Greetings!!! I hope
everyone had a safe Memorial Day weekend.
Let us make sure that we take the time to honor those who have served,
are currently serving and ESPECIALLY those that gave their life for our
freedom.
I always get asked "why do you do this for free?" Actually I want you to get great, honest and solid information. I do have a paid service, however I want you to understand that I am a credible source and that my methodology is solid. Bottom line is that with my recommendations you will reach your goals. For those that want to take it a step further and remove all of the guesswork, you can contact me for workout plans and nutritional advice for a fee.
A few weeks ago I put feelers out on Facebook on what would be a great article that you all wanted to read. Stephanie Stokes asked:
So in true Big Nerd fashion I decided to answer that
question. Now before I get into the
snacks let me give you a few facts that you might or might not know. Here is a calorie breakdown of your macro-nutrients by gram of proteins, carbohydrates, fats and alcohol (yes alcohol has calories,
lol). So when choosing your meals,
snacks or drinks you must first be mindful of what the nutritional breakdown of
the meal, snack or drink is. I usually
break mine down by what the substance has the most of. Sodas for example are seen by me as strictly
a carbohydrate source (and a sneaky one at that!). So let’s take a look at a nutrition label
from a soda can. On the left you will
see the current label and on the right you will see the proposed label the FDA
is trying to enforce to cut down on the math confusion. 
First you will notice that with the current label you have to add the ACTUAL servings of 2.5 to get the REAL total of calories and carbohydrates. In this fast paced world we now live in, most people just go with the raw numbers that they see on the bottle or package, totally forgetting to look at the servings per container. The FDA wants food companies to put the information on the container per container not per serving size. Now with what I just showed you about macro-nutrients you
will see that somehow the numbers don’t quite add up. I’m not saying that the soda companies are
lying, however I will say that they would have a good reason to low ball their
numbers, lol. If you have 78 grams of
carbohydrates and we now know that 1 gram of carbohydrates is equal to 4 calories,
the total calorie count SHOULD be 312 calories.
How they come up with 275 calories is anyone’s guess. I can totally understand that they don’t want
you to SEE that one can of soda is equal to almost 75%-90% of someone’s total daily calorie intake that is on a calorie restricted diet. I’m just sayin’, lol.
Ok, so enough nerd speak for now. BLUF (bottom line up front), choose your
snacks wisely. Remember in order to lose
weight you have to burn more calories than you take in. Also remember that the more lean muscle mass
you have the more calories your body will naturally burn. That is one of the reasons I am so big on the
resistance training aspect of fitness. I
noticed that the more muscle I had the leaner I happened to stay. The more muscle I built, the quicker the fat
came off. If you don’t believe me, try
it. Below you will find a few charts. One is to show you how the food you take in
impacts your ability to burn it off and the other is a chart that shows how
certain activities burn calories based on intensity.
Some of you may be like me. I hate cardio but I know it’s necessary for
heart health and a few other benefits. If you talk to most
bodybuilders and ask what their workout routine is they will give you metrics,
when you ask what they do for cardio most will respond with “I work out faster,
lol”. That in and of itself is another
article entirely.
Now to the meals. If
you look at my article Essentials (click here) I have a pretty solid breakdown of what a
meal for the layperson (read: normal people) should look like. Protein and carbohydrates and/or vegetables
should be included in every meal. One of
my favorite tricks to stay lean is to cut my carbohydrates to strictly
vegetables after a certain hour in my day.
My personal cut off is 4 pm. My
reason is that I usually wake up between 3:30am and 4:00am so I have not had
any carbs for about 12 hours. When I go
to work out or do my cardio I go straight to fat as my primary fuel source. Pre-competition bodybuilders, fitness competitors
and so on will have a TOTALLY different diet based on what their goals
are. Three solid recommendations up
front.
1. Eat 3
square meals a day about 4-5 hours apart.
I know this breaks convention and what you hear about the 5 -
6 meal theory but I have found that baby steps work best. Most people don’t even eat 3 well rounded
meals a day to begin with. So my recommendation
is to get the rhythm to eating 3 well-balanced, solid meals a day.
