To not get why I tend to be slimmer when I eat bread

[KaetzenKlumpenz]

I never used to think about this, but at some point reduced bread and other carbs presuming this was healthier (!). I certainly didn't eat more calories as a result, but did gain a bit of weight. This wasn't a problem so I moved on and forgot about it.

A few years later I began to incorporate bread again and my weight went back down to where it had previously been before .

And again at some point I stopped eating it in an experiment to see if it was better for my gut, and I similarly gained some weight. I more recently returned to eating bread (homemade this time!) and some weight has, again, fallen off. This is only interesting since I hear the opposite happens most of the time, especially on the web.

Some details:
I only ever ate it once per day.
It was/is usually white bread, but either sourdough or a homemade pitta or pizza base.
I eat it with tons of different veg recipes, alternating with lean meat, feta, humous, salads, fish.
I am a healthy weight and don't have any food related health issues or allergies.
When I quit the bread, I replaced it with more veg, certainly not an increase in fats or other carbs.

I mention this now because I recently gave it up again, about a month ago, as have been making new recipes with DH. It has been replaced by more veg (again), and sometimes a bit of quinoa, more legumes and beans.
And I have gained a good few pounds

It seems that bread likes me, as looking back, I always felt more satiated and fit as a fiddle when incorporating it. I am wondering if anyone has experienced this and knows why it happens??

Unless you have gluten intolerance/coelic bread is fine in moderation as are other carbs, you need a balanced diet. Complex carbs eg brown rice and wholemeal pasta are better for most people (unless you have certain bowel issues for instance) but that aside, keep the fats low, carbs in moderation, an appropriate amount of protein (most people eat too much and that’s where the extra calories are) and lots of veg plus some fruit. Weight gain really is down to eating too many calories, most of us under count significantly and over estimate how many we need per day, me very much included

You sound quite naive about how the body works.

if a person finds bread filling, they will eat less overall. So yes it could help you lose/gain weight.

we are all different with different metabolisms. Social media and the internet just reflects the current fad, and isn’t necessarily “science” based.

there is a lot of money in selling books, diets etc, so there always needs to be a new fad.

there is research that shows the affect a diet has on you depending gut bacteria, your historic activity levels, diet etc. so a carb heavy diet will suit some, others will do better on high protein.

i am like the o/p. If I cut carbs and bread I am permanently hungry. I can eat my body weight in cheese and protein and never feel full. So I gain weight because I eat more.

two slices of toast on a morning and that’s me happy until 2pm. Yoghurt and berries? Starving in an hour.

just because you believe a certain way of eating works doesn’t mean it works for everyone.

Doesn't seem to have any effect on the French. Croissants, pain au chocolat, patisseries, baguettes with everything.

Portion control and a bit of everything is my motto.

Nope

Well no.

if I ate 10 slices of bread a day and nothing else I wouldn’t put on weight as I’d only be eating around 1200 calories. It’d be miserable and it’s not a balanced diet, but it’s a deficit.

in my disordered eating younger days this was one of my “hacks”- if you only allow yourself to eat one thing you get sick of it very quickly and it’s easier to eat less.

so 4 slices of bread at a time wouldn’t cause weight gain itself. Eating 4 slices of bread and then a further 2000 calories a day would.

more bloating causing weight gain. But it’s not fat, it’s air
how much does air weigh? (it's gas rather than air if we're being really pendantic... you wouldn't want to breathe a lung full of whatever it is brewing in your guts!) 'Bloating' due to gas clearly isn't going to cause significant weight gain. It may make the clothes tighter, but that's not the same as gaining weight.

I think this. I eat bread at least twice a day.

I like a thick sliced malted or multi grain so probably quite weighty.

But if I don't have bread or some kind of carb, I start to feel wobbly after a couple of hours.

I've also lost weight while eating the chunkier bread but I feel full much longer. I've never been over 9st so my body seems to process carbs well.

I suppose I was going off the idea of one small pizza base or a flatbread, pitta or a sandwich with sourdough. So no more than two slices and not even every day.

Maybe it's all in the dose?

I always ate bread without thinking really, but definitely paired it with healthy things. It's only reading online that I see the negative stuff.

OP bread is ridiculously demonised. While living on white carbs is bad balance is best. And bread is a good source of fibre, particularly brown bread.

