If you can kill or pick and eat it…

Put the lime in the coconut and stir it all up...

I hope I’m not the only one loving the paleo chatter and food buzz. I welcome questions if you have them, and so far have gotten some good ones. Email me and I’ll either reply, refer you to a website, or post on it… like here!

Now that the game is on, I’ve been getting lots of questions about the Challenge rules that I guess my guidelines didn’t cover: “Are mushrooms paleo?”, “If I eat 5 lbs of chicken/10 Larabars/a jar of nut butter in one sitting is it still within the rules?”, “What constitutes one alcoholic beverage”, “Is [insert fast food dish] paleo?”

Those of you in the Challenge got detailed instructions via email. For those of you that attended the Nutrition Seminar, this is review and you could add to all of these points below why’s and how’s.

If you missed the last seminar, there will be a second CFSB Nutrition 101 Seminar Saturday February 13th post-WOD — same seminar with food — $35. Read about it here, and sign-up here, or in the gym.

Hopefully #1 below covers 99% of what you’ll want to eat. I listed these common questions below and answers not because I want to make sure you’re all playing by the rules for rules’ sake, but because by sticking to #1, you’re eating the way you evolved to eat and you’ll get the full nutritional profile your food intake should have, the full anti-inflammatory, insulin-sensitizing, blood-glucose-reducing and fat-burning effects of what it feels like to eat this way. That said, the quantity question is a good one and can have a big impact on whether you get the full benefit of this challenge. So first I’ll address the detailed ‘what food’ questions, and then I’ll go over ‘how much’.

1. Ask yourself this question if in doubt. If the answer to this is yes (and that fits into these guidelines), then it’s a food that your body has best evolved to process, is ‘paleo’, and within the rules: “Is this food (or item including all of its ingredients) one that I could go out into the wild, pick/hunt and eat with minimal processing?”
2. If I eat X quantity of a paleo food is it within the rules? Short answer: yes. The long answer, see below.
3. Coffee is not barred. Better for you: green and white tea.
4. Sugar of all varieties is barred because it’s a processed food. Stevia, however, comes from a plant and is considered ‘paleo’. Look at the ingredients though (powdered kinds often use lactose as a filler/substrate). Use sparingly.
5. Cream is a dairy product that is composed of butterfat-layer skimmed from the top of milk before homogenization. As I understand it, homogenization can damage the structure of the cholesterol in cream (not good for your arteries), so if you absolutely must have cream, make it heavy cream un-pasteurized, or make it yourself.
6. Cheat dairy: if you choose to have dairy in your cheat meals, for your body’s sake, have unpasteurized goat’s milk, coconut milk/coconut milk ice cream, kefir.
7. Salt: Cordain’s paleo diet recommends not adding salt to any food (see here), partly because most Americans’ potassium/salt balance is way off (too much salt from eating out, packaged and processed foods) and partly because it produces a net acid load on the body (read about it!). However, I’m not going to track your salt.
8. Condiments: if you can, do, or could make them yourself with things found in nature, referring to #1, then eat up. Most condiments are loaded with salt and sugar though, which will not help you. Check out Mark’s Daily Apple recipes here for mostly within-the-rules condiments. The mayo recipe is great but please don’t use canola (not rule-breaking but it’s bad news in terms of omega-6′s). http://www.marksdailyapple.com/alternative-healthy-condiment-recipes/
9. Restaurants: tell the chef that the menu looks great, but you’re doing a challenge for your gym; ask him to make you something with tons of meat and veggies and if he can, to use olive oil. Most chefs will jump at the opportunity to impress.
10. Fast food/most restaurants: ask yourself the question in #1. If the answer is no to a part of it (e.g. the sauce), don’t eat it, or have that be a cheat meal.
11. Alcohol: 1 alcoholic beverage = 1 non-paleo/cheat meal. 1 alcoholic beverage = 1 beer or 1 shot or 1 glass of wine. Remember those pictures in health class in high school or at the DMV of what “1 serving” is… that’s the one.
12. Shakes and bars are not paleo unless you insist on eating them in the gym as your PWO meal for mass gainers. The rest of you: EAT REAL FOOD

Quantity…

If you think you’re not sure how much you should be eating, the easy answer is eat mostly meat and vegetables until you’re satisfied, not stuffed, just satisfied. I do understand that knowing that point it tough, some may have never known it, others may have a tough time stopping at that point. I’m going to list some general guidelines and then some more specific tools you can use if you want to achieve specific goals (mass gain or body fat loss).

General…

First, your three classes of macronutrients are easy to estimate when you’re eating paleo because they pretty much fall along paleo food group lines. Eat each at every meal if you can.

