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[FryHole]

Mengy - I find a quick and filling low carb breakfast is blueberries, nuts, dark chocolate and double (or heavy, as our American friends will call it) cream. Sometimes stir in some yogurt mixed with shredded coconut too, either way it takes minutes to prepare.

As for potatoes, they're around 20g carbs per 100g, and a single baked potato is around 300g I think. Personally I think anything under 100g a day qualifies as low carb, so you've got plenty of breathing space (if you agree!). Cutting out sugar and bread makes a huge difference, once you're restricted to veg it can be quite hard to reach your daily carb intake.

 

[Jado]

Make a dozen hard-boiled eggs, peel them and keep them in a sealed container in the fridge. For a couple of bucks, you will have a quick and ready breakfast each morning. They stay fresh about a week, taste great with a bit of salt and are quite filling on their own.

 

[Kuro Madoushi]

Biggest hurtle is the sugar. Man, cake and sugary drinks,and cookies are hard to resist. I don't worry so much about carbs since I was cutting out rice anyways, but maaaaannnn....

Coworker told me today he lost 50 lbs in 6 months doing low carb, but then he got 45 back after getting married,having a kid,and eating junk food.

 

[bigsnack]

Two things are going to present huge problems for me: cereal for breakfast, and potatoes.

Cereal is just so damn convenient for breakfast. I'm going to start getting up a bit earlier in the morning in order to allow myself to make oatmeal or eggs and bacon a few days a week, and I'd like to eventually stop buying cereal altogether. That's going to take me some time though I think, more so for my girlfriend.

Now potatoes, I looooovvveeeeee potatoes. For now I'm just going to cut back on my potato eating to twice a week at most. And trust me, that's less than normal for me, lol.

I'm hoping that just a greatly reduced carb intake with a healthy respect for the glycemic index will help me lose body fat. If I'm not seeing good enough results by March then I'm going to make some more hardcore changes.

Yeah I have been a huge cereal fiend since I was a kid. It has been a staple of my diet for so long I can't remember NOT eating it. But when I think of it, I also can't think of a time when my digestive system felt completely "normal". Until now of course! To be honest, I've squeezed in a few 1 cup servings of Apple Cinnamon Chex. The first bite is like a sweet explosion, but what sucks is that 20 minutes later I am completely exhausted. It also gives me gas a bit now, which I never noticed until I took a break.

If you get in the habit of getting up 30 minutes earlier and cooking breakfast, you won't regret it. I am usually putting the eggs on my plate at about 8 a.m., and I don't even get the slightest feeling of hunger until about 12:45 / 1 p.m.

One other quick point to make. Although the topic title refers to weight loss specifically, Taubes' research goes further into the incidence of disease and diet as well. Since I am very thin to begin with, it was this point that really got me excited. My mom once told me that I had my very first asthma attack only 1 week after I had been weened (I no longer have symptoms). My first meals that week were bread and breakfast cereals... I personally believe that there could be a connection there.

 

[Piecake]

Two things are going to present huge problems for me: cereal for breakfast, and potatoes.

Cereal is just so damn convenient for breakfast. I'm going to start getting up a bit earlier in the morning in order to allow myself to make oatmeal or eggs and bacon a few days a week, and I'd like to eventually stop buying cereal altogether. That's going to take me some time though I think, more so for my girlfriend.

Now potatoes, I looooovvveeeeee potatoes. For now I'm just going to cut back on my potato eating to twice a week at most. And trust me, that's less than normal for me, lol.

I'm hoping that just a greatly reduced carb intake with a healthy respect for the glycemic index will help me lose body fat. If I'm not seeing good enough results by March then I'm going to make some more hardcore changes.

Eh, potatos arent terrible. You could eat that as a cheat food pretty regularly and be fine, especially if tht potato is a sweet potato. One thing you better not be doing is dousing that potato in margarine. That shit is evil. Use butter if youre not

Plus, there is some diet views out there that eating food with low food reward is the way to go, and potatos have very low food reward (meaning that youll eat a lot of cookies because they taste super awesome but not a lot of potatoes)


As for breakfast, full fat Greek Yogurt (plain) with berries and almonds is a great choice if you dont want to cook anything for breakfast and super healthy. Not as healthy as eggs, but, well, nothing else really is

Biggest hurtle is the sugar. Man, cake and sugary drinks,and cookies are hard to resist. I don't worry so much about carbs since I was cutting out rice anyways, but maaaaannnn....

Coworker told me today he lost 50 lbs in 6 months doing low carb, but then he got 45 back after getting married,having a kid,and eating junk food.

Going on a low carb diet without cutting sugar would be pretty pointless. That is the one thing you definitely need to cut

 

[Dash27]

I just have to say that I feel better than I have felt in YEARS. I have been searching for many years to find what bothers my stomach, because it always seemed to be random foods, and it wasn't always a consistent reaction.

