Primal Eating

I have updated the «The Diet» page. I paste exactly the same thing I wrote there. Just to make a cheap post LOL 😉 No, really. People might see this post first, and it’s a good one. All the links aren’t displaying, but lok up! See «The Diet»  thing? Click on that, the same post is there but the links are working in there. Here I go:

 

What tha heck do you eat, anyway?

I follow the ways of «Primal Eating». It means, I choose to eat the way our ancestors ate many, many years ago.

50 years back from today, people actually fried and prepared food WITH FREACKING LARD. And not a single fuck was given those days about it.

200 years back from today, people actually made their own bread and pasta from SCRATCH.

About 7,000-10,000 years ago, people discovered that they could plant seeds and agriculture was born. We started to eat grains (wheat, barley, rice, etc.) and legumes as staple foods.

That’s 10,000 years! A long time, uh? But you’ll see, human beings (with our same DNA, not some weird ape-man Neanderthal thingy, but actual humans) have been around for… wait for it… 200,000 years ago!!! Meaning, we survived as a species for 190,000 years without eating grains and legumes regularly.

Let that one sink for a minute. For 95% of our history, we didn’t eat any grains or legumes regularly. No bread, no pasta, no rice. And once we started eating those (for only 5% of our recent history), several crappy staff started to happen, including growth retardation in children, decreased muscle and bone mass in adults, kidney stone formation, decaying of teeth, shorter people, etc). <— PubMed article. But, somehow, even as we grew sicker and sicker, you can still imagine healthy people 500 years ago (around the time that guy Columbus was alive), especially in America (the WHOLE America, americans. Not just you). Maybe the rest of the world was «healthy» too?

But then, we managed to screw things up even more. 200 years ago, we discovered the joys of INDUSTRY. And food started to be sold in a box. Candy was not a treat you baked for a birthday, it started to come in a bag, ready to grab, pay and eat. Then, some guys were not happy just selling soap and invented a Franken-oil. And that was about when the shit hit the fan.

We started to get fat as fuck and started dying like flies. Just a few years ago (looking at the big 200,000 years picture), scientists were FORCED to come up with an explanation and a plan. Politics, ya’ know. Some dude did a little manipulating of data (drama queen, needed attention) and bam! It was the fat all along! We blamed saturated fat (the exactly same fat that we were eating from animals since 200,000 fucking years ago ¬¬’ Are you fucking kidding me?) and we were told to eat a lot of new oils from veggies and flowers, and make the new-eats-from-the-last-5%-of-our-history (grains!) staple foods. The pyramid food was born.

Luckily, this worked like a charm. Today, everybody is healthy and thin and muscular and lives for 100 years. Epic fail, anyone?

Since things were getting worst and worst, scientists sit down and came up with a logical explanation. Their advice cannot be wrong, of course, so it had to be YOU. YOU weren’t listening. YOU are a pig AND a sloth. Their advice was perfect, but YOU are such a failure that can’t follow simple directions. You buy this crap, and keep tracking your calories, and follow the «My Plate» guidelines, eating your oatmeal for breakfast, doing aerobic exercise 20 minutes/3 times a week, but still you fail at losing fat. And feel miserable about it.

Is it your fault? Or is it theirs?

OPEN YOUR EYES.

What is this «Primal» non-sense, anyway? It’s about rewind time the best we can, and eat the foods we ate for the first 190,000 years of our history. And move/exercise the way we did back then. Doing this stuff has some terrible side effects, tho. Like you start to lose fat. You might even start to look good naked. You might got more energy. You might lose sight of your doc, since a lot diseases stop hanging around you. You also might become a zealot. And start lecturing people about the bread they’re eating. And give disapproval looks at other people’s plates. Did I mention start looking good naked?

I try to emulate that way of eating/exercising the best I can. I could never do it exactly that way. For example, bananas might not be the same bananas from 200,000 years ago. We have chosen some species, breed them to make them sweeter and yellower and stuff. Just about a couple of hundreds years ago, all carrots were PURPLE. Yes, purple. They weren’t very popular either. We grew them to be orange (even now, some carrots still have some purple around the leaves at the top, have you noticed that?) Back then, we would hunt a boar for 30-60 minutes, and then carry it to camp. And that was work. The rest of the day we pooped and fucked. Today, we got 9 hours workdays. We used to walk barefoot like a hobbit, we have shoes now (wonder what that does to our feet bone structure…).

