salt, sugar, and oil for diet?

I fully admit I used to be one of those that believed that salt, sugar and oil were the 3 evils for weight loss. I believed that losing weight meant I had to avoid them at all cost.

And I did, for about a year.

I only started including them back into my diet when I realized that they weren’t responsible for me gaining fat at all. They’re innocent, and today I’ll explain why.

Let’s start with salt.

Salt doesn’t really carry much calories at all. If you’re eating too much calories of salt you likely have other issues to deal with rather than the calories. While yes it’s true too much salt isn’t the greatest for health, but in moderation it’s really not a big deal and can be part of your everyday diet.

Salt gets blamed for making you gain weight cos eating more salt than usual can cause your daily weight to spike. That weight spike isn’t from fats though, it’s water weight. Too much salt can make your body hold more water than usual which would be reflected on the scale the next day. 

Not something to be worried about, water weight goes away on its own over the next couple of days, but something to note so you don’t freak out if you gained a kilo over night.

Does that mean you should stop eating salt to avoid these weight spikes?

Not at all, weight fluctuations are a normal part of the weight loss journey. Whether your body is holding on to water due to workouts, salt or some other reason it’s totally fine and doesn’t keep you from progressing towards your fat loss goals. Water weight comes and goes. Focus on tracking your weekly average weight to track your overall progress, daily weight means very little.

Sugar.

Sugar is basically empty calories.

What’s empty calories? It’s calories that don’t have much nutritional value in them.

Does it make it bad? Not at all.

Probably not something you want to eat too much of, but in moderation it’s totally fine. Now when talking about sugars here we’re talking about added sugars like a sugar pack for coffee, syrup in tea, honey etc. and not sugars coming from natural sources like fruits and veggies.

Sugar in itself has no inherent ability to make you gain weight. It is impossible to gain weight by eating 5 tablespoons of sugar and nothing else for a week. You’re guaranteed to lose weight by doing that. Gaining or losing weight has to do with the total calories you consume on a regular basis as a whole, not just one mere ingredient.

Finally oil.

Oil of all types are roughly 120kcal per tablespoon. It’s quite dense. It’s quite easy to overeat it and end up eating too much calories. Solution? Just be mindful how much you’re using whether it’s in a salad or cooking. Oils like olive oil are a healthy source of fat. There’s nothing wrong with eating it while trying to lose weight, you just gotta not soak your salad in it thinking that it’s helping you lose weight.

One thing I’ve learned from my year of avoiding salt, sugar and oil is that including them in a diet makes the diet much easier to follow. Cos with them around the “diet” feels less like a diet and more like a normal meal which then makes it easier to keep up with consistently.

It’s really quite unnecessary to completely avoid salt, sugar and oil for the average healthy individual.

Too much of anything isn’t a good idea, avoidance is unnecessary. Moderation is always always key.

Hope this helps!