I have no doubt that you have been inundated with information on how to eat to improve your physique and/or performance. There are enough nutrition books in your local bookstore to tie up every one of your brain neurons for months. At least for the purposes of this article, I’m going to spare you the intricacies of nutrition, like the latest information on Glut-4 transporter translocation, and just give you generic Cliff’s Notes (or Dr. Clay’s Notes) on how to assemble meals and eat. plans that will help you achieve your physical and/or performance goals.
protein
It is fairly well accepted that a protein intake of around 1.5 grams per pound of body weight is sufficient to support muscle protein synthesis. (For the record, you could bump that up to 2 grams per pound or as low as 1 gram per pound of body weight. Personally, I only stick with 1.5 g/lb.) Although you could certainly choose to eat seven to 10 smaller meals . , most people find that six meals a day is much more feasible. For the sake of simplicity, let’s say you weigh 200 pounds. This would make you eat 300 grams of protein per day. Divided into six meals and you have 50 grams per meal. Pretty easy, right?
So what exactly can you eat to get 50 grams of protein? It’s funny that you should ask. Below is a list of food options that have approximately 50 grams of protein for muscle building. These should be considered your “basic” protein sources.
50 grams of protein
Chicken breast: 6 ounces (170 grams) – baked or broiled / 8 ounces (225 grams) – raw
Lean beef (95%): 7 ounces (200 grams) – well cooked / 8 ounces (225 grams) – raw
Fish: 8 ounces (225 grams) – baked or broiled / 10 ounces (280 grams) – raw
Turkey breast: 6 ounces (170 grams) – roasted / 7 ounces (200 grams) – raw
Egg whites: 2 cups – raw
Cottage cheese: 15 ounces (425 grams) – (also contains about 20 grams of carbohydrates)
Then simply place one of the servings above (conveniently proportioned in ounces and grams) on your plate and you’ve met your protein requirements for that meal. Of course, you could also use a protein powder supplement. Since most types contain about 20 grams of protein per tablespoon, 2 ½ tablespoons will generally provide your 50-gram dose of protein. Check the product label for the exact serving size.
carbohydrates
Knowing exactly how many grams of carbohydrates to consume is a bit more complicated and variable than protein intake. For one, you consume too many carbohydrates and they will have a lipogenic (fat-forming) effect. On the other hand, eat too few carbs and you’ll end up weak, flat, with no pump, and little to no vascularity. Also, chronic consumption of inadequate carbohydrates will, if you are lucky, prevent you from growing; it is very likely that it will end up shrinking.
With that said, let me give you some guidelines for carbohydrate intake. I’ll be the first to admit that these guidelines are not based on an outlandish study conducted at a top university. Instead, they are based on my personal experience gained from doing it myself and helping others for over a dozen years.
If your primary goal is to gain muscle mass, aim for two to two and a half grams per pound of body weight. Therefore, our hypothetical 200-pound male would consume about 400 to 500 grams of carbohydrates per day. In order to slowly lose body fat while maintaining or slowly gaining muscle mass, one to one and a half grams per pound of body weight should hit the spot. Again, that’s 200 to 300 grams for those of you who didn’t major in math. Lastly, if losing weight super fast is at the top of your to-do list, our 200-pound man should aim for 100 grams of carbs per day, about ½ gram of carbs per pound of body weight.
Another point worth mentioning regarding carbohydrate intake is timing. Both experience in the trenches and university studies agree that most of the daily carbohydrate intake should be consumed first thing in the morning and after training. Essentially, the nutrients consumed in the few hours after weight training dictate whether or not one recovers (and/or to what extent). However, some research has shown that we tend to metabolize carbohydrates better in the early part of the day than in the later part. This is great if you train in the morning. If you can’t train into the evening, you’d still consume your workout drink(s) and at least one carbohydrate-containing meal post-workout. Unless you’re in for a really dumb workout, I guarantee you your hungry muscles will ‘soak up’ those carbs. (For the record, I ‘split the difference’ by training around noon or 1pm, as I’m far from a ‘morning person.’)
As with the previous protein, below I’ve provided basic carbohydrate sources and serving sizes that yield 50 grams of carbohydrate. Feel free to mix and match these carbohydrate sources. For example, you probably want to have (for both physiological and flavor reasons) a mixture of rice and beans instead of one or the other. (Especially since 12 ounces of beans wouldn’t make being with you fun, if you know what I mean.) Try 4 ¼ (120 grams) of cooked rice and 4 ¾ ounces (135 grams) of cooked beans to meet your 50 gram carbohydrate requirement.