Still, I got some slack. I do eat cake at birthdays, have some bread or pasta here and there, and I freacking love alcohol 🙂 But I do my best to eat primal every single day. What are my eats?

– Meat (chicken, beef, pork, ham, fish, soylent green) and a side salad.

-Meat and a stir-fry of veggies.

-Omelets, hard boiled eggs, scrambled eggs.

– Coffee, teas, water, sparkling water. Diet soda on special ocassions.

-Fruits, 1 piece or so everyday.

– Whey protein.

-Splash of whole milk on coffee, cream to coffee and meals, butter.

-Honey, sometimes. In beverages, desserts or dishes.

-Cheeses and nuts as condiments.

-Lard, olive oil, grapeseed oil.

-The ocassional potato.

That’s it, in a nutshell. If this is the first time you read anything like this, click all the links and read the websites <— specially this one. I’m here to answer your questions too. I think you just hit the jackpot.

 

January’s report

I’m going to try to make a summary of every month of everything fitness related from now on. So, for january, 2012:

– Vacation week was spectacular! Lots of sun, red skin LOL, and fun. But the eating was… not perfect. I did eat stuff with gluten, and rice, and potatoes. But… I managed to eat 2 times a day, wich I think it helped, and not every meal was non primal. Also, lots of walking and swimming. And dancing. And booze :$. And cheap carbs at the beach.  Somehow, even with not perfect eats, I managed to came home even leaner than I left my house 😀

– In the sun deparment, I took sunbaths all vacation week long, and then some other camping days during the weekends. I used 30 factor sunblock only in my tattooes, and in the rest of my skin a 15 factor oil SOMETIMES. Mainly, I was in the sun without anything on my skin. Yes, I got a little red, but not that much. Up to this day, still no skin cancer.

– Up to this year, young chileans (45 years old and younger) have really catched up with getting tattooed. Now, everybody has ink. I saw a lot of sleeves. But for some reason, the same heavily tattooed people made a «WTF!!!» face when they saw my piercings. One little girl, around 14 years old, just ask me at the beach as we crossed paths: «Did those hurt?» And I answered her with a smile «Those are nipple piercings. Of course they hurted like a bitch!» She laughed.

– Chin-ups are in a plateau. Or I feel a light workout to easy, or I can’t finish a harder one. I took a test yesterday, and I can do 11 consecutive, full ROM, slow chin-ups in 1 set. So I went back to the 20 pull ups program (but I’m doing it with chin-ups) and started another week for the 11 reps. It felt too easy. It’s like I can’t get this program right. Sigh.

– Push ups are a different story!! I did 100 ALMOST consecutive push ups yesterday!!! GO ME!! OK, I did took like, 5 rests. The first one was like, 2 seconds. Just a pause to get my mind right, at 45 push ups. Then another rest, maybe 4 secs. Then, another for 5 secs. The fifth rest was like 8 seconds. And then, I finished 100 push ups. WOW.

– And I’m getting really good at dips. Full body weight, triceps focused dips in parallel bars. Last workout I did 5 sets of 12-14-10-10-14 reps. Triceps were pumped to the point that I had a hard time getting the lock opened with my key at the locker room, because my whole arms were shacky. That’s a good sign.

– Also, I had a carb binge just two days ago. Cake as the offending item. Today, I ate right. Lots of meats, veggies and oops 2 servings of red wine. SOOO GOOOOOOD!!! And nowm enjoying beer 😀

So that’s for January. Next week I’m posting new progress pics! See ya there.-

Liberated

Today was an IF day, as in intermittent fasting. Meaning, my first meal (or breakfast, if you will) was at 7 PM. And since this as been going on for some time, it was EFFORTLESS.

I don’t count calories anymore. I already know that if I do the IF thing 1-2 times a week, there is just no effin’ way I can get over my calorie needs. I just dont bother counting anymore. I drank coffee and tea, black. I loved the coffee!! New bag, new brand, and now searching for the perfect coffee mill. Yeah, I didn’t eat food today, but I’m still freaking gourmet, ya’know.

