Registered Dietitian and Mr. Metabolism himself, Matt O’Neil often answers common questions regarding 1. The importance of Protein, 2. Nutrient rich whole foods, 3. Dairy in your diet. and much much more!!

One of the most common questions I get asked as a trainer by far is what is the best fat loss diet!??  While noone should be fixated on a specific diet, we do need to monitor our Intake and ensure we are balancing all of our carbs, fats and proteins in the foods we consume. 

Matt does a great job at explaining amongst the three macronutrients why protein is very important to include in our daily diet. 

1) Protein is an appetite supressor.  Including lean sources of protein like Turkey/Chicken breast can help you feel full on protein.

2)  It costs more energy to digest protein and can therefore increase your metabolism.

Mr. Metabolism does warn that you can consume too many calories from protein, and if you are trying to watch your weight, those extra calories from protein can provide the chemical building blocks for fat in the  body.  So be careful!!  A portion of chicken/turkey should be no larger than the palm of your hand!

What else constitutes a healthy daily “diet”? An intake of foods that balances carbs, proteins and fats should have low glycemic index carbohydrates so they do not cause drastic spikes in blood sugar! A healthy intake of foods to promote weight loss or weight maintenance should also be high in fiber, include nuts and dairy!

I know lots of you out there who would exclude dairy from your diet for several different reasons.  (An intolerance or a sensitivity for example to lactose).  But for those of you who do not have an intolerance or sensitivity, dairy can help with weight loss.  In fact, Mr. Metabolism has shown that in some populations, people who eat the least amount of dairy tend to be the heaviest.  So not including dairy in your daily food intake could mean you are missing out on some fat burning properties!

So why do we need a healthy dose of fat in our diet??  Fat from fish oils, for example, have demonstrated in studies to decrease depression, improve brain and joint health and have been significant at contributing to fat loss.

So while we need to avoid those fad diets like the high fat diet, 30, 40, 30 diet (30 %protein, 40% carbs, 30% fats), atkins diet or a high carb diet, Matt is hopeful that the next big trend in nutrition will be one that is of nutrient rich whole foods because it will be more about balancing the 3 big macronutrients and instead of counting calories, we will make every calorie count!

I like Matt’s idea of “Nutritional Targeting”  as a way to optimize your diet and stick to it long term.  I recently gave out a link to a great way to track nutrition online. www.ontargetnutrition.com and this site is exactly what Mr.  Metabolism is referring to.  We should be setting targets for ourselves everyday.  A target of how much fruit/vegetables to eat, a target of protein per day and while we may not hit our target every day, if we think about our intake in targets and try to keep on track as best as possible, we will get closer and closer to the bulls-eye!

Ok so no dieting!! Let’s start making nutrition targets for ourselves daily.  And this can be done with anything.  Even water!! Oh I know, the majority of you can be drinking more water.  Let’s set a target to try to consume at least 1 – 2 litres of water per day. 

Stay on Target!

Exercise right, and have a great day!

Candice