Foodist Page 9
DON’T FREAK OUT
The last thing I want to add here is that there is no need to freak out about any meal or ingredient. Our biology is amazingly resilient, and if there’s one consistent finding in the scientific literature on health and nutrition, it is that long-term dietary patterns are far more important than single foods or temporary deviations from your normal behavior. A splurge In-N-Out burger every now and then, so long as it doesn’t happen too regularly, is nothing to be ashamed of.* It is virtually impossible to avoid every carcinogenic molecule lurking in your food, but that doesn’t mean you’ll get cancer from a single bite. The best any of us can hope for is to minimize our exposure whenever possible (keeping in mind that there’s a good chance we don’t know what is and isn’t problematic) and try to maintain the healthy activities that seem to fight these diseases like eating fruits and vegetables, avoiding too much sugar, and getting enough exercise.
Similarly, do not be discouraged even if your average meal falls outside the range of what I suggest in my ideal Foodist’s Plate. Every meal does not have to be ideal, or even close to it, for you to be healthy and happy. The Foodist Plate is only intended as an aspirational goal for when everything is going right. If you do not have regular access to local, organic foods, do the best with what you have. Eating vegetables and fruits from any source (organic, local, or not) is better than not eating them at all. If wild-caught fish or pastured meats are unavailable in your area or are too expensive to be a regular part of your diet, that doesn’t condemn you to a lifetime of disease and excess belly fat. Maybe you’ll need to rely a little more on beans and lentils or have to eat farmed and canned fish every now and then.* But you can still eat healthier than the vast majority of Americans and continue to eat the foods you love by simply making an effort to eat more fresh vegetables and fewer processed foods. Upgrading your healthstyle is about figuring out what works for you, regardless of the circumstances you find yourself in.
PART II
GETTING STARTED
“The distance is nothing; it is only the first step that is difficult.”
—MADAME MARIE DU DEFFAND
FIVE
KNOW THY FOOD
TWO WEEKS OF TRACKING, BECAUSE YOU’RE WORTH IT
“Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance.”
—CONFUCIUS
“Knowledge rests not upon truth alone, but upon error also.”
—CARL JUNG
“The wise know their limitations; the foolish do not.”
—BENJAMIN HOFF, THE TAO OF POOH
Understanding how to eat for health and weight loss is essential for becoming a foodist, but upgrading your healthstyle will be difficult until you know exactly what your current habits look like. Remember that almost all of your eating is done on autopilot, as a result of unconscious scripts that play out in response to different environmental and internal cues. As a result, most of us are frighteningly unaware of exactly what and how much we’re eating.
If you’ve been on and off of diets for most of your life, you may think you’re better at monitoring yourself than most people—you’ve had a lot more practice, after all. But as we’ve seen in previous chapters, chronic dieting tends to make us ignore internal cues and lose track of how much we’ve eaten when we exceed our goals. So contrary to what you might expect, dieters are usually much worse at self-monitoring than other people. Even scarier is that we don’t even realize how bad at it we are. The only way to solve these deficiencies is to unleash our inner scientist and, at least for a little while, become data junkies.
A FOODIST’S JOURNAL
Humans are notoriously terrible at recalling what they’ve eaten. Study after study has demonstrated that we consistently underestimate the amount of “unhealthy” foods we eat and overestimate the “healthy” ones.* We are also awful at judging how much food we eat. For decades scientists believed that overweight individuals did not eat significantly more than normal-weight individuals, because differences were not reported on food-frequency questionnaires. However, more careful measurements revealed that overweight people do in fact consume more, but consistently underreport how much food they eat. Though at first some scientists assumed this was a personality trait of overweight and obese people (maybe the participants were delusional or simply lying), further research revealed that the overweight are in fact no worse at estimating portion sizes than normal-weight people and do not underreport their food intake intentionally.
The reason for the reporting bias was a mystery until 2006, when research by Brian Wansink and Pierre Chandon showed that, although heavy and normal-weight people are good at guessing the size of small portions, both groups are horrendous at guessing the size of larger portions. The bigger the portion, the bigger the error, and these miscalculations can result in underestimating calorie content by up to 40 percent. Wansink and Chandon showed that overweight people underreport how much they eat simply because they consume larger portions, and this fact alone explains why they are less aware of how much they’re eating.1
Given what we know about how environmental triggers impact what and how much we eat (how big are your kitchen plates, exactly?), it stands to reason that any of us can become inadvertent overeaters with the wrong habits or in the wrong environment. This is particularly true of chronic dieters, who are even more susceptible to environmental cues that trigger overeating, and may explain why dieters tend to gain more weight than nondieters over time.
Fortunately, there are plenty of tools that can help us overcome our propensity to delude ourselves about what and how much we eat. The first step in breaking the illusion is collecting accurate information. Just as in the lab, the best way to get good data in the kitchen is to measure, measure, and measure some more. Don’t worry, I won’t ask you to carry around kitchen scales and measuring cups with you for the rest of your life. But diligently measuring and recording how much you eat for a couple of weeks can be incredibly instructive for determining your optimal healthstyle.
