Diet and Nutrition

Thoughts as of November 2024 - subject to change as I learn more - feel free to poke holes, always happy to be corrected.

Many people over the past few years have asked me for tips and tricks about diet and nutrition. I have gone into detail with people on an individual basis over text/dm, on phone calls, or in person, but I felt it would be helpful for me and others to spell out some of my thoughts in greater detail.

This serves a dual benefit of forcing me to list out my thoughts and having something to point to for others to look into at their convenience. Also, over time it will be interesting with new studies and experiences to see how I revise my own beliefs

My advice to you

People often get annoyed with me when they ask a simple question about nutrition. “Is this good?” “Is this bad?” The answer is, it depends. Some will ask what brands of products that I use, and sure, I could tell someone to eat xyz food or use this supplement, but if you do not understand the reasoning behind the decision, then it is far more difficult to adapt or make changes - especially when new information comes out. The closest thing to general guidelines that I can offer would be to eat primarily minimally processed whole foods and prioritize protein consumption.

The biggest problem in all diets is adherence. Myriad studies over the years have indicated that the type of diet almost does not matter, as long as you stick to it. If you are in a calorie deficit, you will lose weight. Whether you are keto, vegan, carnivore, or only eat McDonald’s, as long as you eat below maintenance, you will be okay.

This seems like it is an admonition of those who struggle with diets (most people) in that it comes down to a lack of willpower. However, I do not think this is the case. I think people tend to set unrealistic goals for themselves. What I have seen (and done myself) is yo-yo dieting where I will go from extreme starvation for a chunk of time and then cancel that all out with a weekend of drinking and eating. Formulating a plan that you can stick to is what is most important in the long run.

The last general comment is on your environment. It is really difficult to eat minimally processed whole foods when you have the allure of ultra-processed ready-to-eat snacks all around you. Trust me, if you do not eat highly processed food for a few weeks (it will be tough!) you will not crave it as much. You just need to have the right foods and meals at the ready so that the choice is easy. Meal prepping so you have cooked up meats and vegetables is a game changer. Also having fruit available is helpful for your sweet tooth. If you try to mostly avoid processed sugar, an apple will taste like candy. But then you have one oreo and it lights up your entire brain like cocaine and you eat a full sleeve (or package in my case) and there goes a week’s worth of good decisions.

In short:

• Generally, foods are not good or bad - it depends on your goals
• Create a plan you can stick to
• Set up your environment for success

Details broken down by different topics below

Calories - What are they?

Anyone who is serious about losing weight has probably heard the calories in vs. calories out discussion. By and large, I think that this is correct due to the laws of thermodynamics. It does not so much matter what diet you choose as long as you are intellectually honest and are burning more calories than you ingest.

Calories are essentially just a unit of energy. More specifically, “the amount of heat required at a pressure of one atmosphere to raise the temperature of one gram of water one degree Celsius that is equal to about 4.19 joules.” We are human beings, and so as long as we are alive, we need some amount of energy in order to stay alive.

Burning Calories - BMR

Okay, so you understand that you have to ingest more calories than you burn in order to gain weight, and ingest less calories than you burn in order to lose weight. There are a lot of debates about how accurate calorie tracking truly is, and so you have to take everything with a grain of salt and approximate with error bars included.

Generally, what I have done is look at a BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) and then back into my calorie needs from there. Your BMR is “the amount of energy needed while resting in a temperate environment when the digestive system is inactive. It is the equivalent of figuring out how much gas an idle car consumes while parked. In such a state, energy will be used only to maintain vital organs, which include the heart, brain, kidneys, nervous system, intestines, liver, lungs, sex organs, muscles, and skin. For most people, upwards of ~70% of total energy (calories) burned each day is due to upkeep. Physical activity makes up ~20% of expenditure and ~10% is used for the digestion of food, also known as thermogenesis.”

