If you want to lose weight or, more precisely, lose fat, you need to lower your calorie intake. In other words, it’s time to cut the junk from your diet, fill up on nutritious, healthy foods, and create a calorie deficit. This will force your body to use stored body fat for energy.
However, losing fat is not just a matter of how many calories you consume. Your calorie output is important too. We call the number of calories you use per day your total daily calorie expenditure, or TDEE for short.
Exercise and daily physical activity both contribute to your TDEE, but your metabolic rate also affects the number of calories you burn each day. The higher your metabolism, the more calories you’ll burn, even while you sleep.
Building muscle increases your metabolism, which is why Warrior Babe workouts involve plenty of strength training. We believe that women need to focus on gaining to lose more. However, the food you eat can also boost your metabolism. Some foods are definitely better than others for increasing the number of calories you burn each day.
Some people turn to boosting metabolism pills to lose weight faster, but this is a mistake. Most of these pills are nothing more than concentrated caffeine capsules that will leave you feeling anxious and jittery. By far and away the best method for boosting your metabolism is exercise and food; they speed up your metabolism naturally and without side effects.
Here is a list of the best metabolism boosting foods, many of which are a big part of the Warrior Babe Diet.
- High protein foods
Protein is the most potent macro for boosting the metabolism. Ingesting, digesting, absorbing, and utilizing protein uses a lot of energy. Diet experts call this the thermal effect of food, or TEF for short. The TEF for protein is between 20-30%. That means for every 100 calories of protein you eat, 20-30 of those calories are used for digestion. Good metabolism boosting foods that are high in protein include:
- Eggs
- Chicken
- Turkey
- Lean beef
- Pork loin
- Fish
- Soy
- Whey protein
- Chili peppers
Hot, tasty chili peppers contain a substance called capsaicin. Capsaicin is useful for boosting metabolism. Adding chilis to your meals could help you burn an extra 50 calories per day. That might not sound like a lot but, in the battle for faster fat loss, every little helps.
In addition, capsaicin may also have appetite-reducing properties so, not only will you burn more calories per day, but you’ll also consume less too. This will have a significant impact on weight loss and fat burning.
Add raw chilis to your meals or sprinkle chili flakes or chili powder over your food. Be careful, though; too much capsaicin may give you indigestion, and not everyone likes hot, spicy food. Start off with small amounts and increase gradually.
- Coffee
While Warrior Babe Nikkiey Stott isn’t a fan of high caffeine metabolism-boosting diet pills, she is all for drinking coffee. Contrary to popular opinion, coffee is actually a pretty healthy beverage that is naturally low in calories and contains a lot of beneficial micronutrients, such as antioxidants. It also speeds up your metabolism.
Coffee is also a great way to boost your energy for exercise. It not only peps you up, but it also helps free up fat for easier burning. Tasty and speeds up your metabolism? Ain’t coffee great!
Of course, some types of coffee are better than others for both weight loss and your health. Freshly brewed medium to dark roast is generally the best, while sugar and fat-laden coffee drinks should be avoided as most contain more calories than a meal! Needless to say, you should also try to avoid adding sugar and cream to your coffee, although a little milk should be okay.
Providing you don’t have a caffeine sensitivity, you should be able to drink 4-6 cups of coffee per day. To avoid disrupting your sleep, don’t drink coffee 2-3 hours before bedtime. Not a coffee drinker? Tea and green tea have similar metabolism boosting properties.
- Legumes and pulses
While animal products like meat, fish, and eggs have a lot of metabolism-boosting protein, you don’t have to rely on those foods for your macro needs. It’s good to know that legumes and pulses, such as peas, beans, lentils, chickpeas, and peanuts, also contain plenty of protein.
Also, legumes and pulses are low in calories and high in fiber. Fiber is especially useful for speeding up your metabolism. It doesn’t contain any calories, but your body needs to use energy to process it. It also contains resistant starch, another compound linked to a faster metabolism.
Legumes are high in a couple of very important amino acids, too – arginine and glutamine. These two protein building blocks speed up your metabolism and also increase carbohydrate and fat burning.
- Leafy green and non-starchy vegetables
If you aren’t eating at least five portions of vegetables per day, now is the time to start! Leafy green and non-starchy veggies are not just good for your health, they are also low in calories, high in fiber, and are very filling. Best of all, these nutritional powerhouses are great for boosting your metabolism to the max!
Vegetables like broccoli, spinach, and kale contain glucoraphanin, a substance thought to retune and optimize your metabolism. Glucoraphanin also lowers blood fat levels and may even protect you from certain cancers. Leafy greens and non-starchy vegetables are also high in iron and magnesium, two crucial metabolism boosting minerals.
Create the ultimate metabolism boosting meal by combining a source of lean protein with a big serving of leafy green and non-starchy veggies. Add some chili flakes, and you’ll speeds up your metabolism like a boss!
- Coconut oil
If you are one of a growing number of keto women, you should already know about coconut oil. Coconut oil is very popular on the low and no carb diet, but it’s also a metabolism boosting food. Coconut oil is high in medium-chain triglycerides. Most regular fats contain more long-chain triglycerides.
MCTs are digested and then transported directly to your liver, where they are used for instant energy. They are unlikely to be stored as body fat, and the process of turning MCTs into ketones will speed up your metabolism.
Replace some of your regular dietary fats with coconut oil. It’s good for cooking, so this should be easy to do.
- Water
Water might not sound like a very exciting metabolism boosting food, but it’s arguably the most important. Water contains no calories, but transporting and utilizing it inside your body uses energy.
Drinking chilled water is an even better way to speed up your metabolism because your body needs to additional use energy to warm it up before absorption. Water is filling too, so it can help keep hunger pangs at bay.
The metabolism boosting effect of water only lasts a few hours, so make sure you drink a glass or two every couple of hours. Water is not only one of the best metabolism boosters around, but it’s also vital for your health. Staying adequately hydrated will have a big impact on every aspect of your body’s functions.
You are what you eat!
Every mouthful of food you eat has an effect on your metabolism. Things like sugar, junk food, and processed trans fats not only contain a lot of calories, they can lower your metabolic rate. In contrast, all the foods listed above are not just good for you, they can help you burn fat faster by boosting the metabolism. Make sure you check out the Warrior Babe Diet for meal plans built around these fantastic metabolism boosting foods.