Nutrition – Page 5 – Beary Strong

Tips For Nailing Your Vacation Nutrition

Helping you to enjoy your vacation to the fullest while staying on track with your diet.

For me traveling is one of the most exciting and important things to do. I love seeing new places, learning about new cultures and eating delicious food. But traveling does put your nutrition goals at risk: most of the time you can’t control what you get served, how it is cooked or even if it has enough protein for you. Therefore I compiled some tips for you how to limit the damage and still enjoy your vacation to the fullest.

How To Quickstart A Successful Fat Loss Journey

A simple guide to fat loss.

Congratulations! You have made the choice to invest in your health: not only does losing fat make you look good naked but has also sustainable health benefits, as we already told you here, or for the science nerds here. Nevertheless, you may be overhelmed about the information available: What diet should I follow? Is it bad to eat carbs in the evening? Do I have to do cardio? Or go daily to the gym? To be honest, it is much easier than you think. Create a calorie deficit. How? We help you with some tips.

Cholesterol: Fact Or Fiction?

Physiology, regulation and health concerns.

This one is a really hot topic: is too much cholesterol bad or not? Make your own opinion by reading my short post and some of the references (linked) if you are particularly interested in the topic.

Sourdough Bread

…it’s easier than you think!

I love a nice loaf of bread, and I bet you do too. And my client Viola, who asked me for this recipe surely does so. Bread got a bad rep over the last decade, because it is easy to overconsume: good bread is really tasty, not very satieting and quitecalorie dense. But that’s not a problem if you are diligent with your tracking and if you have an overall healthy lifestyle with enough movement. People suffering from IBS sometimes react to several anti-nutrients found in higher dosage in wheat and other grains. Sourdough makes the bread more digestible and less prone to cause digestive issues because the microbiota “pre-digest” the anti-nutrients.

Caffeine: Tea Or Coffee For You?

Caffeine: the delicious drug.

Let’s talk about the non-scientific stuff first. I love both, tea and coffee. I have a cup of tea (caffeine-free roiboos) every day in the morning followed by a cold brew done with 100% Robusta coffee bean Sumatra Ascogo roasted at one of Vienna’s best coffee roasters (Kafferösterei Alt Wien). Once a week we have also our Forza Napoli with a high percentage of Robusta at Nicholas Franze’s cafe. Matcha scores also high on our favorites (check out Cha No Ma for gorgeous matcha, if you are in Vienna). But is caffeine ok in a healthy lifestyle? And, most important, how much?

Protein and Aminoacids

Building blocks and sources of protein.

Everyone needs protein. Period. It is not just the big muscular gym guy, also you sitting in the chair diligently doing your job or you, running a half-marathon or you, playing football. Why? Because proteins are the brickstones of our body, they are the catalysators (= enzymes) of our metabolism and are also fuel. After water (70%), proteins (18%) are the second main component of human cells. That’s why it may be worth considering adding more protein to your daily food, especially if you are getting serious about living a more active and healthy lifestyle.

What Drives Obesity

Know the Whys to make better decisions.

Gaining fat is really simple: your energy intake is greater than your energy expenditure. You just eat too damn much! Gaining so much fat, that you are actually classified as overweight or even obese, however is a task that takes a lot of consistency and time (and avoiding to look into the mirror). As many drastic changes, this doesn’t happen overnight. But why do you do this to your body?

Fats: Because Nutbutter Is Happyness

Basic biochemistry and functions.

But wait, fat makes me fat, right?! Now you should already know the answer: it’s all about the calorie deficit at the end of the day and like carbs, fats are neither good nor bad. Nevertheless, fat is really energy dense: 10 gramms of fat (approx. a tea spoon) have huge 90 kcals. This means that, you should not indulge in those tasty “healthy” low-carb-paleo-keto-raw-gluten free-vegan nut bars if you are trying to lose body fat ;). So what’s the deal with fats, now? Let’s have a closer look through the biochemist’s goggles.

The Fate of Macronutrients

A very simplified version of metabolism

Did you already read my first post about macros? If not, please do! In this post I will give you a very simplified insight what happens to the macronutrients in the body. I think this is necessary because there is still a lot of quackery around, demonizing macronutrients (like carbs) for some reason. Having some tools to understand what is behind metabolism may help get immune to it. If you do not want to read the whole article, here the spoiler: no matter if you are eating low carb, low fat or whatsoever, if you are in a calorie surplus, the body will start to store fat. If you want to know the why, read further.

Macronutrients

The major building blocks of food

The three major components of food are called macronutrients (“macros” for the pros) and they are: carbohydrates, fats and protein. What lies behind those terms? What are they exactly and where do we get them from? I will introduce them to you and later dedicate a separate blog post to each one of them. Now dear macros, the stage is yours!