If you are like me, you probably did not realize that 70% of your caloric needs are simply spent not dying. The fact that blew my mind was learning how many calories chess grandmasters burn during a day of tournaments. Further, I learned why and how human brains developed over time and how that related to being in a caloric surplus. Thinking is calorically expensive and so was not evolutionarily advantageous until we reached a certain point of meeting other caloric needs. But I digress.

Using myself as an example and an online calculator, I can input my age, gender, height, and weight, and I get a BMR of 2,268 calories/day at the time of writing. The calculator then offers several other parameters for total caloric needs based on lifestyle - adding calories dependent on how active you are in your daily life. Using the exercise metrics given, I would guess very conservatively that my daily caloric needs would be in the 2,500-3,000 range.

You can evaluate each of these components with error bars and then testthem on yourself to see where you actually land. As an example, if you track calories for a month (and don’t lie to yourself), you will clearly see if you are in a deficit week to week, a surplus, or are at maintenance. If I eat an average of 3,000 calories per day over two weeks and am losing weight, it is likely that I undershot my caloric needs.

Another benefit of body recomposition is that muscle burns more calories than fat, i.e. it is metabolically expensive to maintain muscle mass. Your body just wants to survive and reproduce which means it would not want to have any more muscle than it absolutely needs in order to survive. My understanding is that the goal of strength training is to essentially convince your body that your daily life requires X amount of muscle and so your body diverts energy to building and maintaining muscle although it would prefer to store calories as fat.

Macros - What are they?

There are 3 macronutrients of food: carbs, fat, and protein. You essentially need all of them to survive, but most diets will flex up or down the ratios of each in order to achieve some goal. At different times I have focused on controlling the ratios to be within certain ranges, but these days I really just focus on protein and then let the rest fill in.

An interesting factoid is that there are essential proteins and essential fats, but no essential carbohydrates.

There are a lot of studies about how much protein you need and how much you can absorb at one time. By and large, I don’t think we really know the answer. But at this time, I think that the bulk of what I have seen points to somewhere between 0.7-1.2 grams of protein per pound of body weight. Some will say that is too much, some too little, some focus on how much lean mass you have etc. I really don’t care that much and believe the downsides to eating too much protein outweigh the downsides of eating too little.

For me, I try to eat at least my body weight in grams of protein each day. That is roughly 250 grams of protein in my diet every day. Carbs and Protein have 4 calories per gram. Fat has 9 calories per gram. If you look at any nutrition label, you should be able to add up the grams for each macronutrient and that should be the total number of calories in that food.

You may see that the total calories you calculate are less than the reported total, but this is due to things like fiber, certain sugar alcohols, and some other factors that your body does not digest being netted out. You will often see net carbs reported in the keto diet. Net carbs are total carbs minus fiber/other that is not digestible.

There are a lot of benefits I have heard for increasing protein intake. The thermic effect of protein is said to be greater than the other macronutrients, so the calories in a gram of protein may actually be less given it is partially offset. Proteins contain amino acids which are the building blocks of your body. You need adequate protein to maintain muscle mass.

The more you begin to track things and get an understanding of how the different macronutrients impact your physiology, the better equipped you will be to make your own dietary choices. As an example for me, I can feel the difference in my energy levels between eating a lot of carbs in a meal vs a lot of fat or protein. I know that if I eat a carb-heavy dinner I tend to fall asleep faster and have more energy in the mornings. If I am having a lull in the morning after working out and just having a protein shake, I recognize that I may need to have some additional carbs, etc.

My Personal Diet Thoughts

For my own diet, I mentioned I try to get 250 grams of protein per day (assuming I weigh 250 lbs), and it is better to eat more protein instead of less protein. 250 grams of protein is about 1000 calories, and so if my total diet is 2500 calories (this is assuming I am trying to lose weight and is based on the BMR + exercise expenditure above) then that means that 1000/2500=40% of my calories should come from protein.

This is an easy rule of thumb when making diet decisions because I have to make choices such that my total caloric intake of the day is on the order of 40% protein. Given a gram of protein is 4 calories, that means that I should average foods with a 1g of protein per 10 calorie ratio, or 10g per 100 calories.

