By Rebekah 
 

I have always said that the health of your stomach is connected to the entire health of your body. Therefore excessive visceral (abdominal) fat is not only unappealing but damaging to one’s health, especially the heart.  These 5 foods/nutrients have been scientifically tested to help fight the battle of the bulge while preventing heart disease...most natural and best way to lose weight!

This quote from www.greenmedinfo.com makes a lot of sense and essentially proves my point: “Some studies have even revealed that abdominal obesity, known clinically as central obesity, and which is measured by the hip-to-waist ratio, may be more important than blood lipids, i.e. “cholesterol,” in determining heart attack risk.” It is truly what you eat that directly affects your health. If the blood that travels from your stomach to your heart is acidic and full of rich unhealthy fats and chemicals then how do you expect it to run optimally. Eventually it will break down.  This is where foods like Matcha play an important role.

Green med info has scientific data to support how these following foods and vitamins directly effect abdominal weight and heart health. You can read their entire article with links to the reports here: http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/can-these-5-ways-burning-belly-fat-also-save-your-life-2o   Keep in mind that you could add numerous healthy raw fats and superfoods to the list but these had valid recent studies done on this specific topic.

These foods help battle the “central” or abdominal bulge, keep your heart health and maintain a healthy weight:

Coconut Oil - Studies found that when a person consumed 2 Tbsp of raw coconut oil daily for 4+ weeks they lost inches in their waist and their HDL (good cholesterol) increased. You can’t get fat on raw cold-pressed coconut oil. Your body does not store coconut oil instead it burns it as fuel and cleanses out the bad stored fats in the abdominals…making this oil extremely heart healthy. Not to mention it tastes delicious – very buttery & a perfect replacement for butter!

Matcha Green Tea – Matcha is one of nature’s best and most natural aids, safe for almost every person. Matcha naturally increases your body’s endurance, metabolism and heat production during cardio and resistance training which tells the body to burn more calories, specifically fat calories, resulting in fat loss. Those using Matcha regularly can burn up to four times more calories per workout session. The best way to start your day is with a matcha green tea latte! I have found that your metabolism can increase as much as 30-40% simply through drinking matcha green tea lattes daily and incorporating it into your workout. This directly effects visceral fat storage.

Sunshine - “It is known that a deficiency of one of sunlight’s best known beneficial byproducts, vitamin D, is associated with greater visceral fat.”

Exercise: “A 2008 study in the journal of Medical & Science in Sports & Exercise showed that body composition changes are affected by the intensity of exercise training with high-intensity training (HIET) being most effective for total abdominal fat, subcutaneous fat, and abdominal visceral fat loss, at least in obese women with metabolic syndrome.”

Chia seeds - I am adding these to the list because they are not only nutritious and energizing but do an incredible job of cleansing out the colon of stored “bad” fats.

Avoid these: The following 4 chemicals are some of the most commonly consumed toxins that add to that “spare tire” that most are walking around with which directly induces stress on the heart. Here is some insightful research regarding these substances and how they can cause an increase in abdominal fat: http://www.greenmedinfo.com/disease/obesity-abdominal

BPA 
Fructose 
MSG 
Artificial Sweeteners

References…

http://www.isrn.com/journals/pharmacology/2011/949686/cta/ 
http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/can-these-5-ways-burning-belly-fat-also-save-your-life-2 
http://www.greenmedinfo.com/article/exposure-human-skin-uv-light-results-increased-subcutaneous-fat-metabolismhttp://www.greenmedinfo.com/article/exposure-human-skin-uv-light-results-increased-subcutaneous-fat-metabolism