Then you probably find yourself carefully weighing and measuring your food and cutting out anything that strikes you as fattening. Or you start the latest fad diet, downing huge amounts of protein, perhaps, while shunning carbohydrates. For one thing, no matter how noble your intentions, your efforts may be doomed to fail. To achieve and maintain a healthy weight, you have to follow an eating plan you can live with for a lifetime. That means no severe restrictions, no extreme hunger and no fads.
Energy density is the number of calories in a given volume of food.
To find out why it's important in achieving and maintaining healthy weight, read on. Think volume Eat a food that's energy dense, such as fat, and you can't eat much of it without consuming a lot of calories. On the other hand, eat a food with low energy density, such as lettuce, and you can consume a huge amount for few calories. When you're not feeling desperately hungry and deprived, a small piece of good-quality chocolate can be mighty satisfying. Low energy dense foods such as vegetables contain a lot of both.