What You Must Know About Meal Replacement Bars

By Jonathan Octavius Bell

I think a really important thing you should know about meal replacement bars is that they're a great aid in losing weight - but only if used properly. Most people assume that a meal replacement bar is simply a bar that's allocated to let's say lunch. They think that eating the bar at lunch time will then aid them in losing weight - and this may be the case.

But more important they're meant to be used as part of a small meal diet, where you have five smaller meals instead of five big ones. This type of diet achieves two things, restricting calorie intake and helping maintain or even increase metabolism. From here you should start to lose weight as long as you don't stray from the course!

They're not usually meant to simply replace a meal which was previously much larger. People who want to lose fat, tend to have had a several hundred calorie abundance for several years. A tall man who would need around 2500 calories to maintain his weight may have been eating 2700 for several years. In this instance all he has to do is reduce his calorie intake by 200 to stop gaining weight, and 300-500 to lose mass.

But what's important is that he must have a calorie deficit without affecting his metabolism. Usually when people are desperate to lose weight they think by starving themselves for a week will do the trick. They may lose some weight at first, but when the body realizes it's going to go without food for a while the metabolism drops massively. This means that the tall man's 2500 calorie daily allowance to maintain his weight is no longer applicable... it may be 2000 or even 1500! This is why it's important to lose weight by dieting properly and over a long period - and not just fad dieting - this is why meal replacement bars are so useful in losing weight.