Low carb, low fat, high protein, alternate day fasting, cutting out ultra processed food, eating multiple small meals a day, time restricted feeding, Keto, Paleo, you name it, what do they all have in common (besides energy balance)? They all rely on some variation of the 3 and only 3 ways to cut calories.

Although all diets claim to have their own “special secrets”, “magic recipes” and/or fancy narratives on how and why they work, they all use some combination of portion control, food frequency, and energy density to reduce the number of calories you eat each day.

We have 41 different well studied diet types, and yet, they all depend on just three calorie cutting methods. In today’s episode, The Nutrition Grouch discusses how to utilize these three strategies in establishing your nutrition rules and controlling your food environment to create a diet that you can stick to for the long term.

Only you can decide what to eat, when to eat, and how much to eat. There’s just too many variables and too many decisions to be made for someone else to tell you how to do it. It’s daunting and difficult to start. But it’s worth it. You get out, what you put into it. Take the time to start building a solid diet foundation today.

Some of the topics in today’s episode include:

• The 3 and only 3 ways to cut calories (1:50)
• Fad diets are a one trick pony (4:02)
• Fad diets: an overly crude and blunt instrument for a complex problem (4:43)
• People hate uncertainty, fad diets solve this (5:46)
• Food logging: you ate what you ate, big deal, please don’t take it personally (7:29)
• Fad diets are a “quick fix, get rich quick scheme” often ending in ruin (8:54)
• Should you build your house on sand or stone? (12:20)
• Fad diets are fool’s gold (13:30)
• The portion size, food frequency, and energy density of breakfast tacos (14:07)
• My reluctance to use reduced fat and/or artificially sweetened products (24:49)
• Food logging sucks but you have to do it (28:10)
• Weight loss should be psychology based, not math based (33:27)

Many of us have a nearly unlimited access to a wide variety of ultra-processed, highly palatable, energy dense food. And yet, most of us don’t gorge ourselves on these ultra processed foods at every waking moment like a bear in September. But why don’t we?

With the risk of oversimplification, I think that most of us have some level of restraint (outside of hunger and satiety, because we know that can be overridden) based upon an internal framework of what they should be eating and how much of that food or drink they should be consuming. Even the most uninhibited eater has his limits.

People have some level of reasoning and rationale behind what they eat and how much of it they eat. I call this reasoning and rationale your “nutrition rules”. Nutrition rules are self-imposed (somewhat) arbitrary boundaries that help guide your eating. Some people have extremely loose rules while others have very strict rules, but everyone has some set of rules, whether clearly defined or clear as mud.

I encourage you to make your own nutrition rules that fit your life and your goals, not someone else’s (i.e. a fad diet’s). Your nutrition rules should follow the golden rule of energy balance by limiting unnecessary calories from fat, carbohydrate, and snacks, while also allowing you to fully enjoy calories from fat, carbohydrate, and snacks. You just can’t be open to eating ALL OF THEM.

By establishing your own set of nutrition rules you’ll be able to automate and streamline your eating decisions, thus reducing your decision load (fatigue) throughout the day and freeing up more space to tackle some of the more pressing and important problems that you’re likely to encounter throughout your day.

Some of the topics in today’s episode include:

• How much weight can you lose on a diet, exercise, meds or surgery? (1:31)
• What is your dream weight, goal weight, happy weight, and acceptable weight? (2:46)
• The first weight loss conversation you need to have (6:17)
• Flooding the zone with bullshit (8:51)
• What are Nutrition Rules? (12:18)
• Nutrition Rules = Setting Boundaries = Self-Binding (13:58)
• Mostly positive, yet mixed reviews of James Clear’s book, Atomic Habits (14:44)
• Fad diets are based upon arbitrary nutrition rules (17:33)
• You can’t trust government scientists, but you can trust gurus? (18:32)
• Any diet that is not of your own making is a fad diet (20:48)
• The golden rule of nutrition (27:13)
• Design your nutrition rules to limit unnecessary excess calories (28:35)
• How I limit some fats and how that allows to me to enjoy other fats (29:12)
• How I limit some carbs and how that allows to me enjoy other carbs (31:36)
• My relationship with alcohol and snacks (36:19)
• Fad diets depend upon executing one rule exceptionally well, forever (42:52)
• I’m not against fad diets per se, but I am against fad diet magic (43:48)
• There’s 3 and only 3 ways to cut calories and 3 and only 3 ways to eat too many (47:10)
• What is decision fatigue? (48:28)

Weight loss conversations should start out like this: weight loss is a lot harder than you think it is and it is a lot harder than you’ve been told it is. You’re going to lose less weight than you think you should and you’re going to lose less weight than everyone has told you that you will lose.

