13 appetite-controlling tactics

Where do you eat? If it’s behind the wheel of your car, sprawled on your lounge or packed into a noisy restaurant, don’t be surprised if you tend to overeat (and not fit your jeans).

“You can’t lose weight if you’re in an environment that doesn’t support healthy eating,” says dietitian Dawn Jackson Blatner. So, based on the newest research and the best expert advice, we’ve put together a 13-step plan to help you create one that does.

1. Hide the remote

A poll of 1520 people found that 91 per cent watch TV while eating. And dining tube-side makes you eat more. One US study showed that uni students consumed almost an entire extra meal’s worth of kilojoules on the days they channel surfed. “If you do eat while watching TV, stop regularly to see if you feel satisfied,” says Dr Amanda Sainsbury-Salis, author of The Don’t Go Hungry Diet. “Our bodies’ satiety signals are delicate and can be easily drowned by external cues, so don’t rely on things like the end of the program as a signal to stop eating.”

2 Use tall glasses

A study published online in the British Medical Journal found that we pour 32 per cent more liquid into short, squat glasses than into tall, skinny ones. It’s a classic optical illusion: equal amounts of liquid appear more voluminous in thin glasses than in wide ones.

3 Enjoy your own company

Sad but true: you eat less when you dine alone. According to a study in the journal Nutrition, a person consumes 44 per cent more when she eats with at least one other person and a whopping 76 per cent more with seven or more. When you do dine en masse, be the last one to start eating and you’ll keep kilojoules down. And come armed with good stories: When you’re flapping your gums, you can’t stuff your face.

4 Minimise your menu

You eat as much as 40 per cent more when you’re given a variety of foods than when you get just one dish, according to research in the Journal of Consumer Research. That’s probably because all the choices of colour, smell, and taste distract you from noticing when you feel full.

5 Pick petite plates

Eat your food from a 480g (about 2 cups) bowl rather than one that’s 960g (about 4 cups) and you’ll ingest 30 per cent fewer kilojoules, according to a study in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. When it comes to plates, use ones that are 20cm instead of 27.5cm. And for cutlery, swap your soup spoons for smaller dessert spoons – you’ll slurp less.

6 Banish buffets

Just seeing food makes you more likely to eat it. Another study in Nutrition found that subjects who said they didn’t want pizza were more inclined to eat a slice anyway when it was in front of them than when no food was on display. Keep kilojoule-dense foods out of sight.

7 Pull up a chair

(but not in front of your laptop). This rule is more basic than Dubya’s grasp of vocab: “A meal is not a meal unless you have a table, a chair, and a plate,” Blatner says. “If you eat on the go or standing in the kitchen, you rush through before your brain realises you’re full.” Which means you shovel in more kilojoules than you need.

8 Unplug the stereo

A study in the journal Appetite found that participants took an average of 40.5 minutes to finish their meals with music playing, but only 29 without. (And they downed another 1890 kilojoules in those extra minutes.) Doesn’t matter whether you dig Missy Higgins or Arctic Monkeys: soft music makes you loiter at the table, but you chew faster (and may eat more) when you listen to loud, fast songs. Have a conversation instead.

9 Turn off the aircon

Heat is a healthy eater’s BFF. When you’re cold, “you fuel the furnace by eating,” Dr Wansink says. In other words, your body requires more energy to maintain your core temperature when you’re chilly – and that energy often comes in the form of hot chips.

10 Fire up the oven

The temperature of your food can make as much of a difference as that of the room. “Hot food is more satiating, so you’ll eat less of it,” Blatner says. Take an extra minute to zap that leftover (healthy) pizza in the microwave or add something warm (like chicken) to a salad.

11 Dim the lights

“Bright lights encourage you to eat faster than you otherwise would because they make you feel stressed,” says Dr Brian Wansink, author of Mindless Eating. (Makes sense that most fast-food joints are so well lit.) But don’t turn them off altogether: “A dark room will lower your inhibitions, which means you’ll be more likely to have dessert,” Dr Wansink adds. Try using medium-wattage light globes (20 to 50 watts), so you can see well enough to eyeball your eggplant parmigiana but don’t feel like you’re in an interrogation room at Bali International Airport.

12 Repaint

Bright, warm hues like red and orange may look cheery, but on your dining room walls? Not a good plan. Just like bright light, these colours “make the environment more stimulating, so you’ll want to eat and get the heck out,” says Dr Wansink. Blues and greens, on the other hand, encourage you to stick around longer (also bad). Go neutral with colours like white, beige, and grey. If your walls are already scarlet and you’d rather eat paint than scan the Dulux selection at Bunnings, balance the brightness with softer lighting.

13 Watch the clock

If your body were a primary school, your stomach would be in the slow learners’ class: it needs about 20 minutes to figure out it’s full. No wonder research shows that taking less than nine minutes to eat your meal can cause you to scoff an additional 294 kilojoules or more, Blatner says. “That could add up to nine extra kilos per year!”

But in an evil twist of nature, lounging at the table for more than 30 minutes can make you eat just as much. The longer you linger, the likelier you are to reach for seconds. The ideal amount of time to spend at the table? 29 minutes.