Isn’t it absolutely amazing what you can still recall years after you needed the information? Ask me to define a simile, for instance, and I’ll automatically say, “A figure of speech comparing two seemingly disparate things using ‘like’ or ‘as.’”

That’s the definition Mr. White wanted my class to know for a poetry terms test when I was in seventh grade 46 years ago.

And isn’t the opposite absolutely irritating? Knowing that for years you knew a bit of info as if it were your date of birth, yet now you can’t recall it?

That happened the other day. Despite having an elementary school teacher who made my class recite the definition over and over so often that I could still do so in college, I found myself reaching for the dictionary to read up on photosynthesis.

You won’t see that word defined in this article, though. You don’t need to know it to improve your health and fitness.

But if you’d like to lose weight, better manage it, keep diabetes from developing, or even reverse it, you should know more about the disk-like membranes in plant cells that allow for photosynthesis.

Thylakoids.

Before the COVID-19 crisis made us all too familiar with the word pandemic, many experts argued that obesity had become one worldwide. No arguing occurred inside the confines of the United States, however.

Here, it’s acknowledged as fact and for good reason.

In the early 1960s, 14 percent of U.S. adults were obese according to the CDC. Their latest figures show the percentage has tripled to 42.4 percent.

And let’s not forget the kids. Since the early 1970s, their rate has tripled, too.

As a result, obesity-related medical care now costs Americans $147 billion a year. While understanding more about thylakoids won’t reduce that number, it certainly could lessen your personal health bill.

That’s in part because a wide body of research suggests the thylakoids in foods can keep you not only from feeling hungry but also from consuming food for pleasure when you’re not.

In a 2015 comprehensive review published in the journal Plant Foods for Human Nutrition, the authors state the “administration of thylakoids inhibits eating and promotes satiety” primarily, it seems, because it increases the production of cholecystokinin, a hormone secreted in the gastrointestinal tract, which then signals to the brain that the body has sufficient energy and no need for more food.

The studies cited determined this by using thylakoids as “food ingredients as part of a complete meal or served as a juice prior to a meal.”

In one, thylakoids were added to a high-fat meal as part of the pesto sauce. In another, they were included in a high-carb meal featuring yogurt and muesli as an ingredient in jam.

Because the results remained the same despite the meals being so different, it stands to reason that adding thylakoids to any diet would enhance its effectiveness.

Moreover, these two studies as well as one using pigs found ingesting thylakoids also limits ghrelin production, a hormone produced in the stomach to signal it is time to eat. This is the hormone that when secreted in excess creates that crazed, want-to-eat everything-in-your-house-and-your-neighbor’s hunger, so keeping it in check is crucial when dieting.

In the review, the authors also assert “thylakoids have the ability to suppress the urge for sweet and fat,” which reduces “hedonic eating,” eating not to sate hunger but purely for pleasure. In one cited study, such eating was reduced significantly over a series of entire days when a thylakoid-enriched juice was drunk in the morning.

So let’s say the evidence offered so far has intrigued you enough to want to experiment. Your method of experimentation is a simple one.

Eat more green-colored foods.

Thylakoids contain chlorophyll, the pigment responsible for making plants green; therefore, any green vegetable, like broccoli or Brussels sprouts, has some. But leafier vegetables such as kale, cabbage, collard greens, mustard greens, lettuce, and spinach are loaded with them.

An especially good choice is spinach.

In a study published in the journal Appetite two months after the aforementioned comprehensive review found ingesting 5 grams of thylakoids in a spinach extract added to an early-morning drink reduced hunger by 21 percent and cravings throughout the day by 35 percent when compared to a healthy blueberry drink used as a control.

And don’t forget the other good that results from eating Popeye’s go-to food.

Spinach is not only one of the few nondairy foods chocked full of calcium, but it also contains significant amounts of manganese and vitamin K. Both work synergistically with calcium to strengthen bones and ward off osteoporosis.

It’s also a good source of iron and organic nitrate, both of which aid in the transportation of oxygen, making any aerobic effort throughout the day a bit easier.