Diet advice please.

touch · 5 Nov 2007 at 15:51

I'v finally decided that i need to lose the gut

I go to the gym quite a lot now, usually do 1-2 hours of cario-type stuff each day (bike, treadmill, cross-trainer and rowing) and i go rowing sat/sun.

Over the past week i'v tried my own diet which consists of:
Porridge - havnt set any limit, but usually 1-2 bowls/day
Fruit - A lot of fruit (apple, orange and banana, 3 per day)
Eggs - 2 eggs per day - usually poached on toast.

I made my diet based around what i had in my cupboards that looked healthy, so any suggestions/improvements would be much appreciated. Also, my mum thinks that i need a lot more protien. I had a read of some posts on here about quark and protien shakes, but im not sure what i need really.
Please help

chrissss · 5 Nov 2007 at 16:30

porridge is good, but musli is better. I ( when I was still thai boxing and when I had THE BODY) used to eat a bowl of musli, semi skinned with half a banana in it. ( depending on the banana size, either a small banana in my musli, or half a large one)
Musli has lots of different nuts, which contain healthy oils and fats which you will need to function.

Fruit is amazing. kep doing that. make sure you use different fruits to make sure you get enough vitamins and minerals of each kind.

Eggs: I wouldn't eat too many of them. some health studies say eggs are great, others say they have too many saturated fats. I usually eat One Hard boiled egg before I go to bed with one glass of milk. this regenerates your muscle with the slow and fast working protein.

Protein bars (if you can find some you like) are very good meal substitues. one bar can contain 20-30 grams of protein and only 200-300 calories.

Good snacks: raw vege (carrots are amazing raw and advocados are very good and full of healthy minerals) and nuts. Roasted vegetables are good in general, they are easy to make (peel them, cut them, in the oven for 15 minutes)

drink a lot of water: this increases your metabolism, and you will burn more calories.

for evening meals; try to eat more fish if you like it, because its a lot healthier than meat. if you like meat try to get low fat or lean meat. chicken is also good for a diet, just don't eat the fatty skin. Chicken breast is really good for diets.

Use olive oil instead of butter. olive oil has healthy oils and fats. It's a lot better than butter.

Tony soprano is a bad example, you should change your avatar to a thinner mafiosi to motivate you

A2Z · 5 Nov 2007 at 16:51

chrissss said:
for evening meals; try to eat more fish if you like it, because its a lot healthier than meat.

in what way?

chrissss · 5 Nov 2007 at 17:23

A2Z said:
in what way?

less fat, more protein, more minerals and healthy fats.

A2Z · 5 Nov 2007 at 19:16

chrissss said:
less fat, more healthy fats.

come again?

Morba · 5 Nov 2007 at 19:23

protein bars are horrible things to have if you are dieting!
much much better ways of getting the macronutrients that you need.

be careful about muesli, most named brands have lots of sugar in them.

do you know what is really good for you? lemon (peel included). eat lots of lemon.

chrissss · 5 Nov 2007 at 21:10

I forgot to mention an important part indeed, I always buy my muesly in a nature shop around the corner where I live. try not to buy the cheap tesco brands, they have lots of processed suplements in them which indeed aren't good for your diet.

same goes for protein bars, I buy organic bars because they are low is sugar, and high in protein. they cost £2 though, which is the downside

I wouldn't recommend buying cheap protein bars because they arent that good for you.

A2Z said:
come again?

there are different kind of fats. bad fats and good fats.

here is an article that explains it farely well:

http://goodfats.pamrotella.com/

this explains it all a lot better than I would.

Morba · 5 Nov 2007 at 22:18

chrissss said:
I forgot to mention an important part indeed, I always buy my muesly in a nature shop around the corner where I live. try not to buy the cheap tesco brands, they have lots of processed suplements in them which indeed aren't good for your diet.

same goes for protein bars, I buy organic bars because they are low is sugar, and high in protein. they cost £2 though, which is the downside
I wouldn't recommend buying cheap protein bars because they arent that good for you.

indeed, finding good muesli can be hard though if all you have is supermarkets near you. means buying the ingredients and making your own instead, which can mean its even healthier again

A2Z · 5 Nov 2007 at 22:35

chrissss said:
there are different kind of fats. bad fats and good fats.

here is an article that explains it farely well:

http://goodfats.pamrotella.com/

this explains it all a lot better than I would.

i know what fats are

i mean how exactly does that make it 'healthier' then meat?
since when does fish have more protein as well?
and since when does all meat have fat? how much fat is in a skinless piece of chicken/turkey?
and whats wrong with having some saturated fat in your diet?
what if I use Flax oil and fish oil caps and other sources of omega 3? should i still be eating oily fish because i need the 'good' fats?

of course oily fish is good to have in a diet, but saying its more 'healthier' then meat is..lol

chrissss · 6 Nov 2007 at 10:07

A2Z said:
i know what fats are

i mean how exactly does that make it 'healthier' then meat?
since when does fish have more protein as well?
and since when does all meat have fat? how much fat is in a skinless piece of chicken/turkey?
and whats wrong with having some saturated fat in your diet?
what if I use Flax oil and fish oil caps and other sources of omega 3? should i still be eating oily fish because i need the 'good' fats?

of course oily fish is good to have in a diet, but saying its more 'healthier' then meat is..lol

Well it's kind of a known fact that fish is a lot better than most meats. the meat industry is sick, and the fish industry is a lot better (except for the fact that fish are becoming extinct). Not all meat have lots of fat, but chicken isn't real meat. I mean, if you look at health magazines/studies, they always say; meat, fish and poultry. chicken doesnt have much fat in it, which is also why I said chicken is good for your diet.

Meat isn't that good anymore, aside from hormones, diseases, bacteria, antibiotics which can be found in meat nowadays, meat has more fat and calories which you don't need on a diet. The new cancer research concluded people should eat as less meat as they can, and always preferably lean meat.

I gues it also depends on your spendable income, I can't spend that much on food because I am a student, and fish is cheaper than healthy meat here, so I try to eat fish 2 times a week.

MTA99 · 6 Nov 2007 at 11:05

chrissss said:
Well it's kind of a known fact that fish is a lot better than most meats. the meat industry is sick, and the fish industry is a lot better (except for the fact that fish are becoming extinct). Not all meat have lots of fat, but chicken isn't real meat. I mean, if you look at health magazines/studies, they always say; meat, fish and poultry. chicken doesnt have much fat in it, which is also why I said chicken is good for your diet.

Meat isn't that good anymore, aside from hormones, diseases, bacteria, antibiotics which can be found in meat nowadays, meat has more fat and calories which you don't need on a diet. The new cancer research concluded people should eat as less meat as they can, and always preferably lean meat.

Meat industry = sick :confused:

Seriously what made you come to that conclusion? You realise fish can be farmed too? You realise the seas contain pollutants (heavy metals) that make their way through the food chain and back to us?

chrissss said:
I gues it also depends on your spendable income, I can't spend that much on food because I am a student, and fish is cheaper than healthy meat here, so I try to eat fish 2 times a week.

Fish is *so* much better than meat that you eat it *twice* a week! :rolleyes:

I don't even like fish and I eat it 3 times a week