50g of carbohydrates
Potatoes (white): 8 ounces (225 grams) – baked / 11 ounces (310 grams) – raw
Sweet potatoes: 8 ounces (225 grams) – baked / 10 ounces (300 grams) – raw
Pasta: 2.5 ounces (70 grams) – raw / 7 ounces (200 grams) – cooked in water
Oats: 3 ounces (81 grams) – raw / 18.5 ounces (520 grams) – cooked in water
Bread: usually about 4 slices
Beans: 12 ounces (340 grams) – cooked
Rice: 2 ¼ ounces (65 grams) – raw / 7 ounces (200 grams) – cooked
Fruit
A ‘serving’ or piece of fruit typically contains between 20 and 25 grams of carbohydrate. Due to the potential lipogenic effect of excess fructose (fruit sugar), I would not normally recommend consuming 50 grams of carbohydrates from fruit in one sitting. For these reasons, I am going to list the fruit carbohydrate servings in servings that contain 20 to 25 grams of carbohydrate.
Again, if you use your head a bit, you’ll find that you could eat a piece of fruit and one of the starchy carbohydrate servings above to meet a carbohydrate requirement of 70 to 75 grams per meal. If you’re paranoid about fructose, keep in mind that the fruit is packed with a host of vitamins, minerals, enzymes, phytonutrients, and good oily fiber. As a friend of mine says: “Just eat the damn fruit!”
20 to 25 grams of carbohydrates from fruit
Banana: 1 medium
Orange: 1 wide
Apple: 1 medium to large
Pear: 1 medium
Kiwi: 2 medium to large
Melon: ½ medium or 1/3 large
Strawberry: 11 ounces (300 grams)
fat
The exact amount of fat one needs to consume is as debatable as whether global warming is real or political propaganda. Consuming too much fat can, oddly enough, make you fat, even more so if you consume excess trans and/or saturated fats, or if your insulin levels are high. Too little fat will wreak havoc on testosterone levels, unless of course “supplemented” with testosterone. Even in a ‘highly anabolic’ athlete, an adequate amount of dietary fat will facilitate muscle growth in several ways. This; however, it is fairly well accepted that as carbohydrate intake decreases, dietary fat can (and usually should) be increased somewhat.
In my opinion, the one thing that’s pretty definitive about eating fat is that it’s beneficial to consume between six and nine grams of fish oil per day. (Opt for a product that has enough – 30% or more – DHA and EPA). Otherwise, try just mixing up your fat sources so you’re getting about 1/3 monounsaturated, 1/3 polyunsaturated, and 1/3 saturated.
As for guidelines on how much fat to eat, I think around 0.3 to 0.5 grams per pound of lean body weight is a good starting point. So if you weigh 200 pounds, you have 20% body fat, then your lean body weight is 160 pounds. Therefore, you should consume approximately 48 to 80 grams of fat per day. If you’re eating more carbs, I’d lean towards the lower end of these guidelines and vice versa. Below I list samples of fat that contain 15 grams each. Simply adjust portions as needed.
15 grams of fat:
Oil (olive or flax): 1 tablespoon
Olives: 5 ounces (140 grams) canned ripe (black) / 3.5 ounces (100 grams) canned green
Walnuts: 1 ounce (28 grams)
Eggs: 3 whole eggs (also contains 15 grams of protein)
Avocado: 3 ½ ounces (100 grams) – all varieties except Florida / 5 ¼ ounces (150 grams) – Florida variety
Salmon: 5 ounces (150 grams) – raw (also contains 30 grams of protein) / 4 ounces (120 grams) – cooked (also contains 30 grams of protein)
Fish oil: 15 capsules. Ideally, though, you shouldn’t consume that much fish oil in one meal.
vegetables
I consider most vegetables to be “free foods.” No, that doesn’t mean they don’t cost anything; it means I consider them free of substantial caloric value. You could, and should, have some vegetables with every meal, with the exception of workout and/or post-workout shakes. Personally, I don’t like consuming them immediately before a workout either, as they contribute to a feeling of fullness, usually a good thing, but not before a workout if you ask me. Here is a partial list of vegetables that can be considered free.
“Free” vegetables:
Lettuce, spinach, broccoli, cauliflower, yellow squash (not butternut), celery, beets, mushrooms, onions, Brussels sprouts, eggplant, radishes, green beans, bell peppers, asparagus
Carrots and tomatoes can be considered free if you don’t eat more than one large per meal. Any more than that and your carbs can start to add up to a significant amount.
conclusion
You will no doubt have noticed that the nutritional values above represent only a small portion of the various types of food that one might consume. However, don’t overcomplicate things by losing sight of the fact that these foods should form the backbone of every eating plan. In fact, you could even achieve the highest level of performance possible without eating anything not on this list, excluding supplements. Most people who have a physique you’d really covet eat these foods day in and day out. The only thing that really varies is the amounts of each. If eating these foods day in and day out sounds boring, now you know why not many people actually have amazing bodies.