A Very Simple Approach For The Very Simple

[neandrewthal]

Gatroenterologists HATE him. 31 year old dad discovers one weird trick to get more than 30 grams of fiber with no DISGUSTING whole wheat.

Highlight to see: Eat 500 grams of carbs per day (P.S. I'm not really a dad)

[FredM]

Otherwise I find the target kind of meaningless. It's pretty easy to get 30+g of fiber on nothing but whole grains when you're eating enough to not lose weight and lifting heavy weights. My rule instead is to have at least 3 fruits and/or vegetables. Usually that's an apple, a banana, and some baby carrots. The fruit is pretty easy because it works so well as a post and during workout snack.

Glad to see you've come to the dark side...and on the same day as me

Yup. I'm even running MM

Thanks again for the BBM log and pointing me here

[FredM]

The 30g+ of fiber is impossible for me. I understand the desire to eat high fiber foods, but I find that value just completely unreasonable. Even focusing on greens every meal, adding husk, and eating fiber gummies, it is still hard to get it that high. I gave up keeping fiber that high. Now my protein shakes taste less like sewage.

Is your daily calorie target 1,800 or something?

I don't track fiber anymore, but looking back at my fitness pal for the last 2 weeks -- there's maybe 3 days I didn't hit 30g. One day I hit 50g. My calories are at 2500-2700.

I hired Santana for a few months during my short stint on SSOC and the first macros he sent me included 70g of fiber -- which ended up being a typo rofl. But that was the only time I really tried to SUPPLEMENT with fiber, and I was getting 55-60g no problem.

So I'm not sure what you're doing. Choose the whole wheat or whole grain breads. Snack on some blueberries or raspberries (I add them to my protein shake for sugar and flavor). Have some oatmeal/whole grain cereal for breakfast. Replace your white rice with rice and beans, or something like Farro (my favorite). Blend some baby spinach in your protein shake (if you add berries, you will barely even taste it). Frankly you should probably be doing these things for the micronutrients other than fiber anyway.

[ChasingCurls69]

These fiber tips are top tier. I'm lucky to get 15-20g most days, even eating 400-500g of carbs.

[cwd]

Just do the *opposite* of Efferding's Velocity Diet.

I.e. he has elite massive lifters eating 10K calories/day mostly as steak and white rice. No beans, no apples, no cruciferous veggies, etc. He's trying to minimize fiber and gas so their guts have room for that much food.

For someone like me who eats < 3K calories/day, but still wants their belly to be full, every meal has stuff Efferding bans. Oats, apples, nuts, beans, cabbage, potatoes, berries, etc.

[mgil]

So I'm not sure what you're doing. Choose the whole wheat or whole grain breads. Snack on some blueberries or raspberries (I add them to my protein shake for sugar and flavor). Have some oatmeal/whole grain cereal for breakfast. Replace your white rice with rice and beans, or something like Farro (my favorite). Blend some baby spinach in your protein shake (if you add berries, you will barely even taste it). Frankly you should probably be doing these things for the micronutrients other than fiber anyway.

That’s basically my point in the OP.

Choose foods that do well with getting fiber with carbs and the need for macro counting diminishes.

[TimK]

So I'm not sure what you're doing. Choose the whole wheat or whole grain breads. Snack on some blueberries or raspberries (I add them to my protein shake for sugar and flavor). Have some oatmeal/whole grain cereal for breakfast. Replace your white rice with rice and beans, or something like Farro (my favorite). Blend some baby spinach in your protein shake (if you add berries, you will barely even taste it). Frankly you should probably be doing these things for the micronutrients other than fiber anyway.

That’s basically my point in the OP.

Choose foods that do well with getting fiber with carbs and the need for macro counting diminishes.

When I was a fat bastard I used to eat shitloads of high-fiber breads and cereals. I would eat a few slices of 15-grain hipster bread as a snack.

I don’t know, I think some people (me) will just overeat regardless of being restricted to certain types of foods. When I did keto for a while it was the same story, I still had to track total calories to actually lose weight.

