In my mind, every successful fat loss meal is derived from 3 basic units of 1 ingredient foods and it looks like this.

• Protein
• Complex carb
• Vegetable

Now I would like you to ignore the macros, the calorie counting, the rage diets and consider the following meal…

Chicken (protein)
Rice (complex carb)
Broccoli (vegetable)

That is the FAT LOSS DNA BLUEPRINT RIGHT! The Holy Grail – the answer to the billion dollar health industry! All your meals (breakfast, lunch, and dinner) should be or look like this!

• Chicken.

• Rice.

• Broccoli.

All the people I know who are successful with weight loss adopt some form of the Chicken Rice Broccoli Blueprint.

P.s. If you are thinking about snacks. Add a snack only if you are hungry!

When you eat real food, such as the above, your calories are regulated. You get the vitamins you need so your cells can work efficiently. When your body gets the vitamins it needs, your appetite is regulated. You get the blood sugar balance you need so your insulin doesn’t spike…

Nature makes it easy. It is very hard to overeat when you are eating like this. Fat loss eating is that simple.

Here’s some more options:

• Eggs (protein)
• Potatoes (complex carb – not deep fried or cooked in canola oil, no ketchup)
• Peppers, mushrooms (vegetables)

Also known as an omelete – a fantastic breakfast option.

Or how bout this personal favourite:

• Steak
• Quinoa
• Asparagus

Or.

• Salmon
• Rice
• Kale

Or.

• Lean Ground Turkey
• Tortilla Wrap
• Loaded with sautéed veggies – No sauce!

Let’s do 1 more…

• Protein powder
• Steel cut oats
• Strawberries

There are lots of options to keep your meals from getting stagnant.

You can see that the last one doesn’t fit as perfectly as the others and thus is not as healthy for you. You can sub fruit for vegetables, but you want to be eating a ration of 5 vegetables to 1 fruit.

It’s unfortunate all this confusion about carbs. Everyone these days seems to be demonizing them and it is creating dysfunctional eating patterns. They are not the problem! (the healthy ones anyways)…

The problem is all the other terrible choices. If you are not eating bad food then it is ok to eat starches (potatoes, rice, etc), and fruit.

The truth – Most people are just not eating enough good food.

We are slaves to nutritional trends. We go thru it approximately every 10 years, where a new trend is the be-all-end-all solution to all weight loss problems. It works at the start but then it stops working, because we are restricting our body of something it needs!

It’s a cycle perpetuated by big business to earn more money. Start being wise to this!

It started in the 80’s with the low fat diets. Which actually marked the start of the obesity epidemic. See we stopped eating healthy fats and carb loaded. Not a great idea for fat loss… It messed with our blood sugar levels and we started eating food that really wasn’t even food – processed carbs and sugar.

Then to combat the carb problem in the 90’s the Atkins diet was introduced. We dumped the carbs, we lost weight, we lost muscle, we lowered our metabolism. It worked at the beginning, but anyone who reads these blogs knows that muscle is important for weight loss! The problem with low carb is it is not long term sustainable and long term it is not wise to keep your calories that low – a new problem – starvation mode.

In the 2000’s we had the boom of mock health foods aka supplements. Are they healthy for you or are they not? This one was full of intelligent business people taking advantage of people with all those organically labelled foods, made with whole grains, vitamin water, fat free…

Today, we’re all about excessive restriction. Gluten free, fruit makes you fat, vegan, paleo, raw food, intermittent fasting… We unnecessarily restrict foods because we think that is the answer. It perpetuates the dysfunctional eating pattern and doesn’t work.

Go back to the fundamentals.

• Chicken
• Rice
• Broccoli

And before I leave you, a note about carbs…

The amount of carbs is perhaps the most individualized aspect of nutrition, because some people respond better to lower amounts of carbs while others thrive on a balance approach. While I’m here to merely give you a guideline, I highly recommend that you tweak your carb servings according to your needs and how you feel. If you are exercising hard don’t skimp on the carbs, if you are having a lazy day, dont have them.

The trick is , it seems when we are dialed in to our workouts, we dont eat carbs, and when we are avoiding the gym (say on weekends, we eat like crap!)

A good starting point is 1 handful for women and two handfuls for men of a carb source at each meal.

And adjust from there to achieve your goals.

Committed to your success,
Josh Saunders
The Bootcamp Effect
Langley’s #1 Bootcamp as voted by the readers of the Langley Advance