I did some weight lifting still in fasted mode and just didn’t care about pre o post workouts meals. I know that the fast spikes the good hormones anyway, so when I ate 2 hours after my workout I.. just didn’t care about grams of proteinz and the like.

Suddenly, I do what my body tells me to do. If I feel thirsty, I drink water. If I’m hungry, I eat. If I’m not hungry, I don’t eat. If I really don’t feel like working out, I keep it short.

If I feel like yawing, I do too.

I don’t stress over high/low glycemic index foods anymore, or how I need to eat them (pre workout? Post workout?) I just don’t eat grains or potatoes or rice regularly. I give myself a slack in the weekends. I don’t stress about that either. I just keep my meals like meat+veggies+eggs+fats+fruits. Then, in the weekend, I eat something else. I don’t go overboard. I just… eat without worrying about it.

That’s the key. I do not worry anymore (most of the time) about working out or how I eat. Since I’m already slim now, progress is slower, but still present. Just… slower.

I don’t stress about it. Good things comes for those with patience.

Healthy guts: splenda and sauerkraut

I had been thinking about gut health for the last few days. Part of it is because the muscle building program I’m following, the Hollywood Physique. In this program, you’re suppose to have a «cleanse» before the actual exercise and eating program begins, in an attempt to aid (or better said, to fix) an impaired digestion and absorb better the different nutrients your body so desperately needs.

And of course, we all have heard about lactobacillus. You know, that healthy bacteria living in your guts, helping with digestion, nutrients’ absorption and killing evil bacteria. And, supposedly, it also helps you losing weight! I remember looooong ago seeing in the Discovery Channel how this bambi-looking  thingy (some sort of deer, I guess) actually ate his momma’s POO in order to get some of that bacteria into its system. Yeah, nasty stuff. Anyway, I’m not licking anybody’s poo to get some lactobacillus into MY system. Trust me, I got quite a handful of kinky fetishes, but that is NOT one of them!!!!!!!!!!

You can also buy yogurt  and other dairy products, but from what I read, most of the good bacteria is already dead by the time you actually eat it. There are some supplements on lactobacillus, but they’re more expensive than a sample of the Pope’s crap (yeah, Holy crap!) and the box only has 10 pills. So, for a month’s worth, I have to spend THREE LITTLE FORTUNES to get the pesky eff’ers in me. Not. Gonna. Happen.

OH! I I recently discovered Splenda kills the good bacteria in your guts. I was always afraid on googling «Splenda side effects» because I love the stuff. But I stumbled on the info and…. crap. So, since I’m an Splenda whore (probably getting the max amount permited every day!) I probably don’t have many lactobacillus in my guts right now. I mean, 5-6 cups of «something» a day with 5 tablets/25 drops of Splenda on EACH cup?

I began to worry when @YumYucky called it «Splenda-shit» in a tweet. Like I said, I didn’t want to actually google it and learn about the bad side of it. But I guessed that cutting down in the stuff was not a bad idea. I started to drink my teas Splenda-less. It took a while, but it is doable. The coffee was a different animal. I started to have it black just a few days ago, and amazingly I already adapted! The first cup was…ugh. Instant coffee. No sweetener. I had to tweet «Instant coffee with no splenda tastes like jockstrap water LOL». Man, it was like a tsunami of gay bots replying to me, I barely made it alive!!! (That’s the second word I banned from tweets, unless you want a bot tsunami. The first word to never tweet? IPad, duh)

Aaaaaaaaand that’s a rap on this post’s introduction. (Really, Rein, all that was just the intro? Yes, it was). I searched for a cheap way to get lactobacillus into my digestive system, and keep it paleo/primal friendly. Enter – I bet you guessed it from the title- sauerkraut! I found this sauerkraut recipe on one of my favorite paleo recipes sites, Paleodietlifestyle.com. And get more confident after watching this video on tha tube:

A few hours ago, I did the whole drill. Shredded half a cabbage, and set something like that video shows. Smaller tho, since I’m the only one who’s going to eat it, probably. Tune in next week, I’ll post the results and pics of what I did!