• Protein (aka Pro): you get primarily from meat/fish/eggs:
  • 100 g animal meat = 20g protein; 100g protein is 3.5oz or the size of a deck of cards
  • You should eat minimum 0.7-1.5g per 1lb lean muscle mass. Go here to calculate your lean muscle mass.
• Fat: you get primarily from high-quality oils, (preferably raw) nuts, and avocado:
  • Use high quality oils at each meal: olive oil, grapeseed oil, and at med-low temperatures walnut oil and macadamia oil. Snack on nuts or nut butters throughout the day if you get hungry (walnuts are best, then macnuts, almonds, brazil).
• Carbohydrate (aka CHO): you should be filling yourself up on vegetables (5-9 cups) of a large variety each day. You should not be filling up on fruit. Eat fruit, but in much smaller quantities than vegetables. Best (lowest glycemic load) fruits are berries.

Specific…

To get more specific, use the blocks from that calculator to determine your recommended blocks. This calculator will give you total Pro, Fat and CHO that will support only lean mass and not body fat given your weight, height, sex, and activity level. From there use this key:

• 1 block Protein = 7 g <– a MINIMUM recommendation
• 1 block Fat = 1.5 g <– a MINIMUM recommendation
• 1 block CHO = 9 g <– a MAXIMUM recommendation

Using the blocks recommendation from the calculator, multiply total blocks for each by grams per block of each. If you’re a medium guy with little body fat doing crossfit 5x a week, you might get a recommendation of 20 blocks. Multiply each by 20. This gives you total grams recommended of each macronutrient. For an idea of how much a block is, here’s a list of approximations (more specific, not all paleo, here):

• Protein:
  • 1 block of most meats (your primary source of Pro) = 1 oz (salmon = 1.5oz)
  • 3-3.5 oz meat is the size of a deck of cards
  • 1 block egg = 1 whole egg (or 2 egg whites)
• Fats:
  • 1 block of nuts = 1 mac nut or 2 walnut halves or 3 almonds
  • 1 block oil = 1/3 tsp (olive oil / walnut oil)
• Carbohydrates:
  • 1 block of leafy greens and broccoli (your primary source of CHO) = 2-3 cups raw
  • 1 block of root vegetable = 1/2 c cooked (carrot, sweet potato)
  • 1 block fruit = half an apple/orange/grapefruit or 1/2 cup berries

A quick look at the numbers reveals that if you’re primarily eating vegetables, that’s a hell of a lot of vegetables (in a good way). Use this “Zone Skinner” tool developed from CrossFit nutrition expert Robb Wolf‘s vast experience to help you determine how much fat you should add if you’re deleting some CHO blocks. This will help to do a few things if you’re still hungry after you’ve eaten meat, lots of leafy greens, other veggies and nuts: 1) to seek and burn fat as fuel when you’re hungry 2) to help sensitize your body to insulin again coming off a diet likely much too high in refined carbohydrate.

• Download/view, mouse over the comments first, then enter the blocks of Pro, Fat and CHO that the calculator recommended.
• You can delete some CHO blocks and replace them with Fat blocks. You’ll notice you have to input a multiplier.
• Use Table 1 below to find yours — aim low, and move up if you’re still hungry (after having eaten a large meal of meat, greens/vegs).

Table 1:

If for some reason you’re dying to know how many calories this is then just multiply your total blocks of each by the amount of calories per gram of each: Protein = 4 cal/g, Fat = 9 cal/g, CHO = 4 cal/g. Zone puts you in a calorie deficit usually if you have > 10% or 15% body fat (males/females) this is so that your energy intake (food) doesn’t support body fat. However, if you’re looking to gain muscle, it’s a slippery slope and large calorie deficits can result in slower progress. For body fat gain and lean muscle maintenance, this protocol works, is strongly advocated at CrossFits far and wide, and if nothing else will help you fine tune what works best for you.

The recipe for today is green curry; it feeds 4. This one is a staple for me.

2T olive oil
2 bell peppers cut into strips
2 zucchini cut into strips
5 radishes cut into slivers
5 leaves kale chopped into strips
Whatever other veggies need to be eaten
1 small yellow onion chopped
6 cloves garlic
28 oz coconut milk (2 cans — not the lite version)
3 c water
4 small chicken breasts already baked, chopped/shredded
1 large bunch basil
1/2 c cilantro leaves
2-3T green curry paste (I use this recipe; watch out for soy/wheat in premade mixes) but use pre-ground spices
1/4 c lime juice

Sautee all ingredients up to coconut milk until vegetables soften, add remaining ingredients and simmer on low for 15-20min.

WOD 1/20/2010

Max Double Unders 2 Min x 2 (no subbing singles. Count attempts if you do not have double unders)

“The Chief”
5 Rounds
Max rounds in 3 minutes of:
3 Power cleans (135/85)
6 Push-ups
9 Squats
Rest 1 minute

Optional:
Overhead Squat 5-5-5-5 60%
Bench Press 1 Rep Max
Snatch Balance 3-3-3 85% of snatch