Does Pasta Make You Gain Weight?

According to a recent study, eating pasta regularly will not make you gain weight. Pasta is a staple in many countries, especially around the Mediterranean. However, its classification as a refined carb made people shy away from it.

What many don’t know is that pasta is actually a good source of folate (vitamin B-9), calcium, magnesium, iron, and zinc. Rather than worsen weight gain, it can, in fact, help with weight management or loss, as part of a healthy diet in children and adults.

What Scientists Think

Scientists Lisa Sanders and Joanne Slavin analyzed 38 studies linked to white pasta intake and body weight outcomes. They even looked into its impact on appetite-related hormones and glycemic response and what they found was that despite the belief that pasta is a “fattening” food, current observational evidence suggests otherwise.

According to the evidence, pasta is generally not associated with body weight or body composition and may be inversely associated with BMI or abdominal obesity.

This corroborates the findings of another study, from Italy in 2016, which proved that people who eat pasta actually have a smaller body mass index (BMI) than those who don’t consume it. Of course, this does not include that creamy carbonara sauce or lashings of parmesan.

Conclusion

The main things to be watchful of are portion size and how you prepare it. Master the perfect ‘al dente’ which will help you preserve some of the resistant starch, giving it a similar glycemic index to brown rice or buckwheat. The same with letting it cool or reheating.

By making it harder to digest and break down into glucose, it lessens the chance of a sugar spike. Also resistant starch is good for the gut bacteria.