Paleo / Primal Lasagna

New recipe! I got to say, I stole the «egg noodles» idea from another site 😛 I learn it from Steve, he has an amazing blog with a lot of mind-blowing primal recipes. Go check him out at Primalocity!

I had the ingredients and the time to make everything from scratch, but feel free to substitute anything I used. Like canned tomatoes and the like.

Tomato Sauce

– 7 tomatoes, peeled and diced

– Spices (I used black pepper, dried basil, 1 small bay leaf, garlic powder, fresh oregano and hot pepper flakes).

– Salt and a bit of Stevia (or raw honey)

I just put everything to simmer in a small pot for like 40 minutes. Don’t make the same mistake I did and DO NOT cover with a lid!! This will help reduction and the sauce will came out a lot more thick than mine.

After 40 minutes the sauce will get a deeper red color. Take away the bay leaf and fresh oregano, and mash it with a potato masher for a chunky sauce, or put it in a food processor.

Meat & Mushrooms

– 1.5 pounds of ground beef

– 1 package mushrooms, chopped

It’s a no brainer. Heat your favorite pan and add some lard!

Add the meat and the mushrooms….

And cook until everything is… well, cooked. Salt, pepper and garlic powder it.

Reserve.

Veggies & Cream

– 1 small zuchinni, shredded

– 1 huge bag os spinach, chopped

– 4 Tbsp heavy cream

Your pan should have some juice from the meat you just cooked. Add a little bit more lard to it and then the zuchinni.

Then add the spinach. As you can see, I had a little problem in this step…

Don’t even try to stir! Just leave the mess alone to steam itself. It will go down after a few minutes.

Then add the cream, cook a little more and reserve.

The egg «noodles»

Now, for the real paleo heart of the recipe. How in Earth do you make lasagna without lasagna noodles???

– 6 eggs

– 6 Tbsp tap water

Whisk eggs and water together.

Heat the pan (again) with a little bit of fat. You only need to add fat once. Add about 3/4 cup of the batter. Since we added water, the «pancake» will be very very thin, just like we want!

Then, cut a cross with a spatula. You should end up with 4 triangles. Flip them.

After a few more seconds, take them out. Oh, you don’t need to flip them right. You can make a mess and end up with a bunch of small pieces of cooked eggs and it will be fine 😉  It’s fool-proof! Repeat with the rest of the batter. You’ll have something like this:

The Lasagna

Finally! Get some pyrex oven dish. Pour a little of the tomato sauce.

Then the «egg noodles». Now you can see why it doesn’t matter if you don’t get the triangles right. Just cut the pieces until you fill the area.

Then add a layer of meat and mushrooms…

Then more sauce…

Spinach & cream layer, and some shredded cheese…

Rinse and repeat as needed.

I bake it for about 50 minutes at 350ºF (180ºC). If you take my advice and cook the tomato sauce without the lid on, I’m guessing 40 minutes.

Enjoy!

Primal Stuffed Chicken Breasts (with broccoli)

I’m an ass. I purposedly cooked this dish to post it here, and took pics of the whole process. But I forgot to take a pic of the finished dish! *sight* Anyways, the first time I did this was an instant hit. The family didn’t even protested at the lack of potatoes or rice. It’s a winner! You’ll be making the meat and the side dish at the same time too, so there less mess to clean up afterwards!

Now, I understand that not all people reading this blog follows the Paleo/Primal lifestyle. But I do encourage «normal» folks to try this dishes once in a while. I’m not trying to convert anybody here,  but this is a very delicious savory meal to try. Not EVERY meal has to have starch, ya’know? Also, if you find the amount of monosaturated fat in the recipe threatening, please do uso EVOO or some «light» version of the ingredients I used. Heck, change whatever you want from the recipe =)

OK, so, how do you begin this things again? Oh right, the ingredients list (serves three hungry paleotards people):

– 3 chicken breasts (or one and a half? I mean, one whole chicken has 2 «half» breast, right? 3 of those).

– 1 cup of finely diced red bellpepper

– 3/4  cup creamcheese

– Bacon, a lot of it

– 2 Tbsp lard

– 1 whole big broccoli. I used some cauliflower as well because the broccoli I had was kind of small.

– Spices! I used garlic powder, fresh black pepper, cumin and salt.