Obviously, all of my meals will not be exactly at that range, but I mentally have an understanding that if I drink a protein shake that is 25g of protein and 120 calories (~83% protein) then I will have a buffer for another meal or snack of say an apple which would be something like 100 calories all coming from carbs. Therefore, if my diet consisted of one serving of protein powder and one apple, I would be at 220 calories and 25 grams of protein (rule of thumb that 25 > 22) and therefore be above that ~40% target.

In designing meals or making choices throughout the day, I try to keep that in mind. Making chicken which is very high protein % wise (3.5oz serving, 165 calories, 31g of protein - 75% protein) can be paired with potatoes or some sauce which would be mostly carbs and thus get to a more balanced percentage. It is tough to consistently get >40% in most meals, especially when dining at restaurants or eating traditional meals, so I try to supplement with high protein options like protein powder or greek yogurt for intermittent snacks throughout the day.

I also realize that I am far more likely to undercount the amount of calories I eat in a day rather than overcount, and so try to be generous with my mental accounting of meals to allow for a margin of safety. I have put in my time on apps like myfitnesspal to understand roughly what different meals I often eat consist of, and so can usually approximate where I am at any given point in a day.

At the end of the day, I am not perfect and will indulge here and there. I also need to enjoy things so if I know I am going out to eat with friends or family, I will maybe pare back some meals earlier in the day or the day before if I am trying to be in a deficit. Generally speaking, most things are okay in moderation.

Once I hit my protein goal and have calories left over, I don’t mind eating ice cream or sweet treats. I know that those things will not fill me up and are extremely calorically dense, so I try to stay away from them for the most part.

Exercise

Continuing to use myself as an example, I think the 2,268 BMR plus some amount of exercise calories would get me to my total caloric burn. Given the blurb above that only 20% of calorie expenditure is due to exercise does not offer much hope for outworking a bad diet.

If you want to be humbled, just look at the nutrition facts on any piece of candy or cookie or cracker and then try to walk or exercise an equivalent amount to burn it off.

In terms of weight loss, I would probably break it down to 70% diet (how many calories you consume), 25% sleep, and then 5% exercise. You can work out 3 times a day for several hours and may burn a lot more calories, but it is probably not sustainable and will lead you to boomerang back and overeat/undersleep which is where the real needle movers are.

Fasting

What about fasting? I have tried intermittent fasting before and I think it was helpful at times. Now I am in a more steady state and try to stop eating by 8 pm each night. I also work out in the mornings fasted with just a bit of caffeine.

With any diet, as long as you are in a caloric deficit, then you will lose weight. I think it was easier when I was on a different schedule to limit to an 8 hour feeding window, but don’t need to do that now. I find that stopping eating around 8 pm each night helps me to get to sleep faster and also helps to reduce the temptations of late night snacking.

I came back to this section to update it after some more research into Time Restricted Eating (TRE). There are a lot of studies that point to the timing of eating being very important. Specifically in reading The Circadian Code, I learned that nearly every cell in our bodies has a circadian component. Eating is one of the few queues that massively can impact circadian rhythms. To the extent that it is possible with your schedule and the demands of life, beginning and stopping eating at similar times each day seems like it brings added benefits. Your body will start to queue certain hunger signals or energy levels if you train it in this way. Anecdotally I can say that this is my experience.

Tips and Tricks

Don’t Drink Calories

Pretty simple, just try to avoid drinking calories as much as possible. Black coffee, teas, seltzers, lots of water. Drinking a soda or a gatorade or even milk and sugar in coffee can very easily add up to 100s of calories and honestly is not doing much in terms of satiating your hunger. Soda companies know this and exploit the fact that our bodies are not as well equipped to queue satiety from liquids - i.e. you can drink a ton of calories and not feel full.

