I Drank This With My Lunch Every Day For a Week, and It Prevented Overeating at Dinner

I had no idea that coming from a picky-eating childhood, I'd grow up to actually want to flip through plant-based cookbooks (Isa Does It is my favorite right now!) or scroll through vegan recipe blogs (shout-out to Oh She Glows!). Some of my happiest moments are in Trader Joe's buying food to meal prep or with my face peering over a simmering pot, stirring away.

Food brings me so much joy, but lately I've been loving it a little too much at dinnertime. For months, I've said "eff you" to the hunger scale and have been eating way past the point of satiety. I'm often left uncomfortably full, upset that I ate so much, and yet, I still reach for another bite because I'm not quite satisfied and food is just so damn good.

Overeating was not only starting to affect my waistline, but more importantly, feeling so stuffed and bloated put me in a horrible mood for the rest of the night. Belly cramps and indigestion made it hard for me to fall asleep, and gas pains would wake me up in the middle of the night. Sometimes I'd still feel crappy in the morning, which made me cranky and not want to exercise or able to work out as intensely as I wanted to.

You'd think I'd learn my lesson, but no. There was this force taking over that made me feel unsatisfied after dinner, so much so that I kept doing it night after night. Something had to change.

What I Tried That Didn't Quite Work
POPSUGAR Photography | Jenny Sugar

What I Tried That Didn't Quite Work

I've talked before about how I started eating a handful of nuts, like almonds, before lunch. I wait 10 minutes to eat and it helps me eat my lunch slower and prevent overeating. I've tried this before dinner as well, and while it helped me not nosh while I was cooking dinner, I often still ended up overeating my meal.

A Lightbulb Moment
POPSUGAR Photography | Jenny Sugar

A Lightbulb Moment

As a plant-based eater, I never really worried about getting enough protein because I eat tons of tofu, tempeh, beans, nuts, seeds, whole grains, and veggie burgers. But as I've recently been working out more and changed my intermittent fasting schedule, I decided to track my macros on MyFitnessPal, just to make sure I was getting enough.

I'm supposed to get between 70 and 100 grams of protein according to my weight and activity level, and I was barely breaking 50 grams. It's probably because over the past few months, I haven't been hungry until 1 p.m., so I've switched from 16:8 to 18:6 intermittent fasting. When I did 16:8, it made sense to eat a snack in between lunch and dinner, which was often packed with protein. But with a six-hour eating window, after eating lunch, I'm not hungry until dinner.

I realized that maybe the issue with me not feeling satisfied after dinner was that I wasn't getting enough protein — ding ding ding!

What I Tried
POPSUGAR Photography | Jenny Sugar

What I Tried

I decided to increase my protein intake at lunch to see how it impacted my overeating at dinner. My meal already offers at least 25 grams of protein, so I decided to bring back my daily protein shake.

I keep a variety of plant-based protein powders on hand because they're a quick and easy way to not only get an extra 20 to 30 grams of protein a day (without a ton of extra calories and carbs), but to also get in a little more hydration. Sometimes I'd even mix the powder with Unsweetened Ripple (plant-based milk made with pea protein) — one cup offers an extra eight grams of protein (and added creaminess!).

It Worked!
POPSUGAR Photography | Jenny Sugar

It Worked!

OK, I was a little shocked by this, but the first time I tried drinking a protein shake with lunch, I didn't feel the desire to overeat at dinner. I thought maybe it worked because I wanted it to, but after trying it for a week straight, it really did make a huge difference in my satiety. Emotionally, I didn't feel the need to reach for more food after dinner because physically, I felt a different sense of fullness that I can only attribute to the extra protein I had at lunchtime.

Reaching my daily protein goal not only helped me feel fuller all day, especially at dinnertime, but I also noticed that it helped me feel stronger during my workouts. Protein for the win! I'll definitely keep this up, and although a protein shake is an easy option, I do prefer getting my protein from actual food instead. So while some days I'll reach for protein powder out of convenience, other days I'll aim to incorporate more whole-food protein options into my lunch instead.