Best time to eat lunch according to experts
Ben Williams
Featured Image Credit: (destillat/Getty Images)
Experts have shared the best time of day to eat lunch, and it could change the way you plan your meals.
For most, lunch is less of a scheduled event and more of a free slot that appears somewhere between meetings, errands, childcare, or whatever else the day throws at them.
Whilst some people eat as soon as they feel the first sign of hunger, others push through on coffee until the afternoon and then wonder why they feel completely wiped out later on.
According to longevity and nutrition experts, though, the timing of one’s lunch may be more important than many people realise. That’s particularly the case if you regularly feel bloated, sleepy, or sluggish after eating.
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It turns out that the ideal time of day to go for lunch is not one universal hour.
Instead, the best time to eat lunch sits roughly halfway between breakfast and dinner.
So, if you eat breakfast at 8am and dinner at 8pm, experts suggest lunch at around 2pm could make more sense than eating at midday.
The idea is based on giving the body proper gaps between meals, rather than eating too closely together throughout the day.
Adam Collins, associate professor of nutrition at the University of Surrey (as reported by GQ), explained: “Most people have breakfast and lunch within four hours of each other,”
He said that creating a bigger gap between meals, such as eating across an 8am to 8pm window, allows the body to have smaller fasting periods during the day.
Collins recommends leaving at least four hours between meals, as well as avoiding snacks and drinks during those gaps, particularly those containing carbohydrates.
The experts also warned that what you eat at lunch can have a major impact on how you feel for the rest of the day.
Rupy Aujla, a doctor who produces podcasts and cookbooks as The Doctor’s Kitchen, recommends avoiding refined carbohydrates, including ‘things like sandwiches, snack bars, granolas’.
Instead, he suggests prioritising protein, which many people do not get enough of. Hydration could also play a role in the dreaded afternoon crash.
Aujla said: “if you’re sleepy in the afternoon, think about hydration”.
He added: “Sometimes, people aren’t hungry, they’re just not well hydrated.”
Valter Longo, director of the Longevity Institute at the University of Southern California, takes an even lighter approach with some patients, advising a weekday lunch of around 100 calories, such as nuts or fruit.
Eventually, he says, ‘they get used to it’.
Longo says this can help ‘optimise the in-between fasting time’ and avoid the energy dip that can follow a larger meal, “because you don’t have the insulin release and all the postprandial consequences”.
However, he says people who are underweight, or aged about 65 and over, are better off sticking to a full-sized lunch.