While a lot of people opt for low-carb diets to keep slim one study suggests eating pasta might be able to help you lose weight. This study in itself is quite mind-blowing and has really thrown us all off.

This study was published in the journal Nature’s Nutrition and Diabetes Journal. For this study researchers from the IRCCS looked at pasta’s effects on health when consumed as part of a person’s diet. That being said, the diet in question is the Mediterranean diet. On this diet, a person would eat things like nuts, fruits, veggies, and small amounts of fish and chicken.

For this study, these researchers looked at about 15 thousand participants between the ages of 35-79. They were followed for a period of three years and in that their weight, height, and so forth were tracked. While you would assume those who ate little to no pasta would be slimmer the opposite was found.

Their results were as follows:

Higher pasta intake was associated with better adhesion to MeD in both genders (P for both<0.001). In the Moli-sani study, after multivariable analysis, pasta-energy residuals were negatively associated with BMI in women but not in men (β-coef=−0.007, P=0.003 for women and β-coef=−0.001, P=0.58 for men). When pasta intake-body weight residuals were used, pasta intake was significantly and negatively associated with BMI in crude and multi-adjusted models (including adhesion to MeD) in both genders and Moli-sani and INHES studies (for all β-coef<0, P<0.05). In the Moli-sani study, pasta-body weight residuals were significantly and negatively associated with waist and hip circumference and waist-to-hip ratio (for all β-coef<0, P<0.05).

While normally pasta consumption would be associated with a very prominently negative BMI but not in these cases. What do you think about these findings? I for one am quite shocked. It’s all about the portions.