The BEST Way to Satisfy Cravings Without Going Overboard

No matter how wholesome your typical meal may be, you’re bound to want a treat every now and then (and you should feel free to have one!). But how do you keep a craving from torpedoing your weight-loss efforts? By boosting the amount of healthy food you eat and decreasing the proportion of the less-healthy option, you can still satisfy a craving without letting it take over your meal, according to new research from Vanderbilt University.

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In order to determine how people choose the quantities they consume of unhealthy but delicious options and healthy but perhaps less tasty ones, researchers separated food into two groups: the healthy foods, which they called "virtues," and the unhealthy ones, which they labeled "vices." (Editorial note: We don't support the idea of thinking of certain foods as "good" and others as "bad"—or that healthy foods are automatically less tasty than unhealthy ones, for that matter—but we'll continue to use these labels from the researchers for simplicity's sake.) Their aim was to find the perfect “taste-health balance point” between the two, which is the proportion of vice that study participants felt pleased their taste buds without impacting their healthy-eating goals too much.

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In a series of four studies with 650 participants, the study authors tested various "vice-virtue" bundles. Instead of eating the healthy and unhealthy food separately, participants had them grouped together, like three apple slices and one cookie (more virtue), two apple slices and two cookies (equal vice and virtue), or one apple slice and three cookies (more vice). Researchers made sure each option was equal to one snack, controlling for portions throughout. After analyzing the results, the researchers found that instead of a whopping vice portion to a small virtuous one, most people preferred one-quarter to one-half of their snack to be vice. They determined that the simple presence of vice foods along with virtuous ones made the participants think a vice-virtue bundle would be satisfying, so they didn’t feel the need to go for the options that had a ton of vice to quell their cravings.

"People rate vice-virtue bundles with small vice proportions as healthier but equally tasty as bundles with larger vice proportions," the researchers write in the study text. The bottom line? A little bit goes a long way. Next time you’re jonesing for a junk food fix, incorporate a small amount of it into another meal. And if you do happen to slip up and go overboard, don't beat yourself up about it; tomorrow is a new day, and you can always jump back on the healthy-eating bandwagon.

MORE: Miranda Kerr Explains Why She Doesn’t Deprive Herself 

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