Last night, I found myself in the kitchen at 4 a.m., eating peanut butter straight out of the jar. I’m not normally a late-night snacker, but over the past week, my toddler has started waking up in the wee hours, and for whatever reason, my inclination has been to fuel up with calorie-dense foods like p.b. as I attempt to keep my eyes open.
Now, it doesn’t take a Ph.D. to know that at nearly 100 calories per tablespoon, straight-up peanut butter isn’t exactly a smart snack. But it turns out that my late night indulgence might be worse for me than I realized. A new study from Northwestern University revealed that eating at irregular times–like the middle of the night–can lead to major weight gain. Researchers found that mice fed a high-fat diet during sleeping hours gained 28% more weight than mice who ate the same amount of calories during their waking hours.
Yes, the study was conducted on rodents–but it’s the first to show a direct causal relationship between meal timing and extra pounds. (Other human studies have shown similar but less definitive results). That’s reason enough for me to put an apple on the counter tonight; if I’m tempted to chow down after calming my crying baby, I’ll at least do less damage in the process.
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Camille
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Hi! Interesting post, but isn’t this one of the myths that was debunked by an American academic in a pre-Christmas fun bad-science list last year? She proved that people who snack late at night are the same people who snack at other times too – and hence are prone to gaining weight anyway. It wasn’t the late night bit which was the problem, but the over-indulgence of snackery.