Is Instant Miso Soup Healthy? (3 Tips for Weight Loss)

When you drink Miso soup and it fills your entire body with warmth, you can understand how much you freaking love this soup. 

But when we just don’t have the time or energy to cut all the tofu, freshly prepare the broth, or chop up some green onions, instant miso soup is the next best option. 

Usually coming in a package with dried ingredients, Instant Miso soup is commonly sold in Asian restaurants and is popularly used by college students or people constantly on the go.

But you are probably wondering, is instant miso soup healthy? 

Instant Miso Soup is a very low-calorie and low-fat soup that is a great addition to your diet when you are trying to lose weight, but is not something that you should consume regularly because it is high in MSG. For short term weight loss goals, Instant Miso Soup is a great choice, but for long term health, it is best to make miso soup from scratch. 

In this article, we will be discussing three great tips that will help you understand more about the nutrition behind Miso Soup and how to enjoy this soup while still losing weight:

Tip 1: Understand the Ingredients that go into Instant Miso Soup

Tip 2: Understand How Many Calories are in Instant Miso Soup

Tip 3: How to Make a Healthier Instant Miso Soup

Let’s get started!

Tip 1: Understand the Ingredients that go into Instant Miso Soup

Instant miso soup is made up of very simple ingredients that are all rather healthy foods that are great to consume when you are trying to lose weight.

In this section, we will cover the different ingredients in miso soup and which ones are detrimental for your health but also those that are beneficial for weight loss. 

MSG

Monosodium Glutamate, or MSG, has also been known as “China salt” because of its flavor-enhancing properties.

It’s the pure extraction of umami that can be naturally found in tomatoes.

The reason why instant noodle or soup tastes so delicious is because MSG contains toxins that makes the food taste more rich and addictive. (1) 

Although MSG does not have any calories itself, the flavor-enhancing qualities can easily make you overeat and go into a calorie surplus making it difficult to lose weight.

Therefore, it is important to try avoiding foods that contain MSG and replace these “instant food” options with whole foods and fresh ingredients.

Miso

Miso is where you get the unique flavor and savory touch of this soup.

After going through a specific cultivating process, miso eventually becomes a paste made of soybeans and koji: fermented rice, soybeans, or barley. 

Miso is a great, low-calorie ingredient that does not hinder your weight loss goals.

Not only is it a super delicious and unique flavor, but this is also a healthy ingredient filled with nutrients and helps with digestion. (2)

Seaweed

The smooth, flat, green pieces in the soup are seaweed, which is exactly what it sounds like.

But trust me, it’s delicious. Often used for its flavorful properties, it is an essential component of miso soup.  

Seaweed is another low-calorie ingredient that is very low on carbohydrates and fat and is a great source of protein.

Filled with antioxidants and fiber, seaweed is often added as a pairing with Asian dishes to give it a little extra flavor and crunch. 

Tofu

Tofu is just amazing.  Made out of solidified soy milk, tofu retains a bouncy yet firm texture.

Though it looks plain, tofu soaks up all the flavor of the soup and adds that final touch to the soup.

For every serving of tofu, (100 grams) there is a total of 80 calories, with around 5 grams of fat, 2 grams of carbohydrates, and 8 grams of protein.

Although tofu is not the best source of protein because it is relatively higher in fat, tofu is still an excellent low-calorie food filled with calcium and iron. 

Tip 2: Understand How Many Calories are in Instant Miso Soup

For the typical package of Instant Miso Soup, there are a total of 30 calories, with 1 gram of fat, 4 grams of carbohydrates, and 2 grams of protein.

This low-calorie soup is a great soup to drink when you are trying to lose weight and an excellent pairing to your main meal.

The importance of filling your diet with low-calorie foods is because the only way to lose weight is to be in a calorie deficit or to eat below your TDEE.

TDEE, or Total Daily Energy Expenditure is a makeup of your Resting Metabolic Rate, the calories you burn through activity, and the calories you burn through the thermic effect of food, which all total to how many calories you burn throughout the day.