[MPhelps]

Just do the *opposite* of Efferding's Velocity Diet.

I.e. he has elite massive lifters eating 10K calories/day mostly as steak and white rice. No beans, no apples, no cruciferous veggies, etc. He's trying to minimize fiber and gas so their guts have room for that much food.

For someone like me who eats < 3K calories/day, but still wants their belly to be full, every meal has stuff Efferding bans. Oats, apples, nuts, beans, cabbage, potatoes, berries, etc.

+1.

I get 50+ grams of fiber a day from eating beans and lentils, fruits and vegetables and whole grains. I Don't even try to get it in, because it's just there.

The meat diets like the vertical diet take out fiber because that volume of meat is way way over what anyone should be eating, so it causes extreme bloating and acidity. Then you blame fruits and vegetables, because sugar is bad and instantly turns to body fat, because that's how it works(/s). And seriously, to take diet advice from a powerlifter from an untested fed is playing with fire.

[OrderInChaos]

Just do the *opposite* of Efferding's Velocity Diet.

I.e. he has elite massive lifters eating 10K calories/day mostly as steak and white rice. No beans, no apples, no cruciferous veggies, etc. He's trying to minimize fiber and gas so their guts have room for that much food.

For someone like me who eats < 3K calories/day, but still wants their belly to be full, every meal has stuff Efferding bans. Oats, apples, nuts, beans, cabbage, potatoes, berries, etc.

+1.

I get 50+ grams of fiber a day from eating beans and lentils, fruits and vegetables and whole grains. I Don't even try to get it in, because it's just there.

The meat diets like the vertical diet take out fiber because that volume of meat is way way over what anyone should be eating, so it causes extreme bloating and acidity. Then you blame fruits and vegetables, because sugar is bad and instantly turns to body fat, because that's how it works(/s). And seriously, to take diet advice from a powerlifter from an untested fed is playing with fire.

Any thoughts on Rob Shaul's diet approach? (LINK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGs2tnMQJlc)
(Caveat: There's some hand-waviness but there's still a few extractable principles worth evaluating)

6 days a week eat "almost" Paleo/Keto (Meat/Veg/Fruits/Nuts/Some Cheese - No other dairy, grains, starches, potatoes, liquid cals)
1 day 'cheat a lot'

Not unlike @cwd's diet listed above, but more paleo/anti-carb ideology tied in. Also probably more carb restrictive and thus 'better for quick results for previously unrestricted dieters'.

@cwd, yours looks remarkably like The Slow Carb diet. Are you a six-pack billionaire yet, 4 hours in?

In greater seriousness; it seems to me there's value in ideas like the OP and above for 'busy working stiff Joes' who won't/can't take calorie/macro tracking to Israetel-Jordan levels of intensity. Those two both have similar hierarchies of how to start eating healthier, but it seems like for many a suggestion like Shaul's is less like to lead to dick stuck in ceiling fan. And beyond elevating quality of food eaten (85% of the time at least), there's also likely net calorie restriction 6 of 7 days compared to unrestricted eating. So it kind of hits the first to levels of Israetel's pyramid without forcing strict counting...

tl;dr - Any tips to overcome personal weakness and commit to track-and-count?

[MPhelps]

Absolute garbage. Carbs don't make you fat, the guy follows Gary taubes, and I'm not too into the civilian tactical guy schtick.

[TimK]

tl;dr - Any tips to overcome personal weakness and commit to track-and-count?

Just put MyFitnessPal on your phone and start doing it. It's really not difficult to track overall calories and protein. It's more complicated if you are trying to hit specific carb and fat numbers, but the good news is that you really don't need to do that.

If you have certain meals that you eat frequently you can add all the ingredients together and save them in the app as a single meal. 90% of the time my meals through the day are ones that I have saved and tracking takes me a total of maybe 2 minutes to do each day, if that. If you frequently eat a large variety of foods and it's always different from one day to the next it will take a little longer but still probably less than 10 minutes of your time in a given day.