In the first lockdown DH and I decided to test out really low carb just to see how we felt. He was ok but I did feel really spaced out and weird towards the end of the day. I remember one evening he just snapped and said "I'm making some bloody toast!", and that was it.

I've had 3 periods of losing weight in my life, two significantly, and I didn't give up bread during any of them. Bread is fine. In fact I often had what I now know to be called a 'whoosh' when I would have a heavy carb day every few weeks.

I don't know why we believe what we read when it goes against our own experiences. One of the times I gained weight was partially because I inexplicably started believing that I had to eat breakfast as part of a 3-meal-a-day routine despite the fact this has never been how I ate. I'm a two meal a day person, lunch and dinner - always have been, although sometimes also with a small supper especially if I've been exercising. What I didn't get, and neither do a lot of the people who push this hard which is why it gets lost, is that if breakfast is the most important meal of the day then it's the first meal of the day that's important, not specifically something that you eat when you get up in the morning. You don't have to eat three meals. My daughter is better with five or six small meals. In fact I fully believe a lot of children are better with five or six small meals and that's where all the requests for snacks comes in.

Anyway, eat your bread and enjoy it.

You must have been subconsciously eating more calories to satiate yourself due to the lack of bread?

If you only eat it once a day presumably it's only maximum 200 or so calories.

Either way it's good because bread is great! 😃

Well i am still puzzled because I did account for that, and only had extra veg (no creamy sauces or whatnot).
The types of thing I ate when not having carbs were soups with legumes and barley, small portion of meat with mixed veg. salads with quinoa.
I do think I def used more evoo oil though, which is the only thing I can account for.
I didn't eat larger meals.

I think my body really likes the amount and type of food i eat when it's parcelled up in a bit of bread, it's the only thing I can think of!

An example of that might be a pitta filled with med veg and spinach, olives, feta and tuna. Sometimes humous, mushrooms, mixed peppers and chicken, or a small pizza base covered with passata, pesto, mozzarella, tomatoes, veggies and courgette, herbs...

Proportions-wise the veg is the largest component, then the meat, then the bread. I do also have days without meat.

Your food sounds delicious and really healthy including the bread x

It could be your metabolism feels starved of bread and slows down the rate at which you burn calories? I'm no dietician that's for sure!

It's definitely a personal thing, and I get that not everyone likes it or get's along with it, and It isn't my favourite food by any means but it just works.

Respectfully, no. This isn't how anything works.

Respectfully, I have no clue as I said I'm no dietician but was offering a guess?
But if it's not how 'anything' works then thank you for letting me know.

I ate bread most days while losing 21kg over the last 5 months. It’s not a demon food, it’s sugar/glucose in long chains. You were probably replacing it with higher calorie alternatives.

I've only spent this past week reading food threads, and oh boy do people get their briefs in a twist over the subject For god's sake don't go to reddit, I was told my diet looked like a multifactorial inflammatory device.

Carbs give a feeling of fullness - you might have been eating more calories to achieve satiation?

Food research is compromised by funding from interest groups and when you dig in on any issue, there are conflicting opinions on almost everything.

The current kink in the information process is that influencers follow trends and if one is preaching about bread, more will follow suit to be relevant. Added to how algorithms feed you more of what you watch, you can feel like there’s a lot of support for a particular viewpoint when it’s actually illusory.

I’m old enough to remember when potatoes were bad, then it wasn’t the potatoes but the butter on them, and we should eat oil based spreads, but then it was trans fats, and now seed oils are suspect, etc etc

Eat good quality food in moderation, and listen to your own body first.

hey @KaetzenKlumpenz this is so helpful!
I think I’m the same- I really focused on protein and it makes me feel a bit sick, then really hungry.
i cut out bread too but you’re right, in my slimmer times I ate bread at least twice a day.

Maybe you're just eating more normally and a more balanced diet when you include bread? When you try to avoid bread you're probably having to replace it with all kinds of things which might not be great.

I think like most things the idea that bread is somehow responsible for all the world's evils is completely overblown. It's a food. Balance it with other things and it's probably fine! Listening to your body rather than diet trends definitely sounds like the way to go to me.

Haha! I can imagine. I'm sorry I don't have a sensible answer but if it ain't broke, don't fix it! X