Local fitness enthusiast Jason Murphy remakes favorite meals of his youth into healthy dishes. See the full list of his recipes at www.mysaline.com/shirtless.
We all have to die of something – and other incredibly stupid things people say
Now that summer is coming at us full speed, the bandwagon I live on full time is starting to get crowded with people trying to drop some lb’s for the beach vacation or pool/lake days.
I myself cycle up a bit during the winter months on purpose, and cut back during the summer months. It’s almost impossible to build any muscle size without being in a calorie surplus, and with cold days lending itself to more inside time covered up with layers of bulky clothes, I use those months to pretty much stop tracking calories and build as much strength as possible.
I use intuitive eating during that time, relying on years now of counting calories to know about where I am for the day, and also using putting on real pants from time to time to make sure things aren’t getting out of hand. There’s a fine line between adding muscle and body fat – and closing in on 50 years of age, the body fat always wants to win that fight.
It’s pretty easy to eat during that time. Unfortunately, cutting that extra body fat for the summer requires two things I hate the most, tracking calories and math. Math and I just agree to disagree, and we do not get along. I have plenty of my son’s old 4th – 6th grade math tests where I helped him with problems to prove that fact.
Tracking calories will require you to look up how much a certain food has, weighing said food, and dividing and multiplying to figure out what you are eating. I’d like to tell you that this is not necessary, but everyone completely underestimates how many calories they eat in a day. It’s like asking a guy how big the fish he caught was or how long the drive off the tee box went… basically any (and I mean any) measurement a man tells you is going to be a lie by at least half.
Calories is the flip side of that, and the difference can be shocking. If you happen to snack on nuts, chips, or candy throughout the day, just actually track and measure it for a day. The results will stun you. People can be off by 1000 calories or more. There is nothing more disappointing than weighing out an actual serving of nuts on a kitchen scale.
I started my cut a few days ago, shooting to come down from about 2300 calories a day to 1750 a day, and tracking/measuring my food, I was probably eating more like 2700 calories a day, and that’s with years of practice. Writing down what you eat as you go and calculating calories is also very effective, especially when eating whole, unprocessed foods. The first 24 hours I dropped 3 lbs, then the next day 2 fell off without being very hungry at all.
Which brings me to the main key about cutting weight for the summer. If you are one that is really serious about using this time to get in shape, getting rid of processed foods and take out is critical. My daily cap of 1750 calories that I shoot to hit could be blown by one take out meal, which would leave me starving the rest of the day. The volume of food you can eat during the day vs the calories can be triple when comparing whole to processed foods.
Take my Jicama fries for instance. Standard french fries are 3.11 calories per gram. A large serving is around 154 grams, so that is 480 calories. Jicama sticks are around .379 calories per gram. A 154 gram serving of jicama fries would be just 58 calories by comparison. Also, anyone could down a large serving of fries without even a thought and be hungry for more, while a 154 gram serving of jicama fries would fill you up like you just ate a Thanksgiving meal with all the trimmings.
Back in my previous life, I could eat a full fast food meal with super-sized fries and a gallon of soda, and still feel hungry and crave dessert.
Empty calories can’t trick your body, it is still searching for something useful to use to repair cells and help the immune system. Eating whole foods means you will be getting much more protein, fiber, and healthy fats, which will fill you up and keep hunger at bay throughout the day. If you are used to eating mainly processed foods, you could cut your calories in half and actually feel fuller eating less food.
Salads are the same way. A fast food salad is a calorie bomb. A chicken salad can easily get over 1000 calories and the sodium content will be off the charts. My warm baby spinach chicken salad comes in at around 475 calories, leaving room for a side of jicama fries.
Cutting out processed foods and simple, refined carbs for natural whole foods is why I looked like this at 43:
And this at almost 50:
Even if you aren’t interested in losing weight, just overall health is a good reason to swap out the processed foods full of preservatives and man made chemicals for home made whole foods with natural ingredients. I’m not claiming it automatically adds years to your life, but what it does for sure is helps you to feel better while you are here.
A common push-back I get when people see the way I eat is “We all got to die from something,” but when those unfortunate moments in life happen where a friend or family member is diagnosed with a life threatening condition, that attitude quickly changes from flippant to very afraid and concerned.
We all pretend life is too long, until suddenly it’s not anymore. There’s no guarantee any of us aren’t a day away from a doctor telling us some bad news, no matter what or how we eat. The list of items that can affect our health that we are exposed to on a daily basis is too long and complicated to comprehend.
What I can say for sure is if you adopt this eating lifestyle and stick with it, you will feel better on a daily basis. I used to suffer from two to three head colds a year, the occasional fever/sickness that would last a week or so, and my gut health was so bad, every road trip or hike in the woods could at any time be a race to find a bathroom in time without losing a sock or cutting off a shirt tail in an emergency.
I literally have not had so much as a sore throat or a stuffy nose in the 6 years I’ve eaten this way. Why is that? It’s pretty simple. Our immune system is under constant attack not only by the amount of food we eat, but what’s in the food we eat. All those sugars and chemical additives stress our immune system to overload maximums, and it has no time to repair itself or pay attention to actual germs entering your body.
By reducing the amount of time it has to deal with breaking down those foods by cutting calories and limiting eating hours, and giving it foods that actually boost the immune system rather than attack it with inflammation, the germs that make you sick suddenly become Michael Spinks and your immune system is Mike Tyson.
Will you live forever? No. Will you feel better the days that you are here? Absolutely. Whether you search my back catalog of articles for recipes, create your own, or simply cut out fast food and restaurant meals, eating a little less and making the quality of the foods a little better can make a huge change in your daily energy and how you feel, and how you look if you care about such things.
If you are looking to make that change, just keep at it, take it one meal at a time, and don’t pay attention to the naysayers. You’ll find once you get the hang of it, it’s actually a more filling and tasty way to eat and live. Good luck!
See the list of all the Shirtless Chef recipes at www.mysaline.com/shirtless.
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