The actual procedure (it takes about 1:30 hours, cooking included):

We’ll need those chicken breasts flat. We will want to roll them up as you would roll a carpet before storage it (or something like that). So take a big piece of plastic film, your favorite kitchen hammer (I bet they have another name but I don’t know it) and pound away.

The idea here isn’t making the breast super thin; it’s more about making it the same thickness all around. The plastic film protects the meat; otherwise you’ll end up with a lot of grounded chicken breast. You can reuse the same film for all the breasts.

Place the creamcheese in a microwave safe dish and nuke a minute or so, until tender. Add the bellpepper.

And mix.

Spread the stuffing into the chicken breast…

Roll them up the best you can (it doesn’t have to be perfect, will be putting more stuff on top anyway), and place them in a oven rack (I was using a toaster oven)

Then put the sliced bacon on top…

And place in the oven at medium heat.

Place the «cookie sheet» underneath it. The creamcheese will ooze. You’ll want to catch it on something.

Cut and wash your broccoli in big chunks (bigger than bite sizes). Pat dry.

In a mixing bowl, add 2 Tbsp of lard.

Add any spices you like, and mix.

Coat your veggies in the lard mixture..

And if you feel like it, get a real mess by mixing it with your hands!

And after the chicken has been roasting for 20 minutes, add the veggies in the cookie sheet. Mix well with any droppings from the chicken, and roast everything for another 40 minutes.

After that, just eat!

I scare the crap out of myself

OK, a little intro first. This community, the weigh loss/health community is mainly dominated by women. There, I said it. The men are minority. And the men who actually hit goal weight, yet keeps on blogging, are a minority inside the minority. And the men who struggle with muscle gain, BUT having our minds already fucked up by previous fat gains (we started blogging as fat dudes), are even less. I think I can count 4 guys like that in my reader. Me included.

So, you’re a dude.  You were fat, but you lost the extra weight. Now, time to bulk because non of us wants to be just skinny, we want to look more muscular as well. And to look muscular, you need to lift weights and eat a little bit above maintenance – or a lot above it. Just eat more, but don’t start to get fat again. Simple, on paper.

I had lost a lot of weight, and now I’m what a like to call a «Skinny Fuck». In my mind, my legs are normal; in the mirror, I see straws. In my mind, my arms are a little bigger than average; in the mirror, I have straws for arms. I have «Twiggy» written all over my face. I hate it. My height is 5′ 61» (1.71 meters) and weight 132 pounds (60 kilos first thing in the morning after peeing).

And still, yeah, I keep on weight training. I add one more rep almost every workout. I get stronger. A stronger skinny fuck.

But the idea of eating over my calorie «confort place» scares the living crap out of me. I’m skinny, yet I don’t own a pack of six abs. Maybe, if I flex, a some sort of 4-pack? So I’m torn between wanting to eat above maintanence for muscle gain, and wanting to undereat for fat loss. One day I feel on one team, the next I feel on the other team.

So, now that summer is almost over, I said fuck it. Let’s eat more, and exercise less. Yes, I said LESS. Less cardio, same weight lifting, more sleeping and naps. And let’s eat a lot, but real food, #primal foods. (Wait, did I just add a hashtag there? WTH?)

I had write this very same post before. Then, a few days later, I panick about growing a belly again and go back to low cal. I hope, the story doesn’t repeat itself. Stick to a plan other than low cal, goddammit!!

So the actual plan: weights 3 times per week. Bodycombat 1-2 times per week. Swimming 1-2 times per week, but not for calorie burning; only for technique purposes. Eat more than I do now, only real food. Meat, veggies, fats, fruit and eggs.

OK. Here I go.

Last swimming lesson

That’s a rap! We did a little bit of everything: kicking in the «sword» position, kicking with the belly up, swimming with props, etc.

I did good on everything except kicking facing up and arms making the sword position. I just sank. Like a «face up submarine». Well, not sank into the actual bottom. I was *so close* to be out of the water, just a few inches under it. Still, that’s not enough to breath in 😦

And what is the solution, according to my coach? R-E-L-A-X my arms. But I’m fucking drowning!!! I guess it comes down to a lot of practice….