That's great! Good for you. This is the main reason I'm trying the Paleo thing with no grains. Just to see how my body reacts.

After a trial period I plan to reintroduce certain things and see how that goes. Ideally I dont want to be "low carb" or go for any long term ketosis diet.

 

[Prologue]

Cereal is a no no? Even Cheerios?

 

[Piecake]

Cereal is a no no? Even Cheerios?

cereal is terrible

 

[Malvolio]

Cereal is one of the things that I thought was going to be hardest to give up, especially since frosted mini-wheats were one of my favorite snack foods, but a week or two of making omelettes in the morning cured me pretty quick. I always liked eggs, but was too lazy to cook every morning. 18 months without cereal and I still look forward to those eggs every morning. Worth the extra effort and keeps me full for so much longer. One of the best exchanges you can make if you're looking to go low carb.

 

[Johnas]

cereal is terrible

It really is. Adults can and should eat better. It's different for kids with the added iron and whatnot.

 

[Eteric Rice]

About to go on keto again Monday. Will probably eat soup for the first day or so to let my body adjust to the lack of sugar.

Also wanted to throw this out there. Reddit has a really nice keto board. You can find lots of before and after there. Some are pretty amazing.

 

[RedCoyote]

Been carefully studying epidemiological reports after reading some literature. From what I've gathered, the way to go is avoiding meat and diary altogether (or at least minimized), and consuming primarily a plant-based diet of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes, etc., and of course, plenty of physical activity. Now, I've always been pretty active, lean, and healthy eating essentially the same stuff, but with diary, poultry, and fish in there too. The studies I've read, however, point that animal-based protein acts as a promoter to initiated cancer genes, causes a host of diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, osteoporosis, and generally makes you feel more tired. Basically, cut out the animal-based protein and fats altogether and you'll eliminate the risk of dying from the 3 main diseases in the western world.

This probably sounds nuts to some of you when there are so many recommendations for low-carb, high-protein diets, because it's essentially the exact opposite. I mean, you can get protein from plants anyway, getting it from animal-based sources allows your body to use it more readily (making it easier to get buff sooner), but you're gonna be running into so many other problems. A diet low in (animal) protein and high in useful carbohydrates, with plenty of activity, causes your body to turn most of those calories into heat instead of storing them as fat since you generate more brown adipose tissue.

 

[Piecake]

Been carefully studying epidemiological reports after reading some literature. From what I've gathered, the way to go is avoiding meat and diary altogether (or at least minimized), and consuming primarily a plant-based diet of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes, etc., and of course, plenty of physical activity. Now, I've always been pretty active, lean, and healthy eating essentially the same stuff, but with diary, poultry, and fish in there too. The studies I've read, however, point that animal-based protein acts as a promoter to initiated cancer genes, causes a host of diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, osteoporosis, and generally makes you feel more tired. Basically, cut out the animal-based protein and fats altogether and you'll eliminate the risk of dying from the 3 main diseases in the western world.

This probably sounds nuts to some of you when there are so many recommendations for low-carb, high-protein diets, because it's essentially the exact opposite. I mean, you can get protein from plants anyway, getting it from animal-based sources allows your body to use it more readily (making it easier to get buff sooner), but you're gonna be running into so many other problems. A diet low in (animal) protein and high in useful carbohydrates, with plenty of activity, causes your body to turn most of those calories into heat instead of storing them as fat since you generate more brown adipose tissue.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vr-c8GeT34

Oh, and i have never have as much energy as i do now. What make me tired and bloated and feel like crap is grains

 

[Badgerst3]

Wife and I trying "the perfect 10" diet.

Ties diet to hormones as well as overall health.

Sugar and white carbs/ processed foods and additives are the devil.

2 days in, so is my craving for mint chocalate chip ice cream, but we press on.

 

[RedCoyote]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vr-c8GeT34

Oh, and i have never have as much energy as i do now. What make me tired and bloated and feel like crap is grains

Ah, forgive me if this seems a bit close-minded, but I won't watch an hour-long youtube video (even if the guy is a PhD) when I could read peer-reviewed articles. The studies I'm reading into are mentioned in this book, which chronicles long-term habits (especially diet) in relation to diseases, with the primary study being a 20 year long epidemiological study of 65 counties China, though there are other smaller studies using mice. It's true that there's an insane amount of misinformation out there, so I'm very critical of anything I read.

The "tiredness" part was based on a finding that mice fed plant-based diets exercised on their wheels about twice as much as the mice fed animal-based diets, so make of that what you will. I really can't tell you you're wrong if things are working for you.

