It’s sort of like painting by numbers. Someone has done all of the hard work for you and all you have to do is follow along and reap the rewards.
So lets have a look at a list of five foods you should stock your shelves with.
1. Green Tea
Now before we get off on the wrong foot, i am going to say drinks count as a food. The calories definitely count, so I’m adding them to the list. But we want to add good ones, so it’s going to be green tea to kick things off. Antioxidants, increased metabolism and some calorie free fluid in the stomach is reason enough. By the way, when I say green tea, you will be buying bags or leaves not premade, sugar filled, pretend-to-be-healthy drinks.
2. Pistachios
As my daughter calls the, “the ones with the shell.” A couple of good reasons to eat these is that they taste pretty good but you also have to shell them which means you won’t eat as many! They contain plenty of goodness, boosting your immune system and lowering your cholesterol.
3. Cinnamon
Now if you have ever said to me that you don’t like spicy foods, you will know that my reply will have been “you don’t like donuts then….?” Cinnamon is a spice, however is mostly used to sweeten foods. Adding some to your oats in the morning, adding it to a shake or even adding it to some steak will help to control your body’s post meal insulin spike. In simple terms, less energy slumps and less belly fat!
4. Spinach
Spinach goes with anything. Anything! You can have it raw, steamed, or my favourite new trick – blended into your shake. Now before you turn your nose up, let it be known that adding spinach to you shake will have ZERO affect on the taste of your shake. It will make it a bit greener and add a whole lot of nutrients but will not affect the taste at all. Don’t comment on this or share an opinion until you have tried it!
5. Beans
Beans, any variety, pretty much any way. The more organic and less sauce they come with the better, but adding beans to your diet will add a heap of fibre and help to suppress your appetite. They can be added to basically anything (notice how I said basically anything…don’t add them yo your shake and blame me!) salads, eggs, meat, curries, hommus or just by themselves.
A nice little trick when filling your shelves with good foods is to take away an equal amount of bad foods. If you cannot bring yourself to throw the bad foods out, eat it. Eat it all, now. Seriously.
You are eating well 80-90% of the time. You are getting all of the nutrients your body needs so that you can train hard, recover and train hard again.
The reward? A fit, strong, lean, sexy body!
But you want to let go. Every corner you turn there is an advertisement for some sort of processed junk food. Every page you turn in the newspaper, catalogue or magazine has a bright colored picture of the latest and greatest snack.
You want it, you’ve earned it and ……….the good news is that you can have it!
But before you have a free for all at the buffet and say ‘but James said it was alright!’ we gotta have some rules!
Call it what you will, a cheat meal (sounds negative), a structured re-feed (sounds too technical, and no fun) but the fact remains that there are some benefits from occasionally straying from the nutritional straight and narrow.
If you are restricting the amount of energy your body gets (ie dieting, calorie restriction, eating well) your body adapts to this decrease in energy by altering the levels of certain hormones resulting in an overall metabolic slowdown.
This would perhaps explain why when you start a ‘diet’ that it works for a week or two and then your progress stops.
The cheat meal or re-feed helps to reset these hormone levels back to their previous state so that your body will continue to burn more fat once you return to your proper eating plan.
What to eat. Well that’s pretty simple. Get the carbs moderate to high and keep your protein levels about the same as normal. You want to keep your fat intake under control here however.
So in real food terms you can have a go at those normally nasty starchy carbs, breads, pasta, rice, juice etc. Low fat pizzas and hamburgers will be alright here as well. Stay away from fried foods as they are going to be too high in carbs and fats together which is what we are trying to avoid.
If you are looking to keep the food choices as healthy as possible you can’t go past a heap of vegetables (grab the potatoes while you can), a heap of fruit and your berries as well.
Now that you know what to eat, you need to know how often. Somewhere between one meal and one day (all your meals for the day) per week will do the trick. You will find that this not only helps you to get that extra bit of fat off the body but will keep you focused in the days leading up to to the ‘cheating’.
All of the recipes I post here are generally the result of some trial and error. As you probably know by now, my number one rule when it comes to eating food is that it has to taste good. Gone are the days of holding your nose and dry reaching in an effort to eat well. Say no to bad tasting food and say yes to this next recipe!
Raspberry Blender Bomb
Ingredients
200ml almond milk
1/2 cup frozen raspberries
1/4 cup whole walnuts
1/4 cup banana protein powder
Now this is where it gets tricky. You have to put all of the ingredients into a blender and blast it for 30-60 seconds.
Maybe it’s not that tricky after all, so that means there are no excuses for not eating well.
It will come out like a raspberry sorbet, but if you leave it for a few minutes (or use thawed/fresh raspberries) it will be a great tropical drink.
This blender bomb is perfect as a snack between meals, or even as a desert. You are getting a nice hit of protein, good carbs, good fats, fibre and a heap of other nutrients.
I am always looking to find ways to add good fats, fibre and nutrients into my diet and nuts are a great way to do all three.
The thing with nuts though, is that it can be easy to over consume them and bump your daily calories up too high.
Enter almond meal, or any other nut meal really. (The best to work I have found are almonds, cashews, walnuts and hazelnuts)
It is very versatile and can be added to salads, used to make a paste (just add some seasoning and olive oil) for flavouring meat, thicken up your beef chili or even to add to your shakes.
You don’t need much as it works really well with other flavours.
Check out the video for a quick how to in the kitchen.