Of actual crawl swimming I did 3 laps (to the other side and back) and the pool’s length it’s 25 meters. So that’s 0,15 kilometers!! Wait, why are you making that «confused gringo» face? Oh, I get it. Alright, alright!!! I’ll do it!! Sheeez! Wait a minute *goes to google* …  OK, that would be 500 feet. Not to shabby for the untrained 30 y/o smoker, huh?

The most important thing I learned with the lessons: I need to shut up «the voice»!!! You know the voice. The one that tells you «You need to stop!! You can’t do this anymore, just walk!!» when you’re running. The voice that tells you «You… can’t… lift this!!» at that last rep in the weight room. In the pool, the voice yells at you «Breath in every arm movement (Jeez, what’s the english word for the arm move?) or you’ll drown. OK, you are drowning!!! Stop and breathe! BREATHE!!!!»

But in reality, if you would make the same moves on land, it’s not really that demanding. A little kicking that you can do forever, and a little arm moves. Nothing fancy about 1 time breathing in, 3 times breathing out. You could probably do it for minutes and minutes until you need to stop for the muscle burn, not because of your breathing.But in the water, you feel like  it’s like a marathon condensed in a few seconds. Like your heart is going to beat off your chest, explode and live your lifeless corpse floating around in a pool of your own blood!!! That’s «the voice» trying to make you panic. That’s when you need to relax. That’s why you just need to practice.

Turns out that swimming, just like running, it’s tougher on your mind than on your body.

Oh well, after the class was over, the whole team (attendees and couch, and her boyfriend) went to a Chinese restaurant to celebrate. Wich gets me to my next point: Diet Hard 3: with a vengeance. I had been slacking off with what I eat. Eating way to much bad carbs. Just check my previous post. I little bread with butter here, french fries there… so, I’m getting late on the Paleo Challenge! Clean, good eating Paleo for the rest of January. If I couls eat those carbs and be OK, it would be fine. But I had been keeping my same level of exercise, plus added the swimming lessons, yet  the belly has grown. A little bit, I’m still a skinny fuck, but some fatty growth can be seen. So, that.

A salute to @Irun2BeFit, she’s starting to swim as well. This is her blog, BTW ;-D

Sweet Xmas!

Dude, I think I ate my house!

People came over my house for Christmas, and as the host, I decided I was going  to make the foods as Paleo-friendly as I could. I tried. I didn’t work out LOL

I did prepare Deviled Eggs (they were a hit!) and Chiken Wings. Oh and Sausage & Bell Peppers appetizers. But I also bought chips. And cake. And Christmas cookies. And milk chocolate with almonds. And I ATE. I also inhaled Turkey with Potato Salad. Oh, and rum. Lots of rum. I almonst became a pirate from all that rum – I certanly started to speak funny, pirate like, and had some walking issues after all that booze!-.

I ended up going to bed at the sweet time of 7 AM. Gosh. 4 hours later, I had to wake up for a trip to the in-laws. Worst. Hungover. Ever.

Over there, there was sugar time. More cookies. More potatoes. Fried goods. And more alcohol.

All that time, I just repeated to myself «It’s not about what you do one day, it’s how you stick to your goals the rest of the year». Yeah, I didn’t buy it either, still felt guilty while I shoved all that food down my throath! But now, it’s over. Well, until next Friday, when the party will continue 😛

So, today I’m back on track. I’m currently following the Paleo Diet 80% of the time, and also doing Eat Stop Eat, wich requieres me to just take a break from eating one or two times a week.

Ugh, just realized I have to pay my gym membership today… for the whole 2011. Dammit!

Pros and cons of Intermittent Fasting

In case you have no idea what Intermittent Fasting (IF) is, here’s a little remainder: there’s quite few ways to do it, but basically you fast for 16 hours – that includes the time you spent sleeping – and eat your meals in the 8 hours window you got left.

For example, you skip breakfast and lunch and start eating at 4 PM. Here you can go in two different ways: eat ALL your calories for the day (and that’s a lot of om nom nom’s, you can do this daily) until 12 AM; or just eat what you normally eat after 4 PM, resulting in a calorie deficit (just don’t do it every day, the «Eat Stop Eat» approach says do it 2 days per week).

