How-To

Make one of your five daily servings of fruits and vegetables an orange or grapefruit to help you manage your weight. Murray Huff, director at Robarts Research Institute at the University of Western Ontario in Canada, found that naringenin, a flavonoid in citrus fruit, causes the liver to burn excess fat instead of hanging on to it. The molecule also helped improve triglyceride and cholesterol levels, reduce the risk of insulin resistance and stabilize glucose metabolism (risk factors for type 2 diabetes and heart disease).

The vinegar in your pantry isn’t merely handy when it comes to shaking up your favorite dressings for salads or quick-pickling produce for sandwiches – it may help you break down fat and reduce its accumulation in the body, thanks to acetic acid, an organic chemical compound that gives vinegar its potent taste and scent. In a Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry study, animals given the acid along with a high-fat diet developed up to 10 percent less body fat than those that consumed the fatty fare alone. Of course, upping our intake of vinegar just so you can eat more fatty foods is not our recommended course of action!