It Matters When You Eat That Bowl of Pasta

Julia Bainbridge
·Food Editor
Updated
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Photo credit: © StockFood / Greg Rannells Photography

Email from me to nutritionist friend Marissa Lippert, 8:00 a.m., Tuesday: “I ate pasta at 10 p.m. last night. Does that matter? Like, that it was so late?”

Her response: “Yes it matters…sadly.”

Me: “Okay, let’s talk. I’m never going to cut out carbs, but if some times are better than others, I want to relegate my pasta-loading to that window.”

So I called her. And here’s what I learned.

“Regardless of what you’re eating, it’s best not to eat right before you go to bed,” says Lippert, who owns Nourish Kitchen + Table in New York’s West Village. “If you go to bed on a full stomach, you’ll have had no time to digest and it will disturb your sleep.” She recommends a cut-off time of 9:00 p.m.

Maybe that’s not a realistic everyday practice. Lippert understands that—she’s a registered dietitian, yes, but she’s not a stickler. “If I’m out to dinner and it’s after 9 o’clock, I’m just more conscious of what I’m ordering. I’ll opt for a lighter meal.”

Right. But back to the pasta. Why not down a bowl while we’re watching Jon Stewart?

“Think about carbs as energizing foods,” says Lippert. “You don’t need that right before you go to bed, particularly if it’s refined pasta.” Ideally, you’re eating nice portions of balanced foods so that your body is releasing energy at a steady constant throughout the day, not plates of carbs that will shoot you up and drag you back down.

“A refined pasta dish, depending on what sauce you’re eating with it, could spike your blood sugar relatively quickly. Then, it will drop again.” That’s not great at any time, but especially when you’re sleeping. “You’ll wake up and either be really hungry or you won’t feel so great.”

Like my cheese-loving lactose-intolerant friend, sometimes I’ll just bite the bullet and eat the pasta anyway, no matter how I’ll feel the next day. But I’ll consign it to desperate times of heartbreak, when carbs are the only comfort that will do. Otherwise, no more 10:00 p.m. linguine for me.