 

[Piecake]

Ah, forgive me if this seems a bit close-minded, but I won't watch an hour-long youtube video (even if the guy is a PhD) when I could read peer-reviewed articles. The studies I'm reading into are mentioned in this book, which chronicles long-term habits (especially diet) in relation to diseases, with the primary study being a 20 year long epidemiological study of 65 counties China, though there are other smaller studies using mice. It's true that there's an insane amount of misinformation out there, so I'm very critical of anything I read.

The "tiredness" part was based on a finding that mice fed plant-based diets exercised on their wheels about twice as much as the mice fed animal-based diets, so make of that what you will. I really can't tell you you're wrong if things are working for you.

The youtube guy name drops a number of peer reviewed studies during his talks. Watch the video and check those out if you want. And its a lecture sponsored by the University that was then put on Youtube. I think thats a little different than a 'youtube' video

I really dont know how you can conclude anything about humans from mice-based studies either

https://www.marksdailyapple.com/does-high-fat-diet-cause-brain-damage/

Anyway, I actually found this study interesting and useful. One of the friends of MDA, Dr. Stephan Guyenet of Whole Health Source, was fourth author on it. He collaborated on the research and wrote about it on his blog a few days ago, having foreseen the uproar it might provoke from the Primal/ancestral health community. Stephan sums up the study, essentially telling those crazies among us who aren’t scared of butter and lard to rest easy and avoid jumping to conclusions about the effect of a high-fat diet on the brain, because he and his colleagues certainly were not. They were looking at something very different and far more basic: what happens to the brain as an animal begins to grow obese.

The high-fat diet wasn’t the target; obese mice brains were. This study wasn’t really about the diet. The diet was a means to an end – a way to make the rodents obese so that the effect of obesity on the brain could be studied. It’s well-known that high-fat diets make mice pretty fat, even when they’re relatively low in sugar. (Remember, different species with a different ancestral environment.) So, in order to study obesity, the researchers used the most foolproof obesogenic rodent diet around. As Stephan says, “We choose rodent strains that are susceptible to obesity on purified high-fat diets simply because we’re studying obesity, and we know that feeding this diet to the right strains of rats and mice produces it readily.” The scientists simply wanted to make some mice fat and see what happens to their brains. That’s it. They chose the best diet for doing that to mice, and they even took away their running wheels (mice love Chronic Cardio, actually respond well to it, get chubby without it, and have no real substitutes for it; studies indicate that although mice are enthusiastic about the idea of burpees, rodent anthropometry makes actually performing them impossible) to really make sure it happened.

Shockingly, mice and humans react differently to different foods

All of those diseases are related to obesity. mice get obese if they eat a high-fat diet. If one of the major pieces of evidence for disease are those mice based studies then I would find it highly dubious considering that mice get obese on a high-fat diet while humans do not

 

[Badgerst3]

Been carefully studying epidemiological reports after reading some literature. From what I've gathered, the way to go is avoiding meat and diary altogether (or at least minimized), and consuming primarily a plant-based diet of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes, etc., and of course, plenty of physical activity. Now, I've always been pretty active, lean, and healthy eating essentially the same stuff, but with diary, poultry, and fish in there too. The studies I've read, however, point that animal-based protein acts as a promoter to initiated cancer genes, causes a host of diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, osteoporosis, and generally makes you feel more tired. Basically, cut out the animal-based protein and fats altogether and you'll eliminate the risk of dying from the 3 main diseases in the western world.

This probably sounds nuts to some of you when there are so many recommendations for low-carb, high-protein diets, because it's essentially the exact opposite. I mean, you can get protein from plants anyway, getting it from animal-based sources allows your body to use it more readily (making it easier to get buff sooner), but you're gonna be running into so many other problems. A diet low in (animal) protein and high in useful carbohydrates, with plenty of activity, causes your body to turn most of those calories into heat instead of storing them as fat since you generate more brown adipose tissue.

This makes some sense to me, but still tying to stay somewhat low carb. Wait a minute- this is the definition of vegetarian no?

What about my organic nitrate free bacon?

 

[teh_pwn]

Been carefully studying epidemiological reports after reading some literature. From what I've gathered, the way to go is avoiding meat and diary altogether (or at least minimized), and consuming primarily a plant-based diet of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes, etc., and of course, plenty of physical activity.

Most European countries' consumption of meat and especially animal fats and dairy while maintaining low obesity rates completely contradicts those studies.

Are you reading the China Study? That's quackery.

Calories from animal products by country
Obesity epidemic

There just isn't correlation


With that said, the diet you're recommending likely would result in fat loss in those that are overweight compared to the standard American diet because you're recommended natural foods with low reward. But it doesn't have to do with consumption of animal products. You could have vegan nachos and cheese, Amy's frozen junk food, or Taco bell bean burritos and end up the same as versions of those foods with meat in it.

 

[Kuro Madoushi]

Going on a low carb diet without cutting sugar would be pretty pointless. That is the one thing you definitely need to cut

Hey mang, I'm trying...even that mint ice cream dude knows what I'm talking about.

