But it is not just a new, hip and cool thing to do. Being a vegetarian has lots of benefits to offer you if you want to reduce weight.

Majority of Americans have been meat eaters right from their childhood. Hamburgers, hot dogs, chicken and eggs have been the identity of the American food for a very long time. So, you may be asking – “Why do I switch my non-vegetarian diet to a vegetarian diet?”

Let me explain that to you in a minute but till then just keep reading. The most important reason why eat eat food is to keep life going, sustain ourselves. The food we eat should provide the required nutrients necessary to provide the energy needed by the body – which varies to the type of work people do.

Food is like the fuel that runs our vehicles. We fill the car with the right amount of gas it needs. We just don’t go riding the car day and night just to fill it with more fuel. Likewise, we only need the necessary amount of food to keep going.

Non vegetarian diets contain more fat content than most vegetarian diets. People living on an almost exclusive non-vegetarian diet should take notice of this.

Do I live a healthy life?

Let me give you a simple exercise to see if you can derive simple and clear conclusions based on it.

• Do you feel happy when you see yourself in the mirror?
• Is your weight what you’d call satisfactory?
• Do you feel good and comfortable with your weight most of the time?
• Can you sleep like a child – quick and easily?
• Can you get up feeling good or do you feel sluggish?

If you don’t feel like you really should then it is high time that you made changes in your diet for weight loss.

Why do I switch to a Vegetarian diet ?

OK, now this will answer your previous question. Vegetarian diet offers a very fulfilling reason to make a switch.

There have been a number of studies done to measure the benefits of a vegetarian diet.

Studies suggest that people living on a non vegetarian diet have a shorter lifespan. It simply means that changing your lifestyle to a vegetarian diet will increase your lifespan.

Vegetarians are less prone to chronic diseases than are non-veggies.

On average have more heart disease, hypertension, and diabetes.

Predominantly eat lesser amounts of fruits and vegetables than recommended.

Keep away from saturated fats like butter

The concept of weight-loss is very easy to understand. Simply, cut out the unnecessary supply of fat and burn the remaining fat in your body to get a lean body. Easy isn’t it? Well not exactly.

Many people tend to cut whatever sources of fat they know of rather ignorantly. While fat is very harmful if taken in access (what isn’t?), it does something which is vital for your body to function properly.

Fats are one of the best sources of energy. A gram of fat provides more than 2 times the amount of energy than that of carbohydrates and proteins.

Your body needs fats to grow and growth requires tremendous amount of energy. And now you wonder why you always felt so fatigued when you were 15!

Fats are also the most energy-efficient foods. And this is the reason why the body stores fats. Much of this fat is usually stored in the abdomen (and hence a pot-belly!) and under the skin. Sometimes, this fat starts getting saturated in the organs like heart and arteries which eventually leads to heart blockage and even heart-attacks!

All fats are not made equal – some fats are more harmful than others! Experts advise that you allot around 30% of the calorie needs to fats. The correct amount in weight would be aroung 90 grams or less of fat intake in a day.

The types of fats are

• Saturated fat
• Unsaturated fat
• Trans fat

Saturated Fats

Saturated fats are considered to be the most harmful fats. Saturated fats raise the levels of cholestrol in your body making it very vulnerable for heart disorders like heart-attacks!

It is a good idea to keep away from saturated fats if you want a healthy heart and low cholestrol.

One option can be choosing foods that are low on the amount of saturated fats they contain.

A more better option is to keep away from saturated fat and include unsaturated fats in your diet.

Foods that contain high amount of saturated fats -

These foods contain high amount of saturated fats and should be low on your intake list.

• meats – beef and fatty cuts of meat like sausages
• whole dairy products like whole milk, butter and cheese
• artificially hydrogenated oils like Margarine
• cream, ice-creams, sour creams
• cakes, pastries and biscuits
• chocolates and other creamy and sweet snacks
• coconut oil, palm oil and coconut cream

In short, anything that brings water to your mouth almost always contains saturated fats. So be judgemental in your decisions!

Unsaturated fats

Unsaturated fats are a better option to saturated fat. Unsaturated fats can significantly help you reduce cholestrol levels while providing essential and required body fats.

Remember that unsaturated fats are always better than saturated fats.

The sources of unsaturated fats are -

• oily fishes
• nuts and seeds
• avocados
• sunflower, rapeseed, olive and vegetable oils
• peanut oils and peanut butter
• soyabean and corn

Oily fish are also a rich source of Omega 3 fatty acids. Research has shown that omega 3 fatty acids help protect against coronary heart diseases and help children during their growth years.

Trans fats

Some studies say that Trans fat is more dangerous than saturated fats. One of the reasons can be that trans fat don’t get easily consumed. It takes time to get fully digested and break down.

The sources of trans fats are -

• generally anything which is artificially made does have trans fat
• potato chips
• donuts
• french fries
• margarine
• cake mixes
• spreads
• Soups - Ramen noodles and soup cups contain very high levels of trans fat
• fast foods
• frozen foods