17: People Think This Common Food Causes Weight Gain - Hear Why They're Wrong [ASK DR. ANNA]

Is this common food really making you gain weight — or is it a myth?

In this episode of ASK DR. ANNA, Dr. Anna breaks down why pasta gets blamed for weight gain and why that story completely falls apart when you look at how it is actually eaten in Mediterranean cultures.

Pasta is not the problem. The incomplete meal around it is. Dr. Anna shares a simple perfect meal formula that makes pasta more filling, steadier for blood sugar, and genuinely easy to fit into a weight loss plan — without giving up one of life's greatest pleasures.

Listen in to learn:

• Why pasta in the US so often becomes an unbalanced, incomplete meal that leaves you hungry and reaching for more
• The perfect meal formula built on protein, fiber, healthy fats, and natural flavor — and how pasta fits right into it
• Simple upgrades like seafood, beans, and more vegetables that transform a pasta dish into a complete meal
• Smart sides that round out the plate without removing pasta from the equation
• Lighter flavor strategies using olive oil, garlic, fresh herbs, and lemon that keep things satisfying without the heaviness
• How a balanced pasta meal can actually improve satiety and reduce snacking later in the day

If you know someone who loves pasta and is struggling with weight loss, send this episode to them — it might be exactly what they needed to hear. 

And don't miss the next free Mediterranean weight loss webinar — the link is in the description below.

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Transcript

Why Pasta Gets Blamed

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Now people think this food causes waking, so they avoid it, they cut it out, and they blame it when the scale goes up. But I want you to watch what actually matters because it's not the food itself. It's something else entirely. And most people don't understand this. And the food I'm talking about here is, of course, pasta. Because pasta is the perfect example. Pasta is eaten literally every day in Mediterranean countries like Italy, where I studied medicine and lived for several years. Yet, people there are not gaining weight the way we are over here in the USA. So what is going on? Well, it might seem crazy, but I can tell you it's not magic. And it's not better genes that they have, and it's definitely not because pasta is actually low calorie over there. It's because pasta is eaten very differently. And over the next several minutes, I'm going to show you exactly how, so you can apply this to your own life. Hey, I'm Dr. Adam, your med diet doc, and I've helped thousands of people lose weight and keep it off using simple, healthy weight loss approaches like the Mediterranean

The American Pasta Trap

SPEAKER_00 1:05

diet. Now, when most people think of pasta, they picture a huge bowl. Maybe it's a thick, creamy sauce, there's usually very little protein, there are hardly any vegetables, and pasta is the entire meal. One could argue that pasta like this is just kind of glorified mac and cheese. And of course, that version is heavy. It's indulgent, it's delicious, but it's misleading. Why? Because it can make you think that because this version of pasta is going to lead to weight gain, because it's heavy, oily, lacking balanced nutrition, that somehow all pasta is bad and causes blood sugar problems and weight gain. But that is really misleading. And instead, I'd argue that that version of pasta, that meal, is just simply incomplete. Now, real quick, if you want to learn lots of simple ways to lose weight while supporting your health, do not miss my upcoming weight loss webinar. It is linked in the description below this video. Or if you're watching this from a TV, there's a QR code that's popping on screen. You can open up your phone's camera app and hover over top of it, and the link to register is gonna pop right up in your phone. Okay, back to

Pasta Needs A Complete Plate

SPEAKER_00 2:18

the video. Now, instead of just labeling pasta as fattening and off limits if you're trying to lose weight, here's how I'd argue we should be looking at it. First, this is what I do. I ask myself, if I'm looking at a pasta dish, do I see the perfect meal formula here? Now, if this is one of your first videos of mine, that is not going to be a familiar term. So quickly, I will break down what the perfect meal formula is. But let's say you're looking at a basic pasta dish and you might have pasta plus a sauce. So when you break it down, these are the components of the perfect meal formula you want to be analyzing for. Protein, is it present in this dish? Well, if it's just pasta plus the sauce, it's probably low or missing entirely. Field, if it's just the noodles or the pastas themselves and the sauce, no, there's really basically no fiber here, or it's going to be very low. Then what about healthy fats? Well, often there is some if you use olive oil, for example, but if you're using a thick, creamy, heavy sauce, usually it's not a lot of healthy fats in there. There's just other kinds of fats that may or may not be unhealthy for you. And then healthy flavorings, things like natural herbs and spices. Well, often that is not included in one of these thick, creamy pasta dishes. So we're missing that too. So I'd argue the issue isn't the pasta, the issue is what's missing with this dish. So let's break this down in very

