One of the most frequent questions I get from friends and clients is “Can you recommend some healthy snacks?”. Unfortunately, the tough love answer to this is…you shouldn’t be snacking! Ideally, you would eat ~3 meals per day spaced 5-6 hours apart.
But the reason for this may not be what you think. Avoiding snacking is not just a means to cut calories. (In fact, I don’t recommend counting or restricting calories as a means to dieting in the first place.) Rather, snacking has some deleterious effects on our digestion and regulation of hormones. Specifically:
1) Your body has an internal “cleaning process” that sweeps out the intestinal track between meals. This prevents bacterial overgrowth in the small intestine. Digestion interferes with this process (which takes about 2 hours) so eating more frequently than 4 hours prevents this from happening.
2) Your blood sugar levels are controlled by hormones such as insulin, glucagon, leptin, ghrelin, and cortisol. The way these hormones and the organs which create them interact as your body processes the food you eat is complex, but the short story is that if you are constantly eating (and therefore maintaining a raised blood sugar level), you are in danger of never giving your body a chance to develop its fat burning capabilities and may even develop resistance to these hormones.
Note that no snacking does not necessarily mean you should be doing “intermittent fasting”. While this can be beneficial for some situations, I do not recommend it for people with autoimmune disease nor typically for women. For people with autoimmune disease or with chronic stress, it can be too stressful for the body and worsen leaky gut. Additionally, there is less overall data for women and the data that exists does not conclusively show any benefits (and may show drawbacks).
Transitioning to no snacking
If you are transitioning from eating processed foods several times per day to a more whole foods based approach, you might have a hard time with this! It will get easier but in the meantime, here’s a few tips:
Make sure you are eating enough at the prior meal. This most often means not enough protein or fat but could also too few carbohydrates which some people tend to go too low on when starting AIP (or other Paleo-ish diet) as a result of suddenly eliminating their favorite refined carbohydrate sources like pasta and bread. Include 4-6 ounces protein and a starchy vegetable like sweet potatoes or other root vegetables with each meal if you are having trouble making it to the next meal.
Make sure you are digesting your prior meal. If you ate well at your prior meal but didn’t digest it your body may still be asking for more nutrients as they aren’t being absorbed even though they were ingested. Remember to take any digestive aids you need with each meal (e.g. bitters, digestive enzymes, bile salts, betaine HCl) and to relax prior to eating.
Are you truly hungry? Here are some things that could be confused with hunger:
Thirst: Try drinking water with lemon and salt to see if that satisfies your craving.
Salt: If you are craving a salty snack, you may just be craving…salt! Again, try drinking some water with lemon and salt to see if that helps.
Boredom: Definitely a thing. Try a quick walk or movement break. If you want something to keep your hands and mouth busy, try water or tea (unsweetened, decaf if after noon).
Stress eating: Also definitely a thing! This one is physiological and involves cortisol so don’t send yourself into a shame spiral about this one, it is not a willpower issue. But you don’t have to eat either….again, a quick walk or movement break can help normalize your stress and cortisol issues so try and get in the habit of moving instead of eating.
If you must……some snack ideas
While you are transitioning, you may have trouble eliminating snacks so here’s some ideas to minimize the effects when you do
Focus on snacks that are high in protein and include some fat. These will be more satiating than high carb snacks.
Fruits and veggies: Include with some nut or coconut butter
Avocado with lunch meat slices (additive and sugar free)
Wild-caught smoked salmon: 365 has a good wild caught version, read labels, there’s lots of weird stuff in some smoked salmon brands
Kale Chips: I use this recipe: Cheesy Kale Chips. And it is important to NOT use a nutritional yeast that’s been fortified with folic acid which most of us can’t convert. Unfortunately, the ubiquitous Bragg’s has folic acid. I use this one from Amazon: Sari Nutritional Yeast
Homemade gummies: These are great for kids too! I use 1 c fruit juice (usually tart cherry), 1/3 c gelatin (Vital Proteins or Great Lakes), and 1 Tbsp maple syrup). Heat the juice and honey over medium heat and slowly add the gelatin to dissolve. Use dropper to put into silicone molds then refrigerate. I bought these molds: Gummy Mold
Olives
Bone Broth
Hard-boiled eggs
Jerky/meat sticks (additive and sugar free)
A handful of nuts (these can be hard to digest even if you are not allergic to them so more than a handful is too much!)
Cheese or full fat, plain yogurt
Note there are some common allergens on this list: eggs, nuts, dairy. Pay attention to your body and try a temporary elimination if you suspect an issue!
Use digestive aids (bitters, betaine HCl, bile salts, enzymes, etc) with snacks as needed. There is no straightforward yes/no answer to whether you will need them or not. It depends on your level of need for those aids in the first place as well as the size and composition of your snack. You’ll need to experiment and see what works for you. Keeping a detailed food journal is very helpful for this. You can always take your digestive aid mid-snack or up to 20 min afterwards if you start to feel signs like excessive fullness or bloating.
Snack intentionally just as you would for meals. Your body needs to be in a relaxed state for digestion to function properly. One of the worst things about snacking is that it is so often done on the fly or while you are working. Definitely not a stress-free state! If you are going to snack, try and stop what you are doing and sit down for a moment of peace and quiet while you do it. You might just find that you really don’t need the snack after all after you’ve done all this!
Good luck and happy (not) snacking!
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Note: There are 2 notable exceptions to the no snacking rule: People with missing or dysfunctional gallbladders and/or hypoglycemia.
o If you are missing a gallbladder or have gallbladder dysfunction, you may have trouble digesting larger meals and may need to eat more like 4-5x per day. Pay attention to the amount of fat you can tolerate at each “meal”.
o If you have hypoglycemia, you may need to eat a snack to prevent “crashing”. However, hypoglycemia is something that can resolve over time as you follow a whole foods based/low sugar diet and incorporate lifestyle changes such as managing stress which has a huge impact on blood sugar regulation. As you start, you may indeed need some snacks but hopefully you will find less and less of a need for them as your body heals.
Some of the worst snack ideas are in this aisle! Most are full of sugar.