Let’s set that all aside for a minute and talk about how much weight you can actually expect to lose on a diet and let’s talk about how much weight you can expect to lose by increasing your nutrition knowledge, exercise, diet and exercise, meal replacements, low calorie diets, very low calorie diets, intensive lifestyle modification, weight loss medications, and weight loss surgery.

Now that you know what you’re up against and what to expect, let’s see if you’re open to resetting your expectations and what method of weight loss (if any) you would like to commit to. Because if you decide to do it, you need to go “all in” and do it, that is if you want to be successful.

It’s going to take a considerable amount of effort, but it’s worth it. Start living by design, and not by default.

Some of the topics in today’s episode include:

• Who cares if you lose 14.6 lbs. or 12 lbs. on a diet, they’re both underwhelming (2:31)
• What really pisses me off about people being lied to (6:42))
• Even if you know it is too good to be true, it’s difficult to not fall for it (7:55)
• There’s no number of reviews, degrees, or testimonials to filter out the good from the bad (8:42)
• The weight loss doctor who didn’t want to “start a war” with me (9:40)
• Why I don’t really care about diets lasting less than 6 months (15:05)
• Weight loss success is really the study of weight maintenance, not weight loss (17:25)
• The first 3 months of a weight loss diet are EXTREMELY IMPORTANT!! (19:41)
• The “J” shaped or “flattened J shaped” weight loss curve that every diet follows (19:41)
• What a Rodney Atkins’ country song and weight loss have in common (22:26)
• The more restrictive and intense the diet, the greater the transition danger is (23:35)
• The 3500 calorie rule is not 100% fat loss, you lose lean tissue too (27:24)
• Weight loss is NOT linear, it’s just not that predictable (28:44)
• Why weight loss is expressed as a percentage and not as total pounds lost (29:57)
• Extreme variability in weight lost in dieting; why every diet can work and fail (32:14)
• The myth of finding “the right” diet for your body type or physiology (33:53)
• Finding “the right” diet type is not the same as playing the lottery (35:21)
• Live by design, not by default (35:59)
• Can knowing more about nutrition (education) help you lose weight? (36:49)
• How much weight can you lose through exercise? (39:14)
• How much weight can you lose on a diet? (43:09)
• How much weight can you lose through diet AND exercise? (44:15)
• How much weight can you lose with meal replacements? (45:45)
• How much weight can you lose with very low calorie diets (VLCDs)? (46:36)
• How much weight can you lose with intensive lifestyle modification? (46:36)
• How much weight can you lose with weight loss medications? (49:09)
• Is microdosing weight loss medications an effective strategy? (53:29)
• How much weight can you lose with bariatric surgery? (54:42)
• Summary of weight loss with diet, exercise, behavior modification, meds, and surgery (56:25)
• What is your dream weight, goal weight, happy weight, and acceptable weight? (58:15)
• If you have a lot of weight to lose, sorry to say it, but you might be screwed (1:03:12)
• Don’t give up, but you may want to change your expectations (1:03:21)

Diets aren’t sold with facts; they’re sold with testimonials. And the reason diets are sold this way, is because if you actually knew how little weight you were going to lose on a diet or how hard it would be to maintain your weight loss, you probably wouldn’t even bother. You would think the effort wasn’t worth the reward.

But when you’re told that you can easily lose 50 to 100 pounds, with relatively little effort, by changing just one thing (i.e., don’t eat carbs, don’t eat after 6pm, eat a big breakfast, have a “cheat day”), of course you’re going to try it out.

The problem is most people will never lose as much weight as they would like to or achieve their goal weight, losing weight is really hard, and losing weight takes a considerate amount of change (an entire lifestyle change) but no one wants to tell you that, because that’s not good for business.

In an effort to sell you a weight loss diet, people bend, twist, and contort the facts so much, that they’re essentially lying to you about the diet. Instead of lying to one another, let’s have an honest conversation about weight loss and chart a different path.