The first thing you’ll need is a place to record your entries. I prefer to log my activities in a small notebook I carry in my bag, but if you want to use an iPad or other digital device, feel free. The only requirements are that you can update your journal from anywhere (i.e., it’s mobile) and that data entry can occur quickly enough to not be a hindrance in your daily life. A fancy spreadsheet in Google Docs is great, but if you can only access it from a desktop computer and data entry is a pain, then you’ll be more likely to forget what you ate and rely on recall rather than specific numbers. Consequently, you will get less reliable information from this exercise. Mobile apps such as MyFitnessPal are another alternative.
When you enter information in your journal, the most important thing is that you are brutally honest. Omit nothing, not even that one pretzel you snagged in the lunchroom off your friend’s plate, and do your best to give the most accurate description you can. Include the food item you’re eating, how large the portion is, and what sauces and other ingredients are used if applicable. Record the time of day you eat (the times you wake up, fall asleep, and exercise are helpful as well) and if possible how you feel afterward. The more healthstyle data you collect, the better.
It helps to have exact measurements of everything you eat, so a small kitchen scale and/or measuring cups and spoons make this a lot easier. You can even buy special bowls, cups, and other utensils with built-in measurements if you find these easier to use, though they are certainly not necessary. Consider bringing your tools with you to work (or bringing in an extra set) if it’s not too embarrassing. If you can’t get exact measurements (no, I don’t think you should bring your own bowls to Chez Panisse), estimate the volume of your food the best you can by comparing it to common objects like a golf ball, a baseball, a deck of cards, and so on. Take pictures with your cell phone if it helps you keep track.
I realize this may sound a little intense, but you won’t have to keep this up forever. Two weeks is my minimum
recommendation, and you will find the benefits of putting in this kind of effort early on to be more than worth it. For starters, even though I have not suggested making any dietary changes at this point (we are only documenting your current healthstyle for now), almost everyone who goes through this exercise will lose some weight. Why? For the same reason the control group in every diet study loses weight. This is what I refer to as the quantum effect of dieting: simply measuring your eating habits is enough to alter your behavior at a subconscious level.
We can’t help but behave better when we feel like someone is watching us, even if that someone is our future self (or our iPhone). So chances are that during this time you will make healthier choices and serve yourself less food. But weight loss is not the point of this exercise. The practice of keeping a rigorous food journal, even for a short time, has a multitude of benefits. Measuring your food forces you to pay attention to portion sizes. Not only will this prevent you from overeating in the present; it will also teach you to be a better judge of portions in general and help you avoid the pitfall of underestimating the impact of big portion sizes moving forward. For example, you’ll learn to eyeball what a half a cup of oats looks like both dry and cooked, and you’ll have a better sense of how much wine you really drink at your weekly dinner parties.
Though few of us are born with the skill of judging portion sizes, research has shown that people can get better at it with training. Food journaling will also help you identify your habitual eating patterns and, as a result, help you isolate the triggers, scripts, and rewards that are causing you to eat unconsciously. A detailed journal helps you find bright spots and weaknesses in your healthstyle as well and is something you can turn to anytime you get stuck or feel as though you aren’t making the kind of progress you expect. Sometimes you won’t notice a patterned behavior or habit until you force yourself to write it down several days in a row. Have a weakness for after-dinner snacks? Maybe you’re not eating a satisfying enough meal, or maybe a difficult family situation or schoolwork procrastination is triggering you to eat more than you need. Could your morning doughnut habit be solved by eating a bigger breakfast at home or moving your workout from evening to morning? Once you clearly see your problems, you can go about finding the best solutions. Last, your two-week food journal gives you your first taste of what it feels like to practice mindful eating, a critical component of upgrading your healthstyle, which we’ll discuss in chapter 7.
Sample Foodist’s Journal
Monday
* * *
11:00 A.M.
½ c. muesli w/ hemp milk, cinnamon
12:30 P.M.
Iced coffee, no cream
4:00 P.M.
Workout
5:00 P.M.
Starving! Spinach feta Peasant Pie
8:00 P.M.
Dinner at Dosa: split Chenai chicken (w/ salad), dahi puri, and lamb curry w/ lemon rice with Kevin
Evening:
2 glasses white wine
Total steps:
15K
Comments:
Late start was a killer, threw off my whole day
Tuesday
* * *
8:30 A.M.
½ c. warm muesli, Americano w/ splash of cream
1:00 P.M.
2 scrambled eggs in butter, ½ c. kimchi
4:00 P.M.
Workout
5:30 P.M.
Coconut: water and flesh
7:30 P.M.
Lacinato kale (1 bunch), 4 oz. tempeh, sautéed w/ soy sauce and garlic; 1 very small avocado
Total steps:
14K
Comments:
Dinner was good, but a little too big; felt much better today than yesterday
Wednesday
* * *
8:30 A.M.
