My Diet
What It Takes To Meet My Nutritional Goals
I have written a detailed nutrition entry every day for 12 weeks, 84 days about what I ate on that particular day. But my days in terms of nutrition were getting more and more boring by the day. Don’t misunderstand me, I’ve been enjoying what I’ve been eating but there was just not that much to write about in terms of interesting things relating to my nutrition. After almost 12 weeks into my transformation I thought I had gotten it down what it took to meet my goals. So I have added this page that should help anyone to put together a similar diet plan for themselves. My goals were pretty simple:
- Eat around 1,400 – 1,500 calories a day
- Eat around 140-150 grams of protein a day
- Eat enough food volume so I don’t feel hungry
These goals can be met the following way:
Breakfast: Having a good breakfast is very important. Your body just starts up from sleeping and reduced metabolism. Your brain starts to fire on all cylinders and you need energy to kick start your day. My breakfast choices have pretty much came down to two things:
- 6 oz nonfat yogurt, 1 oz nuts
- 3 eggs, 1 slice of whole wheat bread
The former is around 260 calories with 13.5 grams of protein the latter is around 300 calories with 24 grams of protein. The eggs are clearly the better choice in terms of protein but I like the cold and sweet taste of light vanilla yogurt in the morning not to mention it’s a lot easier to put a dollop of yogurt in a bowl than to scramble or cook eggs. You could also replace an egg with some bacon for the same calories but a bit less protein and more fat.
Lunch/Dinner: Lunch and dinner are pretty much the same and they usually consist grilled meat, a side of carbs and a side of veggies. I try to eat enough meat to get around 40 grams of protein in the meal while still staying around 400-450 calories.
It is easy to do with chicken and turkey as they are basically nothing but protein so you can eat a bunch of it and not worry about your calories because of the meat. 100 grams of raw chicken breast is only 110 calories and contains 23 grams of protein. So if you eat 7 ounces of it (196 grams) you just had 45 grams of protein and very little anything else. 45 grams of protein has 180 calories. 196 grams of chicken have 215 calories. It means you only get 35 calories from fats which is great. Turkey is not much different. It’s actually a bit leaner as it packs 111 calories into 100 grams but that contains 25 grams of protein. So your 7 oz of turkey will have 49 grams of protein in it and only 21 calories worth of fat. Great stuff. Another excellent choice is shrimp. It is very similar to chicken in terms of calories and protein content. As soon as you venture into fish and red meat the numbers are a bit tougher. Fish and red meat are higher in fat. A lot higher. While fish has unsaturated fats beef is full of the saturated stuff. At the amounts we’re talking about though beef is still acceptable choice for a healthy diet. It’s the cream sauces and cheese that you have to worry about and abandon if you want to eat a caloric deficit and still feel full. Because of the above I seldom eat red meat and even the healthier fatty fish. I try to stick with chicken, turkey and shrimp if I can. All my meats are either grilled, smoked or stewed in a pressure cooker with seasonings and hardly any oil.
For sides the choices are abundant. I prefer brown rice over white rice, it has a nicer crunchier texture that keeps your taste buds excited and you’ll enjoy the chewing more. At least I do. I also like jasmine rice, if my wife makes it I’ll eat it. Another good choice is sweet potatoes as long as you give up the cinnamon sugar. I also like quinoa. Quinoa is a seed and not a grain but it is very healthy with lots of protein. So you can get a lot of protein from your sides which is essential especially when you end up eating red meats and fish. Potatoes aren’t the root of all evil either as long as you don’t put butter and sour cream on it. A lot of people can’t imagine potatoes by themselves. I recommend you giving it a try and see how you like it. I like to season them up with a bit of chopped Italian parsley and t hey make a great side.
Vegetables are the last ingredient to a healthy low calorie meal. I eat them because they’re very filling for practically no calories. Any kind of vegetable, green beans, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots are excellent choices and they only contain around 25-30 calories per 3/4 cup. So you can eat as much as you want without feeling guilty about it. This stuff will fill you up no doubt. Sweet peas, black eyed peas, lentils are also good but they’re about twice to three times as calorie dense as the other vegetables so you have to be a bit more cautious with them. I buy the frozen vegetables by the bags then zap them in the microwave to get them steamed. Once you get used to them you’ll start enjoying their texture and taste without putting anything on them, not even salt.
I usually vary the side to vegetable ratio depending on how hungry I feel. If I’m not too hungry I’ll have more rice and less vegetables. It’s the same calories but more calorie dense so I can eat less of it. If I’m hungry I’ll have more veggies and less rice. That way I still get to eat a large volume of food yet not pack on the calories. If I eat red meat it’s definitely limited side and a lot of veggies to offset the extra calories from the fat in the meat. It might sound counterintuitive to eat more vegetables if you’re hungry but this method really works wonders with hunger.
Snack: For snack the choice is clear. 40 grams of protein from whey. There is really nothing else you can eat that is as palatable as whey protein shakes dissolved in water for a quick meal in the middle of the afternoon. You could always eat another 7 oz of chicken instead but I’m just not that big of a fan of chewing through meat at 4:00PM. Any kind of whey protein shake will do as long as you can stomach the taste. Some are chalky, some are full of Splenda and leave a terrible aftertaste in your mouth. Some are just plain nasty. I’m really not a fan of protein shakes and I wouldn’t drink them if I could get away with it. But I have to drink them if I want to keep my daily protein intake at my target level.
So let’s recap my daily food intake:
- Breakfast: 250-300 calories with 15-20 grams of protein
- Lunch: 400-500 calories with 40-50 grams of protein
- Snack: 200 calories with 40 grams of protein
- Dinner: 400-500 calories with 40-50 grams of protein
This diet keeps me where I want to be, it gives me a wide variety of foods that I can quickly prepare and enjoy without getting boring. Sure I had to give up pasta, cream sauces, milk and cheese but these are small sacrifices for a great diet plan that I can stick with for a long long time. I’ll get all the cheese and milk once I’m down to my target and get to switch over to maintenance with a higher calorie intake.