EE - can i really eat as much pasta as i want?

debtin

Gold Member
hi everyon, just as i was making lunch and not having to weigh my pasta it got me thinking - can i really eat as much pasta as i want? i just cant get my head round the fact i can eat pasta, potatoes rice etc and not need to syn it unless i add butter sauce etc - how does it hlep to lose weight? only my 3rd week so have loads of questins x:eek::)
 
You can only eat as much as you want until you feel full. If you eat too much, your energy intake will be higher than what you'll burn and therefore you'll put on more weight. If you stop eating these foods when you're full then this won't happen and you'll lose weight :)
 
you must be reading my mind yes i agree i cant get my head around it either i just had rice for my lunch and i felt guilty each piece that went into my mouth i would love to know am i doing it right i am only on week 2. i would never eat pasta rice and potatoes prior to starting sw so really struggling. if anyone can shed light on this issue it would be brill as i really want to give this my best shot
 
Don't forget to have 1/3 superfree as well with your pasta:D
 
Okay, this is how it works. The foods that are free on SW fill you up for longer in relation to their calories than other foods.

Not all calories are the same, you could have 300 calories of chocolate as a snack and half an hour later be looking for something else to eat. But ... eat 300 calories worth of pasta and you are likely having it as a meal along with your superfree foods and it will fill you up for a heck of a longer time. Particularly if you opt for the wholegrain versions which fill you up for even longer than the white ones.

Thanks to the whole Atkins and low-carb thing, a lot of people think carbs are the work of the devil and that you need to at least cut back on them to lose weight. But that really is not the case - your body needs carbs to function properly.
 
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As I understand it (feel free to correct me!) the way that SW works is to balance the benefits of foods that fill you up against their calorie content.

So - pasta and rice and potatoes, although not the lowest calorie foods around, fill you up and make you feel satisfied, and as long as you don't hurl butter and oil at them, are still relatively low in calories compared to other foods that will make you feel as full. They also have the added benefit of putting extra fibre in your diet, and potatoes in particular are high in various vitamins.

We have all heard for so long that carbohydrates are a bad thing, but they aren't - they are an essential part of a balanced diet.

I don't think I have explained all this very well, but hope it helps. And for heaven's sake - ditch the guilt! Guilt is pointless, energy-sapping, and timewasting! Enjoy your food.
 
thanks everyone, that makes much more sense now - i shall no longer feel guiltly - brilliant x
 
I've been wondering this, over the past couple of days, too, even though I'm a SW veteran and I know it's not true! I've been feeling really bloated and sluggish over the past week (blessed * week) and I have been wondering if it's due to the amount of pasta and potatoes I've been eating.
I have been eating a lot. I'm talking huge jacket potatoes with entire tins of baked beans on them, massive tubs of pasta salad taken to work, along with 2-3 apples and a couple of yogurts. I work in a residential home where all the food is home-cooked and we have the most delicious cakes and biscuits around all the time, so not eating them is really hard, so the only way I've been able to stop myself so far is to make sure I am full to the brim whenever I am around them!

I keep thinking to myself that if I was to eat more salad and vegetables then maybe I would have lost some more weight this week (at the moment, I don't know for sure that I haven't, as I don't weigh till Wednesday, but I've been "checking" at home, and I don't see a loss, although, I'm not sure of the difference between the SW scales and my own, so I know I'm probably upsetting myself over nothing), even though I know I have stuck to the plan 100% this week.

Having recently taken and passed a Nutrition and Health course through work, I know for a fact that carbs are the body's preferred form of energy, so cutting them out is silly. I tried the Atkins diet for three days once and lost about 10lbs (yes, really!), but as soon as I started eating normally again, it all went back on again.

I'm not really sure what the point of this post was, but I just wanted to echo the feelings of the post at the top, worrying about the amount of carby stuff one eats, even though there's nothing to worry about. ;)
 
I've been wondering this, over the past couple of days, too, even though I'm a SW veteran and I know it's not true! I've been feeling really bloated and sluggish over the past week (blessed * week) and I have been wondering if it's due to the amount of pasta and potatoes I've been eating.
I have been eating a lot. I'm talking huge jacket potatoes with entire tins of baked beans on them, massive tubs of pasta salad taken to work, along with 2-3 apples and a couple of yogurts. I work in a residential home where all the food is home-cooked and we have the most delicious cakes and biscuits around all the time, so not eating them is really hard, so the only way I've been able to stop myself so far is to make sure I am full to the brim whenever I am around them!

I keep thinking to myself that if I was to eat more salad and vegetables then maybe I would have lost some more weight this week (at the moment, I don't know for sure that I haven't, as I don't weigh till Wednesday, but I've been "checking" at home, and I don't see a loss, although, I'm not sure of the difference between the SW scales and my own, so I know I'm probably upsetting myself over nothing), even though I know I have stuck to the plan 100% this week.

Having recently taken and passed a Nutrition and Health course through work, I know for a fact that carbs are the body's preferred form of energy, so cutting them out is silly. I tried the Atkins diet for three days once and lost about 10lbs (yes, really!), but as soon as I started eating normally again, it all went back on again.

I'm not really sure what the point of this post was, but I just wanted to echo the feelings of the post at the top, worrying about the amount of carby stuff one eats, even though there's nothing to worry about. ;)

thanks for that - iam on week 3 and wi tomorrow but feeling bloaty myself and still trying really hard, did underestimate my alchol syns though but trying to remain upbeat - good luck
 
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