 

[Deleted member 17706]

Ah, forgive me if this seems a bit close-minded, but I won't watch an hour-long youtube video (even if the guy is a PhD) when I could read peer-reviewed articles. The studies I'm reading into are mentioned in this book, which chronicles long-term habits (especially diet) in relation to diseases, with the primary study being a 20 year long epidemiological study of 65 counties China, though there are other smaller studies using mice. It's true that there's an insane amount of misinformation out there, so I'm very critical of anything I read.

The "tiredness" part was based on a finding that mice fed plant-based diets exercised on their wheels about twice as much as the mice fed animal-based diets, so make of that what you will. I really can't tell you you're wrong if things are working for you.

The China Study? Really, now? Might as well be watching "Forks Over Knives" or something.

For someone "carefully studying," you could do well by exercising a bit more care in your studies.

 

[RedCoyote]

Hmm, I will watch it then. My big focus isn't learning about what causes short-term weight loss, but whether certain means lead to long term health complications.

Mice are incredibly genetically close to humans, with similar bodily functions and enzymes, and there is a lot of correlation between what can be observed in mice and what can predicted in humans. Of course, yes, there can be some differences, so it is definitely open to some skepticism/criticism, but statistically it's a valid way to perform studies. The big problem is that you can control mice any way you want (ie: diet, living conditions, etc), but you can't control humans.

The initial studies I read were focused on the relationship between aflatoxin, liver cancer, and animal-based protein, first observed in the Philippines, and then verified with mice. From the findings, a large-scale project was established in China to determine the effects of nutrition on diet. You know how heart disease, cancer, and diabetes are huge problems in affluent countries like the US? They're practically non-existent in poorer places that can't afford to eat animal-based foods. Of course, those people have other health concerns to worry about (one town in the study had about 50% of the citizens infected with Hep B).

The book is The China Study, it's pretty cheap and you can read parts of it on google books. I'm not done with it, but I'd love for someone else to read it too cuz I love being able to discuss this kind of stuff, whether it's agreeing with it, ripping it apart, or making some insights.


EDIT: a lot of you guys are already bashing the book. Can you explain what you find wrong with it? I want some info here

 

[Deleted member 17706]

They're practically non-existent in poorer places that can't afford to eat animal-based foods. Of course, those people have other health concerns to worry about (one town in the study had about 50% of the citizens infected with Hep B).

What else can't they afford to eat that so many in the western world have readily available to them? Hmm...

 

[Piecake]

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/a...-masterjohn-criticism-of-the-china-study.aspx

The book is named after a massive observational study that Campbell conducted in the rural Chinese population. This type of study generates correlations between variables but cannot provide evidence of cause and effect. According to the scientific method, these correlations constitute observations that then need to be tested with experiments, including clinical trials.

The study involved 100 adults in each of 65 counties in China. Only those between the ages of 35 and 64 were studied; for mortality rates they eliminated death certificates of those over the age of 64 as "unreliable." Campbell pooled blood samples from everyone in a village so he would have large enough samples to measure over 109 nutritional, viral, hormonal and other indicators in blood.

Campbell also measured 24 urinary factors, mortality rates for more than 48 diseases, 36 food constituents, 36 nutrient and food intakes, 60 diet and lifestyle factors, and 17 geographic and climatic factors.

All in all, he studied 367 variables and made about 100,000 correlations, about 8,000 of which were statistically significant. With those numbers, we'd expect to find about 5,000 correlations that are "statistically significant" just by random chance, so the study provided Campbell ample means to mine the data however he wanted.

In his book, Campbell used the data generated from this study to support his hypothesis that animal protein causes cancer.

As observations, correlations never show causation. As Chris Masterjohn pointed out in his original critique of the China Study and his dialogue with Campbell, animal protein was not even associated with cancer in this study.

Campbell had to make the connection with six surrogate blood markers that he claimed to be reflective of animal protein intake. His method is buried deep in a footnote, he provides no references supporting his use of these markers, and most of them didn't even correlate with animal protein intake within the China Study.

Whelp, im convinced

… The first criticism that I made was that Dr. Campbell's animal experiments were using casein. He showed, or at least he says he showed, that casein promotes cancer in rats. Then, after showing that several plant proteins such as wheat and soy don't have the same effect, he concludes that all animal proteins have this effect.

He says a general pattern is emerging – that all the nutrients from animal-based foods were associated with disease, while all the nutrients from animal-based foods were associated with the protection of health.

… [but] casein is just one animal protein; and not only that -- because

you've divorced it from the natural food context – that you would ordinarily consume it as raw unpasteurized milk. First of all, who knows whether casein actually has an effect when you consume it as this type of milk?

