FIBRE AND WEIGHT LOSS

Getting enough fibre can reduce the risk of heart disease, type 2 diabetes and some cancers, as well as helping control your weight and ensuring you stay, ahem, regular. Fibre aids digestion by absorbing water as it passes through your bowel and therefore increasing the bulk of your waste products. It also sustains the bacteria in your gut, creating a well-fed colony that can help everything from your immune system to the functioning of your organs. Fibre is also a welcome ally in the fight against weight gain through the magic of satiety: broadly speaking, this means it makes you feel fuller for longer, but without adding many calories.

Although there are fibre supplements available, they can’t compete with food when it comes to fibre because it’s not a single nutrient.

Each category has got slightly differently-structured fibre that feeds different bacteria. If we want good gut health, we have to have a very diverse range of bacteria in our gut, and we achieve that simply by feeding our bacteria a diverse range of food.

Dietary fibre is only found in plant-based foods like vegetables, nuts, fruit and grains. Good sources of insoluble fibre include wholegrain bread, bran and other cereals and nuts. For soluble fibre, eat oats, fruit and root vegetables.

If you’re not already a fibre fan be careful to increase the amount in your diet gradually. Going from fibre zero to fibre hero too quickly can cause stomach cramps and bloating.

My favourite sources of fibre include :

Brown Rice:
It might take a fair bit longer to cook, but brown rice brings in around double the fibre of white rice, notching 2g per 100g, so it’s worth making the switch.

Oats:
Just 50g of oats contains 4.3g of fibre so make every effort to insert oats somewhere into your daily routine. Whether that’s porridge or muesli for breakfast, or a flapjack snack. Or just chuck them in a curry. Will that work? Who can say until you’ve tried it?

Mushrooms:
Mushrooms are full of chitin, a type of water-insoluble dietary fibre that makes up the cell walls of all fungi. Insoluble fibre is not metabolically active so it doesn’t contain calories, but it does add bulk to meals.

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