If you go to a restaurant or whatever just estimate for the portion sizes, etc. It won't be perfect but it will be good enough to keep you on track and not blow your diet by having five plates of all-you-can-eat buffet. If you don't want to sit and search for stuff in the app while you're at the table with other people you can always just remember what you ate and enter it later, or take a photo of your plate if you don't trust your memory.

After you do it for a while it becomes like second nature and it's not a chore at all. I like tracking because it puts me in control of my diet and it gives me quality information to make adjustments to my food intake and keep progressing.

[cwd]

For someone like me who eats < 3K calories/day, but still wants their belly to be full, every meal has stuff Efferding bans. Oats, apples, nuts, beans, cabbage, potatoes, berries, etc.

cwd, yours looks remarkably like The Slow Carb diet. Are you a six-pack billionaire yet, 4 hours in?

That's not a cutting diet for me, that's how I eat all the time. Mostly because I like all that stuff.

I'm currently doing a MATADOR cut -- alternating 2 weeks of cutting and 2 weeks of maintenance. Goal is to get from about 23% bodyfat down to 15% or so before bulking again, w/o losing muscle.

So far, lost 6 lbs in the first cut, regained 1 in the maintenance phase. Starting the 2nd cut tomorrow. Strength has been stable to slightly up so far.

I'm too lazy to count calories, instead I'm counting "hungry hours". Sort of the RPE of dieting. I'm manipulating hunger by reducing portion sizes and holding training steady.

During a cut, I aim for 3-5 hours of uncomfortable hunger per day, mostly before lunch and before dinner. Not at bedtime, as I need to be able to sleep.

During maintenance it turns out I need about 1-3 hours of physical hunger. Not just "have munchies" hunger but rather "so hungry I'm restless and irritable". I can tolerate this level of hunger when I'm (a) not sleepy and (b) busy.

If I have 0 hours of hunger per day, that's a slow bulk

[OrderInChaos]

I'm too lazy to count calories, instead I'm counting "hungry hours". Sort of the RPE of dieting. I'm manipulating hunger by reducing portion sizes and holding training steady.

During a cut, I aim for 3-5 hours of uncomfortable hunger per day, mostly before lunch and before dinner. Not at bedtime, as I need to be able to sleep.

During maintenance it turns out I need about 1-3 hours of physical hunger. Not just "have munchies" hunger but rather "so hungry I'm restless and irritable". I can tolerate this level of hunger when I'm (a) not sleepy and (b) busy.

If I have 0 hours of hunger per day, that's a slow bulk

This sounds like an excellent proxy for some other unnamed, unknowable objective measure that is connected with fat loss Using subjectivity for concrete progress is the shit, man!

... If you frequently eat a large variety of foods and it's always different from one day to the next it will take a little longer but still probably less than 10 minutes of your time in a given day.
...tracking because it puts me in control of my diet and it gives me quality information to make adjustments to my food intake and keep progressing.

Okay, so your underlined point is a really compelling reason for me to actually track.

The bold/italics point is where I've ate shit before and find it extremely demotivating/confusing to get started. I posted in another thread here about "throwaway/free" vegetables/foods like celery, broccoli where the accuracy of measurement only matters in regards to fiber, or maybe if you need to keep carbs below X for ketosis/blah. It was to this point; it's easy to use the same protein per day (1.5lbs chicken thighs; .5lbs grd beef; 250g black beans), same starchy carbs (2C Cooked Rice = ~400kcal), but the veg alternates are an ass pain.

Honestly yours is just a really motivating, positive post for me to get off my ass with regard to tracking. I need not to let perfect become the enemy of good.

Thanks, dude!

Absolute garbage. Carbs don't make you fat, the guy follows Gary taubes, and I'm not too into the civilian tactical guy schtick.

Okay, pseudoscience and hand waving aside, is that diet actually absolute garbage? Like, if that were imposed on people in the "middle of the bell curve" of diet quality and below, do you think it would drive them further to the left, towards shit diet? That is, "hey eat this diet because it's simple, relatively inexpensive, has decent macro/micro balance and you don't have to track kcals or macros, you lazy bastards."