½ c. warm muesli, Americano w/ splash of cream
11:45 A.M.
Lunch at Plow: roasted kabocha squash salad, arugula, hazelnuts, vinaigrette, asiago; 1 bite of Kevin’s egg scramble (tomatoes, spinach, feta); herbal iced tea
2:00 P.M.
Workout
4:00 P.M.
Early Girl tomato
5:30 P.M.
1½ c. homemade popcorn w/ butter, salt
6:30 P.M.
Roasted chicken leg, 5 very small potatoes, mixed green salad w/ tomato, carrot, radish, basil, vinaigrette
Total steps:
13K
Thursday
* * *
9:00 A.M.
Workout
11:00 A.M.
Muesli, coffee per usual
3:30 P.M.
½ leftover chicken breast, 4 small potatoes, 2 Early Girl tomatoes
6:30 P.M.
Got roped into 5-course pasta-tasting menu (required whole-table participation); hardly any veggies; hard to track portions, but tried not to get full; had a few dessert bites; wine pairings, about 2½ glasses total
Total steps:
12.5K
Comments:
Dinner not that good; felt like a waste of an indulgence
Friday
* * *
7:30 A.M.
Warm muesli, coffee w/ cream
11:30 A.M.
Workout
1:00 P.M.
Half chicken breast plus wing, 2 very small potatoes, mixed green salad w/ carrot, radish, tomato
7:00 P.M.
Sautéed tempeh and radishes, tossed w/ radish greens and avocado, oil, vinegar
Total steps:
11K
Comments:
Good day
Saturday
* * *
11:00 A.M.
Coffee w/ cream
12:30 P.M.
Fresh English muffin, butter, poached farm egg, smoked salmon, dry-farmed tomato slices, arugula (homemade w/ farmers market ingredients—epic)
12:45 P.M.
Roseblush apple
3:00 P.M.
Workout
5:00 P.M.
¼ c. trail mix
8:00 P.M.
At party: 2 slices roast beef, 2 (duck?) lettuce cups (mostly veggies), assorted cold vegetables, 3 whiskey punch cocktails; dessert: many raspberries, a few strawberries, 4–5 chocolate bites
Total steps:
13K
Comments:
Should have eaten more dinner food, less sugar
Sunday
* * *
10:00 A.M.
2 cappuccino
11:00 A.M.
2 scrambled eggs w/ scallion (cooked in butter), 1 Arkansas Black apple
1:30 P.M.
Organic chicken fajitas, fresh guacamole, tortilla chips (1 c. chips)
6:00 P.M.
1 c. homemade roasted tomato and pepper soup w/ horseradish/chive crème fraîche, pan-roasted brussels sprouts w/ pine nuts, cannellini beans w/ butter, olive oil, parsley, 1 Italian sausage (Whole Foods), 1 glass red wine
Total steps:
10K
Comments:
Felt like too much food today. Full.
LOOKING FOR TRIGGERS
When you begin to notice patterns in your journal, start paying more attention to what you’re doing right before these actions occur. Are you at work? In the car? In front of the TV? Are you tired? Bored? Sad? For all habitual behaviors, there is something that is triggering you to do what you do. Your job is to find the cues for all your habits, both good and bad.
The reason for identifying negative triggers is probably obvious to you by now. Once you know the cue that is triggering a particularly fattening habit of yours, you can work on identifying the reward that made the habit stick and devise a new script, so you can replace that habit with a healthier one. But there is value in analyzing good habits as well. Good habits are your bright spots, the activities where you are virtuous without even trying, and these provide valuable insight as to what sort of behaviors are the easiest for you to integrate into your healthstyle. Your bright spots can also help you identify the k
inds of cues and rewards that motivate you to act in a healthy way.
IDENTIFYING REWARDS
No habit forms without an associated reward. The problem is that the reward you receive by completing a certain habit is not always immediately apparent and can often be very subtle. Never assume that a reward is obvious. For example, if you have a habit of eating an entire pint of ice cream every Sunday evening during The Simpsons, you might think you do it because the ice cream is just so good you can’t resist. But this is probably not the case, and it certainly doesn’t explain why you eat the entire thing and don’t just have a few bites as the packaging recommends.
One thing I’ve discovered since switching to unprocessed, real food is that most of the things I considered decadent treats in the past really aren’t as good as I thought they were. When you start to appreciate that even vegetables can taste amazing, your standards for what is worth eating drastically rise. Also, your palate acclimates to real flavors, and it becomes easy to recognize the overly sweet, salty, and creamy (i.e., fatty) concoctions that pass for indulgence in the industrial food chain. Your mouth starts perceiving these imitations for what they really are: bad for you, without any real taste. These realizations can go a long way toward changing your attitude about certain foods, but they don’t necessarily make it any easier to break a bad habit. What they can show you, though, is that you aren’t necessarily overeating because this food is so amazing you’ll never be able to taste anything like it again. You are eating out of habit, and the reward is likely more psychological than perceptual.