No, calories vary massively. If someone ate 2000 calories of vegetables each day and someone else ate 2000 calories of sugar there would be a huge amount of difference between their nutrition.
> The biggest problem people have is overeating, bottom line
Sorry to say that I disagree with this too. The body does a great job of negating over-eating provided the food eaten is of the right types, it is just pushed back out as waste.
Going back to the vegetable example, you could eat several kg of green vegetables every day and continue to lose weight.
1. Calories in/out control weight
2. Not everyone's digestive system is exactly the same, thus some small variance exists in how many calories we each absorb from various foods. This variance is very small, but maybe some exceptional outliers exist with very strange conditions here that could dramatically affect digestion. Don't justify your weight on this, you are most likely not the outlier and are just eating too much :p
3. Insulin levels and other hormonal conditions could affect the ability to lose fat. Again, this assumes major imbalance, most likely due to medical conditions like diabetes or hashimoto, etc.
4. The body needs what it needs. So a diet is more than just weight loss. You need a balanced diet, not necessarily balanced in foods, but you do in nutrients. It doesn't take much of anything though.
5. Certain foods have extra curricular effects that can be good or bad. It really depends in the food and your body. Intolerance, allergies, carcinogens, antioxidants, and many others. You can think of food as medication that is micro dosed, and with possibly immeasurable long term effects.
Also, it does seem that trans fat affect heart disease, as well as sugars. And it is the interaction between both which creates a high risk scenario. That's why both diets work. Ideally, you even cut out both, which is what Keto often does, it favour healthy fats and cut out sugars.
P.S.: Sorry, I wish I could put down my sources, but I wasn't keeping track. This is the current synthesis from memory of the many studies I read over time for fun in the last 3/4 years.
https://examine.com/nutrition/low-fat-vs-low-carb-for-weight...
I do 16:8 Intermittent Fasting. Are there health benefits to it? Maybe. But I know for sure that if I want to drop a bit of weight, this style of eating makes it a lot easier for me for reasons of hunger more than anything: I'm not that hungry until I eat. I also know for sure that I like eating big. If I have a couple small meals early on, I can have a great big meal near the end of my window as if I were a lion taking down a zebra.
My point is people who have successfully adopted a particular technique for reducing their caloric intake (fasting, kale, smoothies, veganism, omega 3 acids, etc) are disguising the underlying process that's conferring most of the health benefits they're seeing: which is weight loss.
How many stories have you read out there about Secret Diet X that does all sorts of allegedly amazing things for you? Paleo diet. Veganism. Atkins diet. The Zone diet. The Dukan diet. And on and on.
There are many strategies for reducing caloric intake and if 16:8 fasting works for you: fantastic. But at the end of the day most people will improve their health through weight loss, not some special ritual or ingredient, and I think we should be cautious before crowning specific calorie reduction techniques as having special or more beneficial properties unless there is clear scientific evidence for them.
Well, jonwinstanley above, for one. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
> No, calories vary massively. If someone ate 2000 calories of vegetables each day and someone else ate 2000 calories of sugar there would be a huge amount of difference between their nutrition.
Fasting when you are obese is different too. On average, you will burn more fat than muscle. Mainly because your body composition is primarily fat (i.e. 38% body fat).
As someone who lost 95kg within 2yrs And subsequently regained 40 over the next 10... That's not what it was for me.
Calories were always directly linked to me gaining or losing weight.
The difference was mainly in what happens after i've eaten the sugar calories. It's gonna take a few minutes or hours and I want to eat the next serving.
Sugar just... makes you eat more, both short and long term. If it's 2k today, it'll be 2.2k tomorrow and so on.
This is just not true. Anecdotally I know multiple obese vegans, but that aside at the end of the day it's calories burned vs calories consumed.
Generally speaking 1 lb = 3,500 calories[1]. What you're essentially arguing is that the caloric measurement of vegetables is wrong, that they're over-estimated, and you can secretly eat "kilograms" of extra vegetables and not get fat.
You gain weight from taking in more calories than you burn. You can take in too many calories from vegetables. It all depends on your lifestyle.
