Cinnamon and Weight Loss: a Great Way to Lose Weight

Cinnamon and weight loss are connected through constituents of cinnamon enhancing the effect of insulin in enabling your body cells to absorb glucose to generate energy. Natural cinnamon phytochemicals also help to support the health of your cardiovascular system and your overall ability to burn fat.

Cinnamon offers several health benefits to your body, including antibacterial properties and its effect on improving your brain function and memory. When you also consider that cinnamon seems to be able to reduce your blood LDL cholesterol levels then you definitely must use it more in cooking, particularly in the apple pie. I find apple and cinnamon pie absolutely divine!

However, one proven property of cinnamon is that it reduces the amount of glucose in your blood (i.e. blood sugar) and also offer help to diabetics by increasing the blood insulin content. Ingestion of just one gram of cinnamon has been found to lower blood sugar in Type 2 diabetics, and also reduce the levels of LDL cholesterol and triglycerides in their blood.

This the effect that cinnamon has on blood glucose that allows it to enable you to lose weight. The proanthocyanadin contained in cinnamon activates the insulin receptors on your body cells which enables these cells to make use of glucose to generate energy. Therefore, the glucose in your blood is not used as a raw material to fill up your far cells but for energy.

Without these insulin receptors being activated, your cells cannot enable glucose to enter the cellular mitochondria where it is used in the Krebs Cycle to generate ATP energy. There are no further options but for it to be stored in your fat cells as an emergency energy source: i.e. become fat. Thus, you will have a tendency to add weight. Insulin enables your body to use glucose to create energy via the Krebs Cycle and cellular respiration.

Cinnamon promotes this, and its use in promoting good health was known by the Romans who would burn the tree bark (which cinnamon is) in their homes because it was believed to clean the air and keep them healthy. The Romans had no idea why it had these properties, but they that it did have them. This is one more example of ancient remedies and usage of herbs and spices for which modern science is able to provide a reason.

Give them credit; these old civilizations sure knew what was good for them – and bad. They had mastered the use both of healthy natural plant extracts and of natural poisons, each of which they used extensively. It should be said, however, that the world would probably be vastly overpopulated by now without the effect of their prolific use of poisons!

Cinnamon and weight loss go together because the cinnamon in your diet enables your body cells to make the best use of the insulin in your blood and also forces your metabolism to burn fat when energy is required. Cinnamon and weight loss are connected very closely because the cinnamon enables your body to metabolize carbohydrates and convert them to glucose.

That is not the whole story of course, but is enough since the basic biochemistry involved in cinnamon and weight loss explains the change of carbohydrates to glucose, and then through the processes of glycolysis and oxidation to eventually create energy and carbon dioxide. The amount of fat you burn and energy generated is dependent on the efficiency of that process.

Cinnamon does much more than just flavor cookies and apple pies Mmmm…) – Cinnamon and weight loss are interconnected in a way that you may not fully understand, but that will make you lose weight quicker by reducing the fat stored within your fat cells. So get that apple pie out and send me some!

Note: Before you take any supplement that can interfere with the way your body uses insulin or sugars, make sure that you check with your doctor that you are able to use it. Cinnamon and fat loss supplements are usually fine, but let your doctor know what you are doing if you are already on medication.

References:

1. Khan A, Safdar M, Ali Khan MM, Khattak KN, Anderson RA (December 2003). “Cinnamon improves glucose and lipids of people with type 2 diabetes”. Diabetes Care 26 (12): 3215-8.

2. Verspohl, Eugen J. et al.; Bauer, K; Neddermann, E (2005). “Antidiabetic effect of Cinnamomum cassia and Cinnamomum zeylanicum In vivo and In vitro”. Phytotherapy Research 19 (3): 203-206.