Secondly, how can you generalize from casein, to beef protein, to chicken protein, to egg protein, when in fact, you can't even generalize from casein to whey, because there are experiments nowadays where you can see the different effects of casein and whey.

If you can't generalize from one protein in milk to another protein in milk, how can you generalize… protein from milk… to all animal-based foods?

It just doesn't make any sense. "

"If you look closely at his argument, it doesn't quite support that," Chris says. "For example, while he makes the statement that it is difficult to tie the animal protein intake to the incidence of cancer in the China study, all blood markers of animal protein, however, were associated with cancer.

… [then] you have to follow a footnote at the back of the book. You'll find that buried in this footnote, he lists several biomarkers, such as plasma copper and some hormones, that are the supposed links between animal protein intake and cancer.

But the fundamental fact is that animal protein intake itself wasn't associated with cancer, and all of these biomarkers were very convoluted biomarkers.

He doesn't provide references showing that they're reliable, when in fact many of these things can be influenced by so many other things in the diet. For example, plant foods are a good source of copper."

Dr. Campbell disagrees that hypotheses generated from observational data must be tested experimentally:

"[H]e has described publicly, and in private to me… his viewpoint is that "if you have biological plausibility, then you can go out and test your hypothesis by making an observation."

The scientific method doesn't say that, but that's what Dr. Campbell apparently believes," Chris says.

In this case, not only has Campbell's hypothesis not been tested, but the connection he claims to have found doesn't even exist in the observational data!

Has a bunch of links as well. This one looks especially exhaustive (didnt read it) http://rawfoodsos.com/2010/07/07/the-china-study-fact-or-fallac/

 

[ch0mp]

There was a lot of drama around that book a few years ago.

http://rawfoodsos.com/2010/07/07/the-china-study-fact-or-fallac/

 

[Piecake]

What else can't they afford to eat that so many in the western world have readily available to them? Hmm...

OOO, OOO, i know!

Sugar!

 

[teh_pwn]

EDIT: a lot of you guys are already bashing the book. Can you explain what you find wrong with it? I want some info here

China Study does the following wrong:

1. Cherry picking studies to paint a portrait. Scientific method is specifically designed to do this exact opposite; ie you look for conflicting data. If it's found and you cannot explain it and it is repeatable, your hypothesis dies or evolves.
2. Drawling dubious conclusions, like casein in a vacuum promotes cancer, therefore all animal protein causes cancer. That's religious leaps of faith there. Whey in milk, which contains both whey and casein, is about equally anti-cancer.
3. China study's data relies heavily on dietary surveys, which are not reliable forms of data because of so many uncontrolled variables.
4. If you analyze China Study's data for what it is, there's a statistically significantly correlation with increased mortality and wheat consumption. Nothing for meat or vegetables.

http://rawfoodsos.com/category/china-study/

 

[Deleted member 17706]

Hmm, I will watch it then. My big focus isn't learning about what causes short-term weight loss, but whether certain means lead to long term health complications.

Mice are incredibly genetically close to humans, with similar bodily functions and enzymes, and there is a lot of correlation between what can be observed in mice and what can predicted in humans. Of course, yes, there can be some differences, so it is definitely open to some skepticism/criticism, but statistically it's a valid way to perform studies. The big problem is that you can control mice any way you want (ie: diet, living conditions, etc), but you can't control humans.

The initial studies I read were focused on the relationship between aflatoxin, liver cancer, and animal-based protein, first observed in the Philippines, and then verified with mice. From the findings, a large-scale project was established in China to determine the effects of nutrition on diet. You know how heart disease, cancer, and diabetes are huge problems in affluent countries like the US? They're practically non-existent in poorer places that can't afford to eat animal-based foods. Of course, those people have other health concerns to worry about (one town in the study had about 50% of the citizens infected with Hep B).

The book is The China Study, it's pretty cheap and you can read parts of it on google books. I'm not done with it, but I'd love for someone else to read it too cuz I love being able to discuss this kind of stuff, whether it's agreeing with it, ripping it apart, or making some insights.


EDIT: a lot of you guys are already bashing the book. Can you explain what you find wrong with it? I want some info here

Here's a decent roundup of 40 or so articles arguing against or debunking the study and its methodology, if you're up for some reading.

http://freetheanimal.com/2010/07/the-china-study-smackdown-roundup.html

 

[blame space]

I've been off bread for a while now and I'm losing weight without even changing anything else.

 

[RedCoyote]

Well, fair enough. Glad I actually got a response on that so quick. I picked up the book at the recommendation of a professor, whereas otherwise nobody I know can seem to provide any kind of real discussion aside from anecdotal stuff or fads. Like I said, I haven't finished reading it nor have I examined the data, but I dropped the name earlier in the thread and I didn't notice anyone respond so I figured that no one had even heard of it. I'll still read through it and look at the data though, along with those links you guys posted.