Add Protein Fiber And Fats

SPEAKER_00 3:43

simple steps. Here are the steps for how you can fix this to support weight loss. Start with step number one, which is to assess what's already present. Then, step number two, I ask myself which part of the perfect meal formula is not yet here. So with this pasta dish, it's almost always we are lacking protein, we are lacking fiber, and may or may not be lacking healthy fat, and may or may not be lacking natural healthy flavoring. So we might be missing everything we need. Step number three, I ask which part is missing without taking the pasta away. So then we can come up with the ways to tweak this. So this could look like the following: adding seafood like shrimp, mussels, sardines to your pasta. Could even be some meat. Now, typically Italians don't put chicken in their pasta, but around the world in other places, if we're not doing things as traditionally, I guess it's okay. Or maybe you want to add some beans to your pasta. Then how do we bulk up the fiber? Well, we add lots of vegetables. Could be greens, tomatoes, zucchini, mushroom, literally anything you can imagine. Plus, you can also add lots of fibrous seeds or nuts, things like pine nuts or pinoli in Italian is so delicious. Or even walnuts or almonds or pistachios. Depending on where you go in different regions of Italy, they really play around with this stuff. Then, if we can't add these things that we need that were missing, the source of protein, the source of fiber, for example, to the pasta dish itself, what can we eat alongside the pasta at the meal that includes these things? So maybe this is having a protein-forward salad alongside your pasta or a second course dish that is a baked or a grilled piece of fish, for example. Now, if you're thinking about creating the perfect meal formula across your entire meal, the pasta itself is not the problem. It's just one part of the rest of the meal.

Flavor Without Heavy Sauce

SPEAKER_00 5:39

Then step number four is where really the Mediterranean cultures shine. It's about adding flavor without heaviness. So at the beginning of this video, we talked about, for example, a thick, creamy sauce on your pasta that's very heavy, oily, and rich in terms of flavor, but it's not going to provide you with any added health benefit. So instead of drowning your pasta in these thick sauces, instead, a classic Italian pasta dish is going to use lots of healthful flavorings, garlic, olive oil, fresh or dried herbs, lemon, chili flakes, peppers, etc. This kind of flavor adds brightness, it adds dimension, it's satisfying and it's super filling. And this is all without making your dish feel really heavy. So this is why pasta can feel comforting and energizing at the same time. And if you've never eaten pasta this way, I cannot encourage it enough. Now, quick reminder: if you want to understand how to do all of this automatically for yourself, without having to analyze every meal and count everything up, I walk through my entire approach to using the Mediterranean diet for weight loss in my free weight loss webinar. The link is below in the description to register, or again, if you're watching this on a TV, you can open up your phone's camera app and hover over this QR code

How Balance Supports Weight Loss

SPEAKER_00 6:58

to register. Now let me explain why this matters so much for weight loss, because a lot of you probably clicked on this video thinking, well, I never would consider pasta as a food I can eat when I'm trying to lose weight. I've been told it's so many carbs, it's so bad for my blood sugar, it's the thing that's going to fatten me up the most. No, I'd argue, when pasta is eaten inside a balanced meal like this, amazing things can happen that support weight loss. Your digestion is going to slow down. Your blood sugar can actually stay steadier because you're eating the components that decrease blood sugar spikes. You're adding in your protein, you're adding in your fiber, you're adding in some healthy fats. Your hunger signals will start to calm down. You're not going to feel ravenous by the time you get to your next meal. Why? Because you were able to stay full longer after this meal, since it truly satisfied you with the components nutritionally that your body and your digestion needed in order to actually send fullness signals to your brain. This is also how calories start coming down naturally over the course of your entire day. It's not because you're forcing yourself to eat less at your meals, but because your meals are really satisfying you, your body is not telling you constantly, I need more food. So what ends up happening is you can snack less often. So overall, maybe you're eating fewer times in the day. You're enjoying your meals without feeling out of control. This way of eating is something I learned firsthand, spending several years living in the Mediterranean region.

The Mediterranean Food Mindset

SPEAKER_00 8:32

Noticed every single day for folks, meals were not about just cutting carbs, chasing low calorie swaps, fearing certain foods. Instead, they were about balance, completeness, and most importantly, enjoyment. And as a result, as you can imagine, a lot of people can enjoy foods like pasta regularly without gaining tons of weight and feeling like their health is spiraling out of control. And this is exactly what I teach step by step in my free Mediterranean weight loss webinar. It's how to think about the meals so that weight loss stops feeling confusing, like a burden, like something you have to battle your body just to achieve. And it starts to feel doable and folded into the way you live your life. Again, registration is via link in the description below or the QR code on screen. So at this point, you're thinking, I'm starting to understand, Dr. Adna, what you're saying. The key point here isn't pasta causes weight gain. The takeaway is that pasta by itself, maybe the way I've been taught to eat it, isn't actually the complete meal. Yes, once you know how to actually complete a meal with the perfect meal formula, your foods will stop feeling scary to you and your weight loss can stop feeling like a constant battle. Now, if this perspective is helpful to you, I want you to do this right now. Send this video to three people you know are struggling with their weight loss, especially if these are people who are pasta lovers like me and they have been feeling sad that they were cutting this out of their life. And when you're ready to jump into more learning about all the things you can do to apply Mediterranean principles to your weight loss journey, do not miss my next video up here because I want to make this really easy for you. You shouldn't have to struggle in your weight loss. You should enjoy your meals and enjoy your life. So jump into that video, and I'll see you over there.