The Reason Why Eating Carbs Late at Night Doesn’t Increase Weight Gain

Photo by Marvin Meyer on Unsplash

Night-time eating has been plagued by many nutrition experts/gurus as the prime birth time for new fat cells. Add carbs to the mix and fat gain is almost guaranteed. But does this really happen? Do the foods we eat at night, especially carbohydrate containing foods, really turn into fat? Let’s explore two flawed assertions that has led us to believe this myth then jump into some research.

Years of mainstream media has brainwashed us to believe this fallacy because of two claims:

1.) Our metabolic rates decrease as night approaches and screeches to a halt once our heads hit the pillow.

2.) Our body’s sensitivity to insulin is reduced at night shifting nutrient storage more toward fat than muscle

At first glance, the first statement seems reasonable. Sleeping causes a downshift in our metabolisms, which makes it more likely that any carbs consumed at night will be thrown into fat cells compared to if they were consumed earlier in the day when they had more time to be burned off, right? Not so much. While research does show that our energy expenditure does in fact decrease when we are asleep (by about 35%), this decrease is only seen in the first half of sleep while increases in energy expenditure are actually seen in the latter half of sleep. So…