 

[b3b0p]

I would have agreed with this once (and blamed my lack of willpower for staying fat), but my recent experience says otherwise. Have you ever been obese, or even just properly overweight (as opposed to carrying a few extra pounds after Christmas)? It's probably different for different people, but i wonder if people who haven't struggled with their weight truly understand. I did the calorie counting and exercise thing for years, with little but frustration to show for it. Minimal weight loss, difficult to maintain, hungry all the damn time. Went on low carb (without counting calories, or even carbs, really, just avoided high carb foods and went for fatty foods and meat) and the weight just fell off. It was ridiculous. Sat at work during the first week one morning and it suddenly dawned on me - I wasn't remotely hungry, where normally by now I would've nailed my sandwiches and be considering a visit to the work canteen.

How in the world can you say this if you didn't count your calories to compare.

I cannot believe how naive people are in this thread. It's to the point of hilarity.

The low carb talibans. They believe because it agrees with what they want to hear.

 

[teh_pwn]

Well, fair enough. Glad I actually got a response on that so quick. I picked up the book at the recommendation of a professor, whereas otherwise nobody I know can seem to provide any kind of real discussion aside from anecdotal stuff or fads. Like I said, I haven't finished reading it nor have I examined the data, but I dropped the name earlier in the thread and I didn't notice anyone respond so I figured that no one had even heard of it. I'll still read through it and look at the data though, along with those links you guys posted.

I'm a believer in the food reward hypothesis, which isn't really known outside of research.
Part 1
Part 2

It fits everything that I've thought about, and employing it for fat loss has worked the fastest out of all methods

 

[BigWeather]

41, 6'6", 336lbs. I've got to fix that, a few years ago I got down to 290 (in college I was in the 210s) with lots of walking and basically starving myself but obviously that wasn't a healthy approach (well, the starving bit). A bit older and I have less time to walk, but this thread inspired me to give this approach a whirl.

Cutting carbs as much as possible, particularly cereal, sugar, etc. One thing I've got working against me is a busy wife and two busy teenage kids -- so we eat out quite a bit. Replaced my cereal breakfast (a large bowl) with eggs and bacon (from the cafe at work) and knocked out coffee (three cups a day, lots of sugar added), sweet tea, and soda -- just drink water and unsweetened tea. Choosing vegetables when available as well as grapes, berries, etc.

Just wanted to introduce myself. I'll try and post every once in a while with progress.

 

[blame space]

bigweather let's do this, together. big bros getting smaller.. we can do it.

 

[Prologue]

Been carefully studying epidemiological reports after reading some literature. From what I've gathered, the way to go is avoiding meat and diary altogether (or at least minimized), and consuming primarily a plant-based diet of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and legumes, etc., and of course, plenty of physical activity. Now, I've always been pretty active, lean, and healthy eating essentially the same stuff, but with diary, poultry, and fish in there too. The studies I've read, however, point that animal-based protein acts as a promoter to initiated cancer genes, causes a host of diseases such as heart disease, diabetes, osteoporosis, and generally makes you feel more tired. Basically, cut out the animal-based protein and fats altogether and you'll eliminate the risk of dying from the 3 main diseases in the western world.

This probably sounds nuts to some of you when there are so many recommendations for low-carb, high-protein diets, because it's essentially the exact opposite. I mean, you can get protein from plants anyway, getting it from animal-based sources allows your body to use it more readily (making it easier to get buff sooner), but you're gonna be running into so many other problems. A diet low in (animal) protein and high in useful carbohydrates, with plenty of activity, causes your body to turn most of those calories into heat instead of storing them as fat since you generate more brown adipose tissue.

How can you even bulk up in the gym without animal protein?

 

[opticalmace]

I read the first couple pages but figured I'd just ask:

Roughly how many carbs should a person be consuming? I'm not looking to go keto or anything (if that's what it's called), just something low-moderate. I am 28, and about 180lbs.

From my googling I was thinking maybe 50-100g? /new to this

 

[FryHole]

How in the world can you say this if you didn't count your calories to compare.

I cannot believe how naive people are in this thread. It's to the point of hilarity.

The low carb talibans. They believe because it agrees with what they want to hear.

Jesus, don't shit the bed, I'm just relating my experience, which was that I counted calories and lost very little weight while being constantly hungry, and on low carb I was never hungry and didn't need to count calories to lose weight. This is surely a bonus, no, that you don't need to dick around totting up numbers all day? I'm sure I took in less calories than I was expending - I don't see how that could be otherwise if I'm losing weight, and if you think I was saying I was eating like 4k calories a day and losing weight then read the post again. But it was easy, when other approaches weren't. They were saying that paying attention to what you eat is how you control weight - I was pointing out that it's not that simple for everyone, having paid attention to calories for a decade and had nothing to show for it.

