The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the lifestyle and diet of many families. There used to be a lot of people who used to have dinner at 7 pm or later, but now it can be earlier. So when is the right time to eat?
Alisa Vitti – functional nutritionist and CEO of website Flo Living (New York, USA) – says that the habit of eating dinner at 7 p.m. is suitable for circadian rhythms and the rhythm of human activity in general. . Sharing this view, American nutritionist Tracy Lockwood Beckerman shared with the newspaper HuffPost: “From 6pm to 8pm is the ideal time for dinner, as it allows the average person to have enough time to digest before going to bed around 10pm-23pm.”
In fact, everyone’s ideal dinner time is different, based on your circadian rhythm. If you’re a “night owl” (or stay up late), you’re more likely to have a late dinner, or a bedtime snack. If you are an early bird, you will tend to have an early dinner.
The best time to eat is around 18:00 to 20:00.
Why shouldn’t you have dinner too early or too late?
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with a bedtime snack, but eating late at night can negatively affect your sleep. Eating late at night can cause weight gain, raise cholesterol and insulin levels, and increase your risk of heart disease, diabetes, and other serious health problems.
“Overeating can negatively impact sleep, leading to acid reflux,” explains Beckerman. Gastroesophageal reflux disease. In addition, eating too close to bedtime can decrease the quality of your sleep, increase inflammation, and make weight control more difficult. At bedtime, you may be prone to night sweats or hot flashes.
According to the results of a study in the journal Nutritioneating late will cause a series of factors that can lead to weight gain in the body: “Irregular meal times can create disturbances in the circadian system”.
Therefore, if you tend to go to bed early, it’s best to eat dinner earlier. A series of studies have even shown that eating more calories in the morning is healthier because eating later in the day can cause you to gain weight.
In addition, dinner time depends on lunch time. Due to the pandemic, many family lunch hours have changed, which is closely related to dinner time. “The more you eat lunch, the less prepared your body will be for an early dinner,” Beckerman says. “Conversely, the earlier you eat lunch, the sooner your body expects dinner.” So if your lunch starts at 11am, to avoid having dinner around 4pm, eat a balanced snack in the afternoon. These alternating snacks will help keep you from getting hungry before dinner time (about 18-20 hours), avoiding overeating at dinner.
Eating dinner on time makes you healthier
Dr Kelly Allison, lead author of the study on healthy eating, explains about Daily mail: “Lifestyle changes are never easy, but these findings suggest that eating earlier is a necessary effort to help prevent negative health effects later in life.”
Does the ideal dinner time vary by gender?
Hormones affect everything, including our eating habits. For women of reproductive age, it may be more beneficial to be flexible about mealtimes than to be rigid. “Women of reproductive age, especially in the luteal phase of the menstrual cycle (the period after ovulation and ending with the next menstrual period) need to be given plenty of nutrition,” says Vitti. More calories and slow-burning macros (nutrients). such as protein, carbohydrates, and fat), helps keep blood sugar and PMS levels stable, maintain a healthy weight, and get quality sleep,” says Vitti. This means that women must listen to their bodies to decide when to eat dinner and how much to eat.
In contrast to women, male hormones fluctuate less. “Men don’t have a high-frequency rhythm, so they can keep their meal times the same,” explains Vitti.
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