After exerting all that energy to carry the weight of your food on your back, the last thing you want to do is to lose valuable calories by eating carelessly. Chewing your food thoroughly is one of the most important and overlooked things you can do to improve calorie and nutrient absorption from trail foods.
Digestion starts in the mouth before it can happen in the stomach and intestines.
Chewing your food not only breaks the food down into smaller pieces so it can be swallowed, but the saliva from your mouth releases carbohydrate-digesting enzymes. The more your teeth grind away at the food, the longer the enzymes are exposed to the food, making it easier for the next stage of the digestive process.
Chew Food to Micro Bits!
Chewing is primarily an unconscious act, and most people chew food about 5 times, which is not nearly enough!
How much chewing is needed to maximize the release of all those nutrients? There’s no specific number of times you must chew — it depends on the food. Simply chew your food until it is nearly liquified inside your mouth or broken down into micro bits.
Chewing food to micro bits may require 30 to 40 chews for energy-dense solid foods, which tend to be harder to eat, such as seeds, nuts, and chewy fruit leathers. Softer freeze-dried foods, tiny bits of dried fruits, and cooked grains will require less chewing, from 7 – 10 chews.
If you do a lousy job of chewing, you’ll know it because the food will pass straight through you as wasted energy.
Have you ever spotted undigested food in your stool — such as corn, seeds, or nuts?
That means you did a lousy job of chewing.
Not only does this mean you wasted energy carrying the food, but you also penalized your body by not giving it enough nutrients. You can’t absorb the nutrients needed to replenish energy stores and build muscle when you don’t chew your food well.
Speaking of bad eating habits, here are a few others that you don’t want to adopt:
The benefits of eating carefully and chewing your food thoroughly include:
Prolonged chewing is an important, yet overlooked way to absorb the most nutrients from your trail food. A secondary benefit is that it conserves energy; Digestion is one of the most energy-consuming processes of the body, so maximize muscle energy by doing a better job chewing your food!
Many of us eat quickly, so we could benefit from chewing more.
Cheers to eating well and becoming a champion chewer on the trail!
[1] Ellis PR, e. (2019). Role of cell walls in the bioaccessibility of lipids in almond seeds. – PubMed – NCBI. Ncbi.nlm.nih.gov. Retrieved 30 September 2019, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/
[2] Cassady, B., Hollis, J., Fulford, A., Considine, R., & Mattes, R. (2009). Mastication of almonds: effects of lipid bioaccessibility, appetite, and hormone response. The American Journal Of Clinical Nutrition, 89(3), 794-800. doi:10.3945/ajcn.2008.26669
[3] Rémond D, e. (2019). Postprandial whole-body protein metabolism after a meat meal is influenced by chewing efficiency in elderly subjects. – PubMed – NCBI . Ncbi.nlm.nih.gov. Retrieved 30 September 2019, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17490964
[4] Why is chewing such an important part of digestion?.(2019). Whfoods.org. Retrieved 30 September 2019, from http://whfoods.org/genpage.php?tname=dailytip&dbid=337
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