 

[FryHole]

I read the first couple pages but figured I'd just ask:

Roughly how many carbs should a person be consuming? I'm not looking to go keto or anything (if that's what it's called), just something low-moderate. I am 28, and about 180lbs.

From my googling I was thinking maybe 50-100g? /new to this

Yeah anything under 100g is considered low carb, I think. A 'classic' low carb book went so far as to specify 72g as the sweet spot, god knows why.

 

[Mengy]

I was having breakfast this morning, using up the last of the cereal in the house, and drinking my daily glass of orange juice when a thought occurred to me:

What is everyone's opinion on orange juice with respect to insulin?


I know it's chock full of sugar, so I'm now thinking maybe I need to stop drinking orange juice every morning too...

 

[Dilly]

Isn't cereal full of sugar anyway?

 

[Dash27]

How in the world can you say this if you didn't count your calories to compare.

I cannot believe how naive people are in this thread. It's to the point of hilarity.

The low carb talibans. They believe because it agrees with what they want to hear.

Count calories to compare what? I think you are missing the point.

 

[Dash27]

I was having breakfast this morning, using up the last of the cereal in the house, and drinking my daily glass of orange juice when a thought occurred to me:

What is everyone's opinion on orange juice with respect to insulin?


I know it's chock full of sugar, so I'm now thinking maybe I need to stop drinking orange juice every morning too...

Fruit juice is not going to help you lose weight if that's the goal. It's all the sugar (fructose) of fruit without the fiber. I've mostly seen water and unsweetened tea as the go to drinks. I personally drink mostly water but a cup or two of tea with honey.

Every now and then I'll have a few sips of grape juice though, after a workout usually. Oh and sometimes milk with whey protein powder mixed in post workout.

 

[Violater]

What about oatmeal?

 

[Piecake]

I was having breakfast this morning, using up the last of the cereal in the house, and drinking my daily glass of orange juice when a thought occurred to me:

What is everyone's opinion on orange juice with respect to insulin?


I know it's chock full of sugar, so I'm now thinking maybe I need to stop drinking orange juice every morning too...

drinking your calories is the worst thing you can do, especially when basically every drink that has calories is pure sugar

What about oatmeal?

Better than cereal. I wouldnt consider it horrible, but its not good. You gota cut it though if you are going low carb and not just cutting grain and sugar. If you dont want to cook eggs, just go with plain, full fat greek yogurt and throw some fruit on top

 

[Septimius]

I was having breakfast this morning, using up the last of the cereal in the house, and drinking my daily glass of orange juice when a thought occurred to me:

What is everyone's opinion on orange juice with respect to insulin?


I know it's chock full of sugar, so I'm now thinking maybe I need to stop drinking orange juice every morning too...

Yes. You need top stop drinking orange juice. Just think about it. Why would you completely strip a fruit of all its healthy components, and then do the same as eating 4 oranges in 5 minutes?

Fructose does not increase the blood sugar in itself, so it does not trigger insulin. The problem is that fructose and glucose share the same transport cells. Fructose then preoccupies the cells that were to transport away the glucose, and like so, you have more glucose in your stream for longer if you also have fructose. This means you have higher blood sugar longer, and as so need more insulin.

So if you just drink a glass of juice, that's not causing anything on insulin. But if you eat bread and drink juice, or even worse, sugary cereals and drinking juice, then you're speeding up your road to insulin resistance by a lot.

Fructose in itself is actually not good for the body. There are tons of papers and youtube videos about HFCS (High Fructose Corn Syrup) and why fructose is bad - fructose is not directly used - it has to be processed by the liver. Normally, anything only the liver can process are things we call poisons. This doesn't go into the conflicting debates on low carbs or high carbs. It's just plain not good.

Juice is not good. Eat whole fruits.

 

[Mengy]

Fruit juice is not going to help you lose weight if that's the goal. It's all the sugar (fructose) of fruit without the fiber. I've mostly seen water and unsweetened tea as the go to drinks. I personally drink mostly water but a cup or two of tea with honey.

Every now and then I'll have a few sips of grape juice though, after a workout usually. Oh and sometimes milk with whey protein powder mixed in post workout.

I drink mostly water, with a glass of orange juice every morning, and the very occasional glass of wine or a beer at night (only a few nights a month). I used to drink lots of milk too, but I began to think that dairy was giving me gas so I stopped all milk and started using almond milk on my cereal. However, after all the reading I've done in the past few weeks, I'm now wondering if the carbs in my diet are more to blame than the milk. I may actually try bringing milk back in with the low carbs and see how that works out.

 

[Septimius]

I drink mostly water, with a glass of orange juice every morning, and the very occasional glass of wine or a beer at night (only a few nights a month). I used to drink lots of milk too, but I began to think that dairy was giving me gas so I stopped all milk and started using almond milk on my cereal. However, after all the reading I've done in the past few weeks, I'm now wondering if the carbs in my diet are more to blame than the milk. I may actually try bringing milk back in with the low carbs and see how that works out.