Water

Drink a lot of water! It is good for you and helps you think more clearly. I know a lot of people who are chronically dehydrated and forget to drink water. Drink a big glass before a meal to help make you feel full faster. Always have access to a water bottle or glass during the workday because it can be easy to forget to hydrate.

Caffeine

I was not a coffee drinker before starting my first job out of school. Due to my work schedule and meal timing, I found it helpful to drink coffee in the mornings. I typically work out first thing, do a protein shake afterward, and then stick to black coffee/espresso until lunchtime.

Caffeine helps to stave off hunger and cravings. I try to stop having caffeine by 1 pm based on my bedtime to avoid any issues with sleep. The half-life of caffeine is about 6 hours, so you can try to assess your tolerance and impact on sleep and then count down from your typical bedtime to determine when you should stop.

Salt

Salt is honestly a game-changer. An often overlooked part of hydrating is electrolytes. It is easy to remember when thinking about sports drinks or these different powders that have become popular on the market, but a super simple tip to help you retain water is consuming simple table salt.

A lot of hunger pangs throughout the day are actually just cravings for salt. You can even get headaches sometimes if you do not have enough salt in your diet. I have found when I get hungry and I know I should not be, or I start to get a mild headache/fog, literally sprinkling some salt in my mouth helps to reduce any hunger cravings I have until I actually need more food.

To my knowledge, unless you have issues with cholesterol, eating salt is not a bad thing. Especially if you are hydrating a lot, salt is a must in order to avoid trips to the bathroom. In my diet, there is not a lot of sodium with foods like oatmeal, yogurt, protein powder, and fruits/veggies. When I eat foods that should be salted, I tend to add extra if I have been particularly deficient during that day, and this helps to satiate me longer.

I have had a container of salt on my desk nearly since I started my job and have no plans of stopping anytime soon.

NEAT

Taking from Google search results, “Non-exercise activity thermogenesis (NEAT) is a term for the calories burned through movement that isn't exercise. NEAT can account for up to 30% of your daily calorie expenditure, and can be a larger contributor than exercise calories.”

This is basically movement throughout the day that is not explicitly exercise such as fidgeting while seated. Studies involving people who have a tough time putting on or keeping on weight found that NEAT was one of the largest contributors. It is very small in isolation, but over the course of a day can add up to several hundred calories burnt that would not have been burnt otherwise.

An issue with trying to artificially increase NEAT is that your body may compensate by being less naturally active during other parts of the day. I think it is good to try to increase activity overall, but being mindful of where you can add some additional movement throughout the day is a more important takeaway.

Alcohol

Honestly, alcohol sucks. I hate that it is pretty much the only way to engage socially from college onwards. Alcohol is so bad for sleep, recovery, and nearly everything and the benefits are some social lubrication. I think if bars served chocolate milk I would be much more inclined to go.

I think of alcohol as a necessary evil at least for now, but I try to mitigate the impact as much as possible. Whether it is eating a full meal before going out, restricting my total calories before a night of drinking, mixing in water/electrolytes during the night or before bed, or being intentional with the number of drinks I have in a night, the better you can prepare and plan, the better your outcome will be.

Let alone the impact of sleep, training, and general well-being the next day, another pernicious effect of alcohol usage is the eating habits on the day/night of drinking. After some drinks, it is much easier to eat a bunch of junk that is high-calorie and generally bad for you.

High Impact Snacks

Some foods are more helpful than others in maintaining a caloric deficit. Things like popcorn, jell-o, gum, seltzer, and potatoes help to keep me more full than things like chips or crackers which tend to just make me more hungry.

A perfect snack is something that I can eat a lot of and that will fill me up. A good example is rice cakes which are generally pretty low calorie but pretty high volume. I can eat a whole sleeve of rice cakes which would be something like 400 calories and that would probably be half of the calories of a sleeve of ritz crackers, yet I would feel far more full and satiated.

It is really important to try to design an environment that is conducive to your health goals which includes allowing for these types of high-impact snacks for when cravings inevitably strike that will not totally derail you from your goals.