Carbohydrate sensitivity/metabolic syndrome/blah. It's pretty obvious in active, high-hormone youthful folks in most cases generous carbohydrate intake balanced with sufficient protein and net maintenance calories is fine. I find the claim 'carbs don't make you fat' to be a bit Egyptian when there's some decent research out where folks imposed into very low cal diets with drastically different macro spreads have such varying results.

Is that research bunk, or are you attacking the Gary Taubes level of generalization more than the idea that in specific populations, high GI carbohydrates should be restricted for optimal body composition outcomes rather than using calorie restriction alone with free/high-carb macros?

[MPhelps]

I would have to say that unless you are diabetic or have allergies to certain grains, that worrying about the glycemic index of a potato, bread or rice vs eating bacon eggs and sausage, coconut oil and macadamia nuts everyday like the low carb folks say is pretty much broscience. It's the idea that 'hey, i feel like shit after eating a sub with 3 slices of cheese, processed meat and mayonnaise along with a bag of potato chips...must be that big old baguette they put it on.' For instance, my keto bro friend ate like absolute crap before he went keto. Ate out everyday, processed meat, chips, maynaisse, fried food, diet mountain dew by the liter, never exercised, drank a lot, and was obese. Literally went to a a specialist for gluten intolerance...because broscience told him that bread is bad for him. Went keto, lost a bunch of weight by not eating buns with his McDonalds and skipping breakfast. So still eats like crap, but lost sone weight because of a calorie restriction. It's that wheat though, it'll get ya.

[DCM]

Just do the *opposite* of Efferding's Velocity Diet.

I.e. he has elite massive lifters eating 10K calories/day mostly as steak and white rice. No beans, no apples, no cruciferous veggies, etc. He's trying to minimize fiber and gas so their guts have room for that much food.

For someone like me who eats < 3K calories/day, but still wants their belly to be full, every meal has stuff Efferding bans. Oats, apples, nuts, beans, cabbage, potatoes, berries, etc.

+1.

I get 50+ grams of fiber a day from eating beans and lentils, fruits and vegetables and whole grains. I Don't even try to get it in, because it's just there.

The meat diets like the vertical diet take out fiber because that volume of meat is way way over what anyone should be eating, so it causes extreme bloating and acidity. Then you blame fruits and vegetables, because sugar is bad and instantly turns to body fat, because that's how it works(/s). And seriously, to take diet advice from a powerlifter from an untested fed is playing with fire.

Any thoughts on Rob Shaul's diet approach? (LINK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGs2tnMQJlc)
(Caveat: There's some hand-waviness but there's still a few extractable principles worth evaluating)

6 days a week eat "almost" Paleo/Keto (Meat/Veg/Fruits/Nuts/Some Cheese - No other dairy, grains, starches, potatoes, liquid cals)
1 day 'cheat a lot'

Not unlike @cwd's diet listed above, but more paleo/anti-carb ideology tied in. Also probably more carb restrictive and thus 'better for quick results for previously unrestricted dieters'.

@cwd, yours looks remarkably like The Slow Carb diet. Are you a six-pack billionaire yet, 4 hours in?

In greater seriousness; it seems to me there's value in ideas like the OP and above for 'busy working stiff Joes' who won't/can't take calorie/macro tracking to Israetel-Jordan levels of intensity. Those two both have similar hierarchies of how to start eating healthier, but it seems like for many a suggestion like Shaul's is less like to lead to dick stuck in ceiling fan. And beyond elevating quality of food eaten (85% of the time at least), there's also likely net calorie restriction 6 of 7 days compared to unrestricted eating. So it kind of hits the first to levels of Israetel's pyramid without forcing strict counting...

tl;dr - Any tips to overcome personal weakness and commit to track-and-count?