Milk isn't for all adults. The pasteurized, homogenized milk isn't really made for adults. It could well be giving you gas. There a whole movement for raw milk.

But yeah, milk isn't unhealthy, lest it gives you discomfort. Juice is probably the worst thing you can drink that is generally perceived to be healthy. Juice isn't healthy.

 

[teeny]

Yes. You need top stop drinking orange juice. Just think about it. Why would you completely strip a fruit of all its healthy components, and then do the same as eating 4 oranges in 5 minutes?

Fructose does not increase the blood sugar in itself, so it does not trigger insulin. The problem is that fructose and glucose share the same transport cells. Fructose then preoccupies the cells that were to transport away the glucose, and like so, you have more glucose in your stream for longer if you also have fructose. This means you have higher blood sugar longer, and as so need more insulin.

So if you just drink a glass of juice, that's not causing anything on insulin. But if you eat bread and drink juice, or even worse, sugary cereals and drinking juice, then you're speeding up your road to insulin resistance by a lot.

Fructose in itself is actually not good for the body. There are tons of papers and youtube videos about HFCS (High Fructose Corn Syrup) and why fructose is bad - fructose is not directly used - it has to be processed by the liver. Normally, anything only the liver can process are things we call poisons. This doesn't go into the conflicting debates on low carbs or high carbs. It's just plain not good.

Juice is not good. Eat whole fruits.

You have scared me shitless. My girlfriend drinks almost nothing but orange juice and diet fizzy. She hates the way water tastes (yes, really), and doesn't like tea / any hot drinks. I'm going to use your post to try and shock her into drinking water consistently, at least.

Kind or crazy the bolded in your post is considered the go to breakfast by many people. I ate cereal and oj for years until I discovered how awesome eggs are.

 

[FryHole]

On the subject of fructose, this is an interesting read. Overall, Feinman is a low carber, but looks to care more than many about making accurate claims for its benefits and TEH EVILS of carbohydrates. Can't vouch for the accuracy of Feinman's own claims as I haven't got the necessary biochemistry, but interesting nonetheless.

http://rdfeinman.wordpress.com/2011...e-threat-of-fructophobia-and-the-opportunity/

fructose is not a toxin. It is a normal metabolite. If nothing else, your body makes a certain amount of fructose. Fructose, not music (the food of love), is the preferred fuel of sperm cells. Fructose formed in the eye can be a risk but its cause is generally very high glucose. Fructose is a carbohydrate and is metabolized in ways similar to, if different in detail, from glucose but the two are interconvertible — that is why the glycemic index of fructose is 20 and not zero.

 

[Septimius]

You have scared me shitless. My girlfriend drinks almost nothing but orange juice and diet fizzy. She hates the way water tastes (yes, really), and doesn't like tea / any hot drinks. I'm going to use your post to try and shock her into drinking water consistently, at least.

Kind or crazy the bolded in your post is considered the go to breakfast by many people. I ate cereal and oj for years until I discovered how awesome eggs are.

Yes, it's scary the way people think it's a healthy addition to your breakfast, when it's anything but. It's all the unhealthy parts of a fruit with barely none of the healthy parts. Sure, minerals can withstand stuff, but my understanding with vitamins are that they're so volatile that they decay within an hour after you make the juice. Anything you juice or press should be consumed right away, so something that's been on a shelf for a week really can't contain that much healthy stuff.

A tip for your girlfriend is half a lemon's worth of juice in a liter of water. My girlfriend loves it, and it's up there with water. It's even supported as a "cleansing drink" without that really meaning anything.

The problem is twofold, because not only does fructose in combination with other sugar increase the need for insulin, but fructose itself is dangerous.

I even found the documentary which goes into great detail about how much of a poison fructose really is:
Sugar - the bitter truth: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM

fructose is not a toxin. It is a normal metabolite. If nothing else, your body makes a certain amount of fructose. Fructose, not music (the food of love), is the preferred fuel of sperm cells. Fructose formed in the eye can be a risk but its cause is generally very high glucose. Fructose is a carbohydrate and is metabolized in ways similar to, if different in detail, from glucose but the two are interconvertible — that is why the glycemic index of fructose is 20 and not zero.

It is not metabolized in a similar way to glucose. Glucose can be used by mitochondria in every cell in the body. Fructose has to be processed by the liver to pyruvate, which goes to the mitochondria. A byproduct of which is xylulose-5-phosphate, which in turn activates de novo lipogenesis (making of new fat)

From Sugar - the bitter truth:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM&feature=player_detailpage#t=3641s

 

[plagiarize]

out of interest what do you guys make of weight watchers, which isn't calorie counting, and doesn't make you cut anything out of your diet? I know many people that had great success with it.