You may now be wondering, how do you figure out your TDEE?

This is actually very simple! All you have to do is go onto any credible fitness website, like Bodybuilding.com or NASM, and find their calorie calculator.

By putting in your sex, height, weight, and activity level, this calculator can help you generate an approximate number that is your TDEE.

Once you know your TDEE, to be in a calorie deficit, aim to eat around 300-500 calories less than your TDEE every single day.

Although you may not see results in the first couple of days, or maybe even the first week, it’s important to trust the process and to stay consistent.

Weigh yourself every single day, at the same exact time to get the most accurate results. 

My favorite way to track how many calories I am eating every day is by using MyFitnessPal, which allows you to easily input your food into a journal and help you calculate how many calories you are eating throughout the day.

Remember that everyone’s body is unique and the TDEE calculator is simply an estimate.

If you still do not see any results within around two weeks, try lowering your calorie intake by around 100-200 calories and observe the results.

Drink plenty of water throughout the process, and fill your diet with low-calorie options like miso soup!

Tip 3: How to Make a Healthier Instant Miso Soup

As discussed earlier, even though Instant Miso Soup is very low in calories, it still contains MSG which is not a great ingredient to frequently consume if you are concerned about your long-term health.

Since MSG makes you more hungry, this is also not a very beneficial food to eat when you are trying to lose weight and already eating less.

The good news is that you can always make your own Instant Miso Soup that doesn’t contain any MSG!

Even though your homemade Instant Miso Soup will not last as long as the packaged one, preparing it beforehand will save you plenty of time throughout the week. 

Down below, we found a healthy Instant Miso Soup recipe that you can prepare on the weekends to help you create a super easy and storable instant miso soup recipe.

This miso soup recipe adds other ingredients like mushrooms and green onions to give the soup lots of additional flavor for little to no calories! 

https://www.justonecookbook.com/homemade-instant-miso-soup/

There are several benefits that come from preparing your food on the weekends or meal prepping your meals.

They can save you lots of time throughout the week, they prevent you from eating out or buying unhealthy takeout food, and it also saves you plenty of money!

The key to weight loss is to hold yourself accountable and to plan ahead of time.

If you know you are going to be busy at work and will feel too tired to work, take the time to prepare your meals on your open weekends and package them in your fridge.

This will make sure you are eating healthy foods that you know the nutritional information of and will help keep you on track for your weight loss goals. 

I know that if I spend just 20 minutes on the weekend quickly preparing a couple of containers of my Homemade Instant Miso Soup, I won’t regret coming home after a busy day of work to a one-minute preparation broth.  

Now that you know the ingredients in Instant Miso Soup, the calories in Miso Soup, and how to make your own healthy version of Instant Miso Soup, you can go into your weight loss journey with confidence!

Conclusion 

Remember, although nutrition is a huge factor that influences weight loss, it is important to pair this journey with exercise as well. Especially strength training.

Several years of research on the benefits of weight training have shown that individuals that do some sort of consistent resistance training at least 3-5 times a week have shown not only a great amount of weight loss but are also able to keep the weight off! 

The secret to this phenomena is that strength training leads to a build-up of muscle.

Not only does your body recomposition into a more fitting and athletic-looking aesthetic, but having more muscle also increases your resting metabolic rate which essentially means you burn more calories at rest! 

Now that we know the importance of muscle we need to make sure we stay on track with our workouts.

Consistency and longevity are the two key factors when building muscle so there will be some commitment involved.

We understand that not everyone has access to a gym membership or feels comfortable starting off in such an intimidating environment.

Although I would strongly recommend that everyone should get a gym membership, don’t worry we got your back!

You can either go to the gym or build one for yourself.

It really just comes down to 3 pieces of equipment that you need to do most workouts.

These three are the workout bench, dumbbells, and gym flooring.

Check out our recommended gear page to see our best picks for these pieces of equipment here. 

https://www.aspirefitnesswalnut.com/home-workout-equipment

If a home gym is not for you then getting a membership somewhere works too.

As long as you are starting your muscle-building journey, we’re happy! 

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