but it's all these little packets of them. I suggest you go online and do that and buy it in a bigger packet and store them in the cold place. And then they last much longer. which is fantastic.

Drinks, let's come back to drinks. Drinks can be a way that a person can bring in more like energy, you know, within they actually need. So it comes in and we're not sure we don't notice it. I mean, the obvious stuff is sugar in drinks. That's not beneficial to that kind of fat loss or fat balance. But, you know, people have got quite used to these days having, they're like the latte or their kind of, you know, quite milky,

coffees, for instance, and actually they're having a lot of milk. And it depends how they're having their milk. It's having skinned or semi-skinned or regular. That's actually an area where they could cut out in their drinks. And it depends what else is going on in their drinks. Maybe they are having, let's come back to that alcohol again. Maybe they're just as a habit having alcohol each night. And they think it gets them through. And I just really challenge that habit and that thought process. If they are serious about losing weight, then giving up alcohol for a while or choosing an evening, a week or something to drink alcohol, it's going to make a huge difference

to that weight loss. Yeah, because it is so many hidden calories in alcohol, but also there's now all the other drinks that are zero calorie or sugar-free or whatever. But actually, there's still, it's not better just to have water, isn't it? Yeah, water or flavoured water with lemon. Yeah, when we're sitting at our desk, it's very easy to think. I don't want water, I don't want another tea or whatever. So having all these sweetened drinks, whether they're with sugar or with something else,

there's something else is actually worse because it will just get converted in the body, when it's it. The body doesn't know what it is. It's some chemical. That's right. It actually really disturbs your body because it thinks what on earth it is. And actually, it's been proven now that it disturbs your gut microbes. They also go, what is that? That's not real. Funny enough in, you know, research, when they look at the effect on blood glucose levels, and they don't, can't explain this, but weirdly sugar-free, you know, artificially sweetened drinks still has an effect on blood glucose levels, elevates it, because I guess it has a connection to what we taste on our tongue

and the messages it sends us, therefore perhaps, I don't know, I'm only guessing to the pancreas to release insulin. I just don't understand. It's interesting. I don't think people really know, but there's also some evidence that they can stimulate appetite as well. So when they've given busy drinks or really sweeten drinks to children, they've gone and eaten a lot more. So it stimulates lots of receptors in our brains as well, isn't it? And I think food is seen as a reward for many people, but it's also can be highly addictive as well. So it's very easy for us to sit here and say,

oh, yes, you should eat this and you shouldn't eat that. But actually, sugar's very addictive. So it can be very difficult. And I did a podcast recently with Amanda Thib, who you might know, who lives in America. but she was saying, let's not think about taking something away from our diet. Let's add something. And I really like that, actually.

So let's not be listening to this podcast thinking, my goodness, may I've got to stop having a fizzy drink. Let's think what I can add. So could I have a herbal tea? Could I have some more water to drink? And then that fizzy drink will slowly disappear. But do it that way around. Yeah. And I don't know what you think, but I quite like that.

Yeah, no, I absolutely do. And I always say to people, add more plant food. your diet when you're thinking about what am I going to eat in the evening and yes it might be a family meal but for you personally if you if that person's serious about the fat loss you know think about vegetables first what interesting tasty vegetables am i only put on my plate where that plate's pretty well full of those good veggies and what i'm going to add as an add in more plant food so i think it's just really fundamental i love that attitude as well we haven't even touched on diets and i'm not going to accept, but I want to say something here because it's funny enough, it's not about

the diet, it's about all these other things we've talked about habits, especially. But there is one interesting, literally just released January this year, a research, a double-blind placebo, you know, gold standard research, which was so fascinating looking at low-carbohydrate diets versus plant-based lower fat diets. So low-carb diets tend to be kind of something. sometimes called high protein diets, high fat diets, where you're taking almost all carbs out of what you're eating. And then the other types of diets are high fibre diets, which tend to have lower fat. And if you are having fat, it needs to be unsaturated fat, preferably, in my case, extra virgin olive oil. And they put these two groups on these, they weren't even diets. They asked

them to eat however much they liked. And they actually provided all the food, good, fresh food, and they did two weeks on each way of eating. And it came out that both groups lost a bit of weight, but the ones that ate the plant-focused foods actually overall ate less calories each day because it came down to what you, if you look at your plate, if you imagine your plate and you want to fill up your plate because we as humans like to see our plate full, which is another thing entirely. So if you tend to overfill your plate, we'll just have a smaller plate. Anyway, that's another thing to think about. But if you fill you plate up with plants and vegetable foods, then the density, i.e. and the calories, I guess,

of that literally what you can physically eat is going to be less. Or if your plate is full of meat, like bacon or cream or sausages or lots of fats, which is that high protein way of eating and some vegetables, then of course it's going to be denser, denser in the literally the energy from the food. So they found that quite interesting. But both works for some people. It's just what's suits that person. And ultimately, I think, comes down to what we were talking about at the beginning, which is actually habits, about timing your meals. And I think that actually is far more effective than almost what you're eating. Yeah. Really, really brilliant. We could talk for hours, but it's been really interesting. So it's all about timing. It's all about what we eat plant-based

food. And it's about feeling good and positive. And if we can get as much as we can out of our food which will keep us healthy and positive and active, that's got to be good. So I really appreciate you going through this today, Emma. But before I go, I just want three take-home tips from you. So three really quick, easy ways of, there's no easy, quick way of losing weight, but a sort of easy way to start that journey for those people that really want to try and lose some weight. What would you say? Okay, okay, Louise. I think that evening is the key thing, is once you finish your evening meal, feel full and satisfied from it, and then don't have anything else except for, say, water or herbal teas in the evening. If you feel temptation, then move away from

that association, that habit that is temptation. I love what Lizelle said recently. She talked about snacking, and she said instead of snacking on food, snack on exercise. And I'm thinking in the evening, if you feel that temptation coming on, just go and run around your house or go and run around your garden or go if you live in an apartment, just do some running on the spot or whatever it takes. Just kind of get that out of your head, that kind of habit, break that habit of wanting to grab something in the evening to eat. I think your body will just really love you for it, whether you want to lose weight or not. It just is amazing. The other one is, there's just, there's no getting away around it. If you're serious about wanting to lose fat,

then don't drink alcohol. I can't even expand on that any further. It just is what it is. If you're serious about it, don't drink alcohol. That's the thing. And I think the third thing is try whatever possible to eat your own food, as in make your own food, however simple it is. It doesn't have to be complex.

Just make your own food if you can. Because that way you're always going to be on a winner. It's just so much better than the processed meals or the takeaway meals for your health and also funning. for that sort of fat balance, fat loss, it's always better. So plant focused if you can, adding a lot more vegetables, but certainly make your own, keep it kind of focused on that if you can, make your own meals. Yeah. Brilliant, great advice. And for any of you that don't follow Emma, start following your own Instagram and she'll give you lots of inspiration as well.

So thanks ever so much for your time today. I really appreciate it, Emma. Thank you. Okay, thanks. For more information about the perimenopause and menopause, you can go to my website, menopause.combe, or you can download our free app called Balance, available through the App Store and Google Play.