Some of the topics in today’s episode include:

• What people are lying to you about (0:16)
• 41 different diet types and the power of persuasion (4:38)
• The is no “best” diet: all diet types are created equally ineffective (5:06)
• Choosing a diet type based on your preferences doesn’t increase weight loss (5:56)
• People are okay with being lied to if it makes them feel good (8:55)
• Identity: when an attack on a fad diet is an attack on you! (10:53)
• Hard work equals success, right? (14:59)
• Why I’m a relative failure in the health & wellness industry (17:52)
• Social media and subject matter expertise are incompatible with one another (24:42)
• 41 different diet types and 80 types of diet interventions (29:54)
• The magic isn’t in the diet, it’s in the “process” (30:35)
• The list of the 80 different types of diet interventions (33:44)
• We’ve literally tried EVERYTHING!! Nothing is new, everything is recycled (36:51)
• All 41 diet types actually fit into just 8 different categories (38:26)
• Cultural rot and its effect on health (39:32)
• Don’t you dare challenge the almighty power of nutrition (45:20)
• The drastic difference between weight loss expectations and reality (46:15)
• Social media, the disconnected factoid and tidbit selling machine (49:01)
• The weight loss variation within any given diet is absolutely incredible (52:39)
• Fad diets, cults, and religion share so much in common (55:10)
• The myth of failing on a diet being your fault and not the diet’s fault (1:01:26)
• The myth of finding the “right” type of diet for you (1:02:38)

What do you spend your leisure time doing? Is it something you enjoy doing, or is it something you used to enjoy doing but are still doing it out of routine or habit? In today’s episode, Todd and Jeff discuss some of the things in their lives that just don’t really serve their health and happiness anymore, as well as some recent changes they have made to improve the quality of their lives. They also discuss some of their vices that they think make them happy, but in reality might be doing them more harm than good.

Some of the topics in today’s episode include:

• My system of eating and way of living has greatly evolved over the years (1:04)
• This episode’s inspiration, Seneca, On the Shortness of Life (6:36)
• What Todd spends too much time doing (wasting) (9:50)
• What you pay attention to in life has a profound effect on your happiness (10:56)
• What Jeff spends too much time doing (wasting) (11:41)
• What Jeff would like to be doing more of (14:14)
• What Todd needs to be doing more of (17:03)
• Something that Jeff has recently changed (19:18)
• Something that Todd has recently changed (23:54)
• Bad habits that Jeff has developed recently (31:49)
• Bad habits that Todd has developed recently (37:05)
• Why Jeff spends more time warming up than actually working out (42:28)
• What are some pleasurable activities that might actually make your life worse? (49:52)
• How many minutes a week does Jeff exercise? (1:01:25)
• Even experts need plans! (1:03:08)
• People don’t like being told what to do! (1:09:41)

Not all carbs are created equal, with some being better than others. But how can you tell? In part III of our miniseries on carbohydrates, The Nutrition Grouch reviews the nutrition epidemiology literature to discuss what types of carbohydrates you should be eating, based on the literature. Some answers are pretty straightforward, some are surprising, and others just don't make any sense at all.

Some of the topics in today's episode include:

• Carbs: nothing is “OFF LIMITS” (0:00)
• When it comes to food, variety is “not” the spice of life (0:36)
• A quick recap of our last two episodes on carbohydrates (7:06)
• Ultra-processed foods tend to contain carbs AND fats (9:30)
• Three types of scientific studies suggesting carbs do not turn to fat (11:59)
• Some carbs increase your risk of type II diabetes but so do some fats (15:09)
• Saturated fat and trans-fat increase your risk of developing type II diabetes (23:57)
• TV Dinners: Phase I weight loss for The Science of Dieting (25:46)
• Does eating dairy (saturated fat) cause type II diabetes? (28:20)
• A potential podcast episode: if I was an internet asshole (33:09)
• Reverse causality, ice cream, and Diet Coke (34:07)
• Ultra-processed cereals and their surprising protective superpower against diabetes (35:30)
• Should I eat low glycemic foods to prevent type II diabetes? (37:02)
• Fruit juice and the risk of developing diabetes (46:22)
• I thought fruits and veggies were supposed to be SUPERFOODS?! (46:55)
• Brown rice versus white rice, which is better? (48:46)
• Potatoes: apparently a hill that I will die on! (49:17)
• Nuts, coffee, and alcohol (52:27)
• Conclusion and beginning of final summary (52:53)
• Are whole grains really that good for you? (54:37)
• I want to go work for the cereal industry! (56:02)
• Bottom line recommendations (58:30)

In part II of our miniseries on carbohydrates, Jeff Burkart of Brave Chicken and I talk more about how in most cases carbs, are not only NOT harmful, but in many cases they're actually beneficial to you.