2. Once you
get used to eating 3 times a day about 4-5 hours apart, add a healthy snack
between them.
Meaning if you eat breakfast at 8am and lunch at noon then
put your snack at 10am. If you are
eating 3 times a day and working out, your body will tell you that you need
this anyway. Once your metabolism starts
to pick up you will find yourself hungry more often. This is usually the reason for the unhealthy
snacks from the vending machine. So
pre-plan for the snacks.
3. Turn your snacks into meals with the correct macro-nutrient content.
Once your metabolism gets all ramped up you will find that your “snacks”
will need to have even more substance.
Now you can just turn them into mid-meals. Making them with the same nutritional
breakdown as your primary or original 3 meals.
Now you are up to 5 meals a day.
The process in and of itself usually takes about a few weeks to a month
to come full circle. It really depends
on how active your day is, how hard you work out and how CONSISTENT your
schedule is.
My recommendations for healthy snacks:
Bumble Bee Fat Free Tuna
Salad Kit (with low-fat wheat crackers). Per kit: 150
calories, 1.5 g fat, 0.5 g saturated fat, 9 g protein, less than 1 g fiber, 580
mg sodium.
Quaker Instant Oatmeal Weight
Control Cinnamon, 8 packets per box ($2.50 to $4.89). Per packet: 160 calories, 3
g fat, 0.5 g saturated fat, 7 g protein, 6 g fiber, 270 mg sodium.
1 Laughing Cow Light Swiss Original wedge, 3 pieces Kavli
Crispy Thin (85 calories)
8 Shrimp and 4 Tbsp.
Cocktail Sauce
The perfect appetizer--and no one at the table will know you're counting calories.
The perfect appetizer--and no one at the table will know you're counting calories.
The crunchy texture keeps choppers busy, and tangy hummus feeds your need for comfort food.
1 1/4 oz. Turkey Jerky
when you must have meat, chew on this low-cal, low-fat power snack.
when you must have meat, chew on this low-cal, low-fat power snack.
1 cup Strawberries and 3 Tbsp.
Cool Whip Free
For a totally guiltless dessert, dish up a bowl of this sweet, fiber-rich combo.
For a totally guiltless dessert, dish up a bowl of this sweet, fiber-rich combo.
Fresh
Vegetables with Dressing
Slice a cucumber into strips and place on a plate with baby
carrots or baby corn. Dip in a lower-fat dressing, such as Annie's Naturals
Roasted Red Pepper Vinaigrette or Trader Joe's Carrot-Ginger.
Parmesan
Pita Crisps
Sprinkle 2 tablespoons of grated Parmesan evenly over a
4-inch whole-wheat pita. Dust pita with ¼ teaspoon dried oregano and broil
until the cheese browns. Cut into quarters.
Add smoked turkey breast meat from your deli for the perfect snack!
P28 High Protein Breads and Spreads
1
Slice of Bread with 2 tbsp. of spread 26 grams of protein, 18 grams of
carbohydrates
Now if I could only get (P28) to ship to HAWAII…….*Cough Cough*.
(I mean you already ship to APO’s…..I’m just sayin’!)
That’s just the tip of the iceberg as far as snacks go. I have a few links at the bottom to reference
and you can also google Healthy Snacks to find more than 200 ideas of what you
can munch on that won’t help add inches to your waistline! If you follow my 3 solid recommendations and go
back and view my presentation Essentials (click here), you will find everything
you need to get you on the right track from a nutritional aspect.
If you need any customized workouts or nutritional
information just contact me at bignerdnutrition@gmail.com
or if you just want to say hi you can email me as well. I love communicating with people!
As always……
Yours in Fitness and Health,
Aaron “K-Nine” Washington, CFT
Email: bignerdnutrition@gmail.com
Blog: http://bignerdnutrition.blogspot.com/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/BigNerdNutrition
Blog: http://bignerdnutrition.blogspot.com/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/BigNerdNutrition
Instagram: @Bignerdnutrition
Twitter: @BgNerdNutrition
Healthy Snack Websites and Sources:
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