Diet Study - Designer Diet - Part 2.
Nutrition is one of the most important subjects affecting our lives, yet it's a subject little understood by most people. Our physical bodies are composed entirely of chemicals, so to properly understand nutrition requires some knowledge of chemistry. Science has determined exactly what chemicals make up the human body and in what proportion. For example, the most abundant elemental chemicals in the human body, in descending order, are: oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, and calcium. These chemicals and others combine to form nutrients such as proteins, carbohydrates and fats. A healthy body is one that is chemically balanced. All disease results from a chemical imbalance!
A chemical imbalance can result from an infectious substance, such as a bacteria or virus, entering into our bodies. But most chemical imbalances occur as a result of the food we eat. We change the chemical balance of our bodies every time we put food into our mouths. The very notion that we would control this chemical change to our bodies simply by the standard of taste is foolish. The most prevalent diseases affecting Americans, such as heart disease, cancer, arthritis, and diabetes Type II, almost always have a dietary origin.
Not only do most people know little about nutrition, they could care less! That's why obesity is rampant in our country today and getting worse. Almost 70% of adults in the USA are overweight. Nearly 50% are actually obese. Obesity is defined as body-weight in excess of 20% to 49% over ideal. In other words, for a woman whose ideal body-weight is 125 lbs., obesity would begin at anything over 150 lbs. For a man whose ideal body-weight is 160 lbs., obesity would begin at anything over 192 lbs.
Excess body-fat is one of the key markers of a person prone to disease. Because excess body-fat is by definition a chemical imbalance!
Keeping our bodies lean and free from excess body-fat is not difficult. It's actually quite easy. Because we have total control over what goes into our mouths each time we eat. Unless we are incarcerated in prison, in a hospital, or eating in a military chow line, we can choose what foods we eat or avoid. The secret is knowing what to eat and what to avoid. It's like the choice between right and wrong or good and evil.
In my last article I laid down the basic framework for a diet plan designed to reduce excess body-fat and keep it off. Now we are going to see how to put that plan into effect each day.
The Perfect Meal
The perfect meal can be defined as a meal that satisfies our nutritional requirements and also tastes good. You notice that tasting good came second. As I stated in my previous article, the primary rule of nutrition is - function first, taste second. If any food does not pass the function requirement first, it's not even considered food, no matter how good it might taste.
That doesn't mean that we can never again eat pizza or stuff ourselves at an all-you-can-eat Chinese buffet. Personally those are two culinary delights that I still love to enjoy. But the thing is, I know how to control and compensate afterward for those nutritional over-indulgences. I'll get to that later.
For now, let's see how we should structure each meal that we eat. To begin with, most of what you may already regard as nutritional basics, such as; three balanced meals a day, the four basic food groups, count only calories or carbs or fat, is either inaccurate or downright wrong.
Three balanced meals a day is simply not the best way to eat. It's actually better to eat 4-6 smaller meals than 3 large meals. Eating several smaller meals is better because it puts less strain on our digestive system, keeps our blood sugar more stable, and speeds up our metabolism to actually allow us to eat more food without gaining excess body-fat! And what does balanced mean? Balanced by the "four basic food groups"? Understanding the differences between the food groups and what each has to offer us is important. But it is much better to learn to think in terms of protein, carbohydrates and fats. Our body could care less about food groups. Chemically we are composed of protein, carbohydrates and fats.
In Part 1. of this series on diet I discussed how to determine your daily requirements of protein, carbs, and fats. Once we know that, a simple method to design our individual meals is simply to divide those daily amounts by the number of meals we eat.
For example, if our total protein requirement each day is 135 grams, then 135 / 4 = 33.75 or approximately 35 grams of protein each meal. The same would apply for carbs and fats. This example would apply to the average woman.
As I stated in my previous article, most men who weight train have higher protein requirements closer to 1.5 grams of protein per pound of body weight. For a man whose desired weight is 170 lbs., (170 x 1.5 = 255 grams of protein per day). He would best divide his daily diet into 5-6 meals.
A typical meal on a carb-loading day for a person whose weight goal is 135 lbs. would be something like:
35 grams of protein 32 grams of carbs 7 grams of fat
For that same person on a carb-depleting day each of their 4 meals would be:
35 grams of protein 8 grams of carbs 7 grams of fat
You notice the grams of protein and carbs don't match on the carb-loading day. That's because 135 / 4 = 33.75. As a general rule we always round up with protein and round down with carbs and fats. A little more protein each meal won't hurt you. But a little more carbs or fats over time will have a cumulative negative effect.
These amounts will most likely be for women. Men generally will have higher weight goals so they'll more likely strive for 4 - 6 meals a day to keep their individual meal totals somewhere in this range.
For a man whose weight goal is 170 lbs., his 6-meals-a-day plan might look like this:
Carb-loading - 42 grams of protein 40 grams of carbs 9 grams of fat
Carb-depleting - 42 grams of protein 10 grams of carbs 9 grams of fat
These are approximate numbers and it may be difficult to be entirely precise with each meal. That's why keeping a diet journal each day is crucial when you begin this program. Refer to my previous article concerning keeping a diet journal. After you become experienced with this diet system, you may not even need the journal any longer. Also, as a general rule, on carb-loading days, its better to consume your carbs in your early meals and leave your last meal of the day low-carb. More on that later.
In Part 3. I'll offer some sample meals and other suggestions.
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