Some of the topics in today's episode include:

• Three ways science shows us that carbs do not make us fat (1:09)
• Does eating carbs cause you to develop type II diabetes? (3:13)
• What is BY FAR the GREATEST risk for developing type II diabetes? (10:23)
• Who really cares what you’re eating if you have obesity (14:09)
• Is it easier to avoid fat or carbohydrate? (26:56)
• A low fat diet should be low in fat AND carbs (29:15)
• Don’t waste your calories on unnecessary fat (30:35)
• Is it easy to get fats in your diet? (32:56)
• Is there ever a reason to justify eating pop tarts? (33:56)
• There are recommendations for carbs and protein, but not for fat (39:25)
• How Jeff formed his perspective on carbohydrates (41:33)
• If you don’t have fitness figured out by 35, you may want to hire someone (44:52)
• 80-90% of fitness is in the basics, try not to overcomplicate things (45:45)
• Jeff’s personal story of disordered eating (46:10)
• What Jeff’s first job out of college taught him (55:39)
• Eating carbs to lose weight? (57:13)
• Exercising in the “fat burning” zone is inefficient and time consuming (58:09)
• Performance isn’t just for Olympic athletes, it’s for you too! (1:00:57)
• Eating carbs to preserve performance during dieting (1:05:01)
• If you do any volume of training at a relatively high intensity, you need carbs (1:11:02)
• The “collective illusion” of carbs being bad for us (1:14:37)
• Todd’s theory on why people say that carbs are bad for us (1:18:17)

Most rational people realize that there are different varieties, types, and sources of carbohydrate. But the dialogue around carbs is not a rational one. We’re far more likely to hear about how carbs are bad, period. They make you fat. They give you diabetes. You shouldn’t be eating them. There’s just a blanket condemnation of an entire macronutrient without really knowing all that much about carbs.

In today’s episode The Nutrition Grouch explains what carbohydrates are, the difference between simple and complex carbs (there really isn’t), how carbs are digested, absorbed, and metabolized in the body, how carbs can be converted into fat but probably won’t make you fat, how energy balance and carbohydrate control fat burning, and what he looks for in a grain based carbohydrate product.

This podcast episode is jam packed with great information that hopefully can help you better understand carbohydrates, be a little less afraid of them, and maybe even learn to love them, guilt free.

Some of the topics in today’s episode include:

• Carbs weren’t the enemy for 99.999% of human existence (2:53)
• Hunter-gatherer diets varied greatly by region and availability (6:03)
• The saturated fat/cholesterol hypothesis of heart disease (9:03)
• Just say “NO” to saturated fat, says the American Heart Association (12:51)
• The low saturated fat diet became the “low fat” diet by mistake (14:23)
• If you don’t eat fat, you HAVE to eat carbs almost by default (15:22)
• Low fat diets should be low in fat AND low in carbs! (15:54)
• Along comes Dr. Atkins to turn diet advice on its head (17:03)
• How a high saturated fat diet can actually reduce heart disease risk (18:33)
• There isn’t just one type of saturated fat, there’s at least 10 in the diet (20:24)
• Not all saturated fats are bad and not all unsaturated fats are good (22:14)
• We tend to hate things we don’t know or understand (27:13)
• What do all carbohydrates ultimately become in the body? (28:15)
• Fat doesn’t control fat burning, carbs do! (29:14)
• The single unit sugars: the monosaccharides (31:25)
• More simple carbs, the disaccharides (32:38)
• Simple carbs (sugars) versus complex carbs (sugars) (32:56)
• The gut can only absorb monosaccharides, sorry di and poly (33:43)
• Glycogen is the storage form of carbohydrate in the animal (35:49)
• Will eating carbs make you fat? (37:23)
• How the body can convert carbs into fat (38:26)
• Energy balance, not fat, controls fat burning (40:10)
• Your inability to burn fat makes you fat (41:57)
• The oxidative hierarchy of nutrient metabolism (42:11)
• Carbs can turn to fat AFTER glycogen storage is maxed out (45:33)
• A calorie is a calorie is a calorie, the first law of thermodynamics (49:23)
• Fat and protein calories are not superior to carbohydrate calories (49:23)
• 32 controlled feeding studies, the nail in the coffin (Hall & Guo) (49:23)
• Macros DO NOT MATTER!!! (51:28)
• Is the ability to burn fat predictive of long term weight change? (54:08)
• The myth of choosing complex carbs over simple carbs (58:05)
• Less processed carbs have to be better for you than processed carbs, right? (58:53)
• Should I make my carb choices based upon the glycemic index? (59:19)
• What exactly are “added” sugars? Should I avoid them? (1:00:01)
• “0” added sugars don’t make a food healthy (1:02:55)
• There are no healthy desserts or indulgences (1:07:34)
• Two things I look for on a nutrition label (1:10:15)
• What food groups contain carbs? (1:13:30)
• Carbs are easy to produce at scale, that makes them cheap (1:15:36)
• Carbs: what are the take home messages? (1:19:46)