So why on Earth would someone eat in this hippie way? Well..

THE PROS

– Insulin is kept at minimum during your fasted hours, resulting in the use of your body fat for energy. Insulin is highly anabolic (meaning «anabolic» as taking the chemical energy from food and transforming it into real tissue), so fat burning is impaired as long as insulin is high.

– You give your pancreas a rest during your fasting hours. This might be of extreme importance for diabetic people… Go check that link, insulin-dependent dude goes paleo and IF and keeps his diabetes without medication now. Interesting read!

– Insulin sensitivity goes high. That means that when you do eat, your pancreas need to work less to do the same job.

– Growth Hormone (HGH) goes high during the fasted state. This hormone helps to repair your body and build muscles. When 4 PM arrives, and you eat again, your body is on «give me the bricks to build muscles faster» mode on.

– During a fasted state, your sympathetic innervation gets more stimuli. Fat cells have that innervation. Do the math.

– Since all the blood that used to be in the digestive tract now has a break, circulation increases in other tissues. One reason why stubborn fat is stubborn, is its poor vascularity. Now you are able to take fatty acids away from those cells and into the bloodstream.

– And muscle tissue is spared during the fast (for more than 48 hours actually), provided that you are involved into some kind of resistance training regularly. If you don’t lift weights, I don’t know what happens. But still, we’re talking just 16 hours here.

OK, enough with boring biology. Plus, this guy explains it much better in this article than me and knows a lot more about it anyway. But there are some practical pros as well:

– I love to cook. But I don’t like to cook after I hit the gym, had dinner and all I want is to hit the hay. The day is over and you just want to chill or sleep or whatever, but you still need to cook your lunch and pack it, maybe breakfast too and pack it if you are like me, because if you don’t cook ahead you end up eating vending machine crap at work.

Doing IF I don’t need to cook or plan anymore. I won like 1 hour of time everyday.

– You get to eat lots of stuff that are banned in the «normal» way of eating. 5 strips of bacon and 4 whole eggs with 2 cups of whole, full fat milk and coffe for breakfast? No way, José, unless the breakfast is at 4 PM. You actually try to add more calories (as in extra bacon) just to meet you calories for the day.

– Also, you get to experience full, and I mean FULL errr… fullness. Like you binged big time, but when it comes down to calorie counting… you still need another 500 cal snack just to hit maintenance calories!

– Oh, and I use my lunch hour to take a full hour power nap at work =D

OK, OK, too good to be true. Everything that has a good, shiny side has a dark, evil side as well. Here are the cons from my point of view:

THE CONS

– You do get hungry while fasting. You miss lunch. You try to keep ocuppied or fool the guts with green tea and coffee and the like. It usually works like a charm, but sometimes it doesn’t. You’re never in real hunger pain, but it bites.

– It’s really hard to eat all your calories in just a few meals. There you have this yummy, high calorie, zero guilt feast in your plate but when you reach fullness, you still have like half your plate to eat. And you must force it down your throath. They say you get used to it and eventually like it. It’s getting easier for me, but I still struggle.

– I stopped eating lots of veggies and fruits. You just reach for high calorie density foods, so you can meet your target calories. I can’t afford to get full on spinach and not eating all the other stuff.

– You look great in the morning. Pants almost falls off if you don’t use a belt. You look thinner, and you have a smaller waist all day long… until you eat. Since you eat a lot of food in one sitting, I swear you go up one size of jeans automatically. You need to unbutton your pants after the «breakfast». Be warned, do not look at yourself in the mirror just to check on your «abs» after eating. After my meals, I look PREGNANT LOL. Sure, it comes down about an hour after but still…

So there you have it. Just another piece of info you can use (or not) while trying to make this puzzle all toghether. I’m not saying this is the only way that works. It’s just A WAY that’s is getting pretty popular right now, is based on science, and worth a shot. Maybe you might wanna skip breakfast and lunch if you have a fancy dinner in this Italian restaurant, or maybe start eating at 4PM if you know you’re gonna go out and have quite a few drinks. Or have some peace of mind when life get in the way and you skip a few meals and you go all nuts because you didn’t eat your proteinz and aminoz and teh bicepz are going all catabowlik. As everything in life, take it with a grain of salt =D