I think these semi-exclusion diets that offer you a day of cheating a week - whether it's the CarbNite diet, Rob Shaul's schtick or whatever - are shit because they have you feeling deprived for much of the week and then bingeing on crap the rest of the time. It's just not a sustainable approach, doesn't teach you how to feed yourself properly, stops you learning some basic bloody self-discipline, etc. I agree with with TimK: tracking really isn't that hard and puts you in control.

[Cinic]

I'm currently doing a MATADOR cut -- alternating 2 weeks of cutting and 2 weeks of maintenance. Goal is to get from about 23% bodyfat down to 15% or so before bulking again, w/o losing muscle.

So far, lost 6 lbs in the first cut, regained 1 in the maintenance phase. Starting the 2nd cut tomorrow. Strength has been stable to slightly up so far.

I'm too lazy to count calories, instead I'm counting "hungry hours". Sort of the RPE of dieting. I'm manipulating hunger by reducing portion sizes and holding training steady.

During a cut, I aim for 3-5 hours of uncomfortable hunger per day, mostly before lunch and before dinner. Not at bedtime, as I need to be able to sleep.

During maintenance it turns out I need about 1-3 hours of physical hunger. Not just "have munchies" hunger but rather "so hungry I'm restless and irritable". I can tolerate this level of hunger when I'm (a) not sleepy and (b) busy.

If I have 0 hours of hunger per day, that's a slow bulk

This is awesome. I learned from tracking that I need to be hungry to lose weight. But your hours above seem pretty damn comparable to my experience. Tracking hungry hours is a genius idea.

[JohnHelton]

I would have to say that unless you are diabetic or have allergies to certain grains, that worrying about the glycemic index of a potato, bread or rice vs eating bacon eggs and sausage, coconut oil and macadamia nuts everyday like the low carb folks say is pretty much broscience. It's the idea that 'hey, i feel like shit after eating a sub with 3 slices of cheese, processed meat and mayonnaise along with a bag of potato chips...must be that big old baguette they put it on.' For instance, my keto bro friend ate like absolute crap before he went keto. Ate out everyday, processed meat, chips, maynaisse, fried food, diet mountain dew by the liter, never exercised, drank a lot, and was obese. Literally went to a a specialist for gluten intolerance...because broscience told him that bread is bad for him. Went keto, lost a bunch of weight by not eating buns with his McDonalds and skipping breakfast. So still eats like crap, but lost sone weight because of a calorie restriction. It's that wheat though, it'll get ya.

I agree that eating high quality food is important. I also agree that calorie restriction is the key to losing weight. However, insulin resistance is also a real thing. It tends to get worse with age. I have had mine measured recently (LP-IR score), and it was considered high at 55. I also only have a 36" waist. So, it doesn't just relate to those with a 40+" waist. Given the insulin resistance, I tend to curb the carbs in general. I also don't feel hungry when I'm operating in a caloric deficit. That being said, I'm not religious about low carb. It is just a bit of habit at this point.

[cwd]

Thanks, @Cinic.

When I think of hunger as the sensation of fat being eaten away, it helps me stay on track.

After about 3 hours of being restless/irritable, I switch to being lethargic and stupid (and food-obsessed). That's not a good state, and doesn't seem to be necessary for me to lose weight.

I know many people's glucose regulation is all fucked up, and have a much harder time than I do. My wife can hit the lethargic/stupid phase even when at maintenance, and without being terribly hungry. Dieting must be much harder for those folks. Much respect to those who manage despite this.

[FredM]

Thanks, @Cinic.

When I think of hunger as the sensation of fat being eaten away, it helps me stay on track.

After about 3 hours of being restless/irritable, I switch to being lethargic and stupid (and food-obsessed). That's not a good state, and doesn't seem to be necessary for me to lose weight.

I know many people's glucose regulation is all fucked up, and have a much harder time than I do. My wife can hit the lethargic/stupid phase even when at maintenance, and without being terribly hungry. Dieting must be much harder for those folks. Much respect to those who manage despite this.

I found intermittent fasting to help tremendously with this. The best part is, a year after doing it for a couple of months I still am 1000x better at managing hunger.

Thanks for the counting hunger hours idea. Freaking love it.