For most people, there are no serious dangers involved in eating one meal a day, other than the discomforts of feeling hungry. That said, there are some risks for people with cardiovascular disease or diabetes. Eating one meal a day can increase your blood pressure and cholesterol.
The amount of food we consume daily has a significant impact on bodily function. Most adults need a minimum of 2000 calories to sustain metabolism, muscle activity, and brain function. However, too many calories can lead to weight gain and a variety of diseases.
In one sense, it all comes down to math: The average adult human requires 2,000 calories per day, and you're only awake for so many hours. "Across all peer-reviewed research and health practices, three meals a day is a general recommendation to encourage consistent, adequate energy intake," Miluk said.
While many folks still plan their days around “three square meals,” it turns out the number of meals you eat may not be so important. How you eat those meals is what matters most when it comes to decreasing the risk of heart disease and other health problems that come along with being overweight.
"The Romans believed it was healthier to eat only one meal a day," food historian Caroline Yeldham told BBC News Magazine in 2012. "They were obsessed with digestion and eating more than one meal was considered a form of gluttony.
For the majority of human history, people ate one or two meals per day. The current time-restricted eating patterns like the 16:8 or one meal a day diet (OMAD) mimic this ancient phenomenon. During periods without food, the body evolved to tap into fat stores for energy.
If you could only select five foods to survive on, potatoes, kale, trail mix, grains, and beans would get you pretty far.
The one-meal-a-day diet — also known as 23:1 intermittent fasting — may help people lose weight and body fat. However, it can lead to hunger and cravings and may not be suitable for everyone.
Jesse Feder, Registered Dietitian, says, “ A person can only survive short term on 500 calories a day. This is extremely low and can lead to serious health issues over time.”
In order to lose at least a pound a week, try to do at least 30 minutes of physical activity on most days, and reduce your daily calorie intake by at least 500 calories. However, calorie intake should not fall below 1,200 a day in women or 1,500 a day in men, except under the supervision of a health professional.
However, other studies show that while consuming 1,000 calories a day may result in significant weight loss, most people cannot sustain it and often experience significant weight regain . The reasons include regaining lost muscle mass and increased appetite. Also worth noting is that the human body can adapt.
One of the latest trends among celebrities is the “one meal a day” diet (or “Omad”). Fans of Omad include Bruce Springsteen and Coldplay frontman Chris Martin. Many proponents of Omad claim it helps them better manage their weight and keep fit.
Not only can you survive on just two meals, but you can actually thrive. Here's where it gets interesting. Two very popular nutrition philosophies today in India, advocate for two opposing thoughts. One advises intermittent fasting, and the other advises eating every two hours.
Eating 2 meals in a day can improve metabolic flexibility. This means you can shift between using different fuel sources available with ease. You become less dependent on carbohydrates in food for energy. Instead, you can shift into using stored energy like body fat.
"The other negative effects can include having your blood sugar drop so you feel weak and shaky, nutrient deficiencies, exhaustion, binge eating at the one time you do eat, weight gain, or if you do keep your calories low at your one meal, heart problems, hair loss, cold intolerance, and more," says Hotz.
“On a day you don't eat for 24 hours, you're guaranteed to be losing a third or half a pound of non-water weight that's mostly from body fat,” Pilon told Global News.
OMAD can then start to look a lot like chronic caloric restriction. Although chronic caloric restriction helps with initial weight loss, it poses long-term concerns because it tends to lower resting metabolic rate, which makes weight loss very difficult to maintain.
"The only food that provides all the nutrients that humans need is human milk," Hattner said. "Mother's milk is a complete food. We may add some solid foods to an infant's diet in the first year of life to provide more iron and other nutrients, but there is a little bit of everything in human milk."
During that time, energy intake would have been higher than at present—probably about three thousand kilocalories per day for males and perhaps 2,750 kilo-calories for females.
"English settlers in teh seventeenth century ate three meals a day, as they had in England... For most people, breakfast consisted of bread, cornmeal mush and milk, or bread and milk together, and tea. Even the gentry might eat modestly in the morning, although they could afford meat or fish...
Studies show that the city dwellers ate a variety of meats, dairy, grains and other plants. The shards yielded traces of proteins found in barley, wheat and peas, along with several animal meats and milks.