I Put All My Foods in a Blender, Cause It’s Healthier…

             “Oh my gosh can you believe that its almost swimsuit season again?  Ugh I’m so overweight!!! Why do the winter holidays all have such good food?” 

            “Because no one is wearing swimsuits” I laugh as Ally pokes her really rather non-existent roll of fat.

            “Why do they do this to us every year? Stuff us full and parade Victoria Secret’s bathing-suit line right in front of us! It’s cruel really.” Ally stops and scoops up more pasta “Why am I eating this? It’s only making things works.”

            “No idea” I giggle back.  Here she goes again, New Year new diet.  It’s gonna hit in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1

            “I need to go on a diet!” She exclaims “No more of this stuff! You know I’ve been reading about this liquid diet thing I think I’m gonna try that! It sounds pretty good just stick your food in a blender and away the pounds go.  Wanna do it with me”

            No.  It’s more than I just want to relish in my chubkin rolls just a little bit longer.  It’s that I have no desire to purely drink my diet.  What exactly is there to gain from liquefying your diet?  You only really lose all the fiber in your fruits in veggies and still keep all the sugars that make you gain weight.  Also, there is little room for natural protein and although many people do use yogurt and milk, a lot use powder protein instead.  Powder protein is highly processed which makes it generally not good for your body (keep in mind your body like thinks to have as little processing as possible).  Drinking your diet in general leaves a lot of room for holes and trying to fill them in will take you in a circle to the point where it really makes no difference whether you’re drinking your food or eating it.  Think about it what about a blender or juicer takes the fat out?  Nothing.  Fat is liquid at room temperature.  If you’re eating a good diet, drinking your diet isn’t going to change anything.  

The only thing I can really find that gives reason as to why a liquid diet works is because people on them generally consume less calories than they should which would be perfect if it weren’t for two key factors.  The first is that you aren’t getting the proper nutrients to sustain your body, so you become malnourished not healthy.  The second is that you miss out on the process of chewing your food.  Chewing your food not only uses a few minimal calories, but also kick starts your metabolism.  So we are back to square one, unless you have another medical issue where you can’t eat solids, balance your plate and chew your food slowly like your mother taught you.

            Well what about the liquid detox?  I mean after the holidays I have all those toxins from alcohol, artificial sweeteners, caffeine from coffee after dinner, and the smoke from Uncle George’s cigars that have built up and my body is pretty much the lake behind the power plant where Homer Simpson works in walking talking human form.  I mean a little lemon, a whole lot of water, some cayenne peppers for just a week, that’s not too bad, is it?

            Wrong, a liquid “detox” diet is just about one of the worst things you can do to your body.  Anytime you are depriving your body of the nutrients it needs, its bad news bears.  And while you are depriving your body of everything it uses to function, you are teaching your metabolism to slow by light years.  They funny thing is if you just take those “toxic” consumptions out of your life, your body has organs in place to detox yourself for you.  Within a few hours of you taking these toxins into your body, your lovely liver, kidneys, and gastrointestinal tract have already gotten to work and started removing those toxins out for you better than any amount of lemon and cayenne could.

            Now I have a friend, who is an avid detox diet girl and she raves about how after that horrible week of the detox, her body feels so much better.  Believers in the diet will tell you the same, but that rush of awesomeness that you feel after your detox week isn’t from the detox.  It’s your body’s natural way of thanking you for the nutrients you finally put in it.  We get this feeling of satisfaction all the time when we eat good things for us, but after a week of starving ourselves, we have forgotten a bit of what that feels like.  Also, those pounds you lost, will come right back, because you haven’t actually changed anything about your habits.

            So girls, don’t torture yourself, if you feel like you aren’t eating healthy enough, add some fruits and veggies and some solid protein.  If you can’t down a vegetable to save your life, sure go ahead make a smoothie where you have all your veggies with the fruit flavors to cover it up, but be sure to eat something solid with it.

Sources:

http://www.webmd.com/diet/liquid-diets

http://myfitnessmotivator.com/diets/liquid-diet-weight-loss-what-liquid-diet-plan-works/

http://www.webmd.com/diet/features/detox-diets-purging-myths?page=2

Egg Yolks and Other Deadly Sins that are Good for Your Health

           “Oh you had an egg white omelet? Those are so good for you!”  Wait, what? I thought looking at my friend.  I had just said that I had an omelet before my run that morning.  Nowhere had I mentioned getting rid of the yolk. 

“What? No just a normal omelet.”  I said staring sideways at my friend.

“Oh I thought you said you had a good nutritious breakfast of an omelet and they aren’t good for you if they aren’t only the eggs whites.”

“Really?” I said.

“Yea egg yolks are really bad for you.”  She said turning down the path to go to her class.  I boiled through my own class.  How horrible, all those years of my mother forcing me to eat the egg yolk and she was only doing it to torture me.  I called the moment I got out of class angry that I had been the victim of her sadist ways. 

You wanted me to be fat didn’t you mom?!  How could you force me to eat those vile yolks from every hardboiled egg at Easter!

Ok so maybe I didn’t quite approach her writhing in anger, because well she is my mother and when I run out of money I know exactly who I’m calling,  but I did confront her.  I’m really glad I did because that is when she told me a few secrets to life.  First, don’t believe everything your friends tell you especially when it has to do with dieting, do a little research yourself. And two, egg yolks are actually good for you.

 So, I decided to follow both pieces of advice and went back and did some research.  Turns out that although the yolk does contain most of the fat, it also contains all of the nutrients as well, if you eliminate the egg yolk, you are missing out on vitamin D, vitamin B, and iron which as a woman are all very important to your health.  Sure it contains fats and cholesterol as well, but it’s better to fill up on an egg yolk packed full of nutrients and fat than it is to chow down on carbs later in the day.

The problem isn’t just in egg yolks, as women we often tend to satanize some foods and glorify others.  The fact is, if it happened naturally (read wasn’t made in a twinki factory) than you can generally safely assume that it really isn’t all that bad for you.  The truth is that any food when you eat just that food isn’t going to give you everything you need, you need a full plate of different foods.  The more natural the better, but variation is best.  If you look and your cart and you see the exact same thing as what you bought last week, try taking it out, and try something new (take it out especially if it is processed food like Ramen noodles).  You can always get it again next week, but mixing it up is never a bad thing.

Of course some foods are better than others and for specifics on whether your apple is better for you than your orange you have to look at your own diet, what you need more of and use the magical powers of the internet *proceed with caution*.  However, if you don’t want to walk around your local grocery store with your iphone out and ready to research everything in your shopping cart and spending hours reading the backs of packages, I have a pretty useful rule of thumb “the darker it is the more nutrients it has.”  Think about it, blueberries are better for you than strawberries which are better for you then pineapples; dark bread is better than white bread;  red meats are jammed pack full of iron while their whiter counter parts lack; and do I even need to mention dark chocolate or red wines.  Now don’t go crazy although your dark chocolate maybe darker than blueberries that doesn’t mean anything, you have to stick with the same general food groups, and as my mom said do a little research when you can to keep you on track.  It doesn’t work on everything like your green gummy bear is no healthier than your yellow gummy bear, but in general rush to get back to our lives that exist outside the grocery store, it works.  Oh and look at that egg yolks are darker than egg whites.

Sources:

http://www.fitsugar.com/Egg-Whites-vs-Whole-Eggs-7291034