[edit: 3,500 calories, not 3,000. Sources: https://www.google.com/search?q=3500+calories+1+lb&oq=3500+c...]
Anecdotes are not data, but 'obese vegans' don't suprise me at all. Carbs are very present in vegan diets, therefore it's easy to overeat.
Also, yes you can get fat from veggies, but honestly, most have so few calories per kg, you would need to feast on them the whole day.
A pound of kale has around 227 calories. Spinach is similar. You are off by an order of magnitude.
“Kilograms” of green vegetables are absolutely below a typical 2000 calorie diet.
The body doesn’t negate over eating when it’s a lifestyle.
What I am saying is that portion size is not a big issue if you eat very healthy, low carb food. You could eat a mountain of steamed broccoli, mushrooms, carrots, cabbage every day and you wouldn't gain weight. You'd just need the to visit the loo a lot.
What? Yes, but calorie wise it's the same. You mix up IIFYM-critique points with calories.
> Going back to the vegetable example, you could eat several kg of green vegetables every day and continue to lose weight.
Because they have close to no calories.
In fact I read eating raw cabbage takes as much energy to digest as it gives you in calories. I don't have a link at hand but I remember clear as day that I read this somewhere.
Eating 2000 kcal of vegetables is the same as eating 2000 kcal of bread and meat.
0 - https://www.health.harvard.edu/diseases-and-conditions/glyce...
However I was obviously referring to the weight gain and loss I mentioned in my previous sentence. I.e. the long distance runners in your link that chooses high glycemic food are not getting fat anytime soon.
There are different effects on the gut microbiome, which affects how many of those calories are processed.
Can I eat 2000 kcal with one diet and gain weight and 3000 kcal with another weight and lose weight?
What you eat will of course matter when it comes to nutrition, muscle gain, satiety and many other factors but that in itself does not generally remove that a calorie is a calorie (unless extreme diets).
Right, but the point is it is easier to stick to this kind of regime than counting every calorie. And if you stick to the regime it also keeps you focused and conscious about not eating too many colories in general, you don't "forget" that you are trying to lose weight.
Further I've read that fasting kicks your body into a state where it starts to burn the extra reserve fat you have, which should make you feel less hungry after the start of the fast. SO rather than taking calories in, you are using what you already have. I don't know if 16 hours is long enough to get this fat-burning process started but perhaps.
I almost follow this same regime but I often slip and eat all night after the fast :-) But the account above gives me more inspiration to try a lit bit harder. Don't eat after 8pm. Skip the breakfast. How easy is that
He associates fasting, kale and "super nutrients" with this lifestyle transformation -- when it's just about reducing calories.
If his argument was, "It's hard to count calories, if you stick to this approach you'll automatically cut your take without having to journal every sip of OJ" -- then yes, I wholeheartedly agree.
There is some evidence that fasting can be good but people are so different it's hard to generalize-- others will over-eat in their feeding window. For some micro-meals throughout the day is a better technique to managing their hunger and keeps their metabolism up.
There's no one-size-fits-all technique. My main point is, when reading about "How I lost weight, it's so amazing" is caveat emptor.
I think the whole approach of strict fasting, along with the plant-based diet is what worked... and I can't see how it won't work for others, but then again I have no idea. People are radically different, and certainly, I was super motivated to lose weight because I never, ever wanted to be obese.
When I was a kid I used to watch The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, and Will Smith did a bit about Dunlap Syndrome. When my Doc told me I was going to be obese that bit from Fresh Prince flashed in my mind's eye and it was like Will Smith was laughing at me lol.
Hey it's a good strategy. Works for you, can work for others. But the magic is not in breaking your fast with a "burst of fresh nutrients" -- it's in reducing your overall caloric intake, as well as eating a balanced diet.
Good luck and congrats again.
That's the easy part of your regime. No meat, no dairy, no refined carbs is the hard part.
Actually no meat is easy, the other two are harder for me.
But not only that, I don't think it is as simples as "a calorie is a calorie". Different food are digested differently and trigger different responses for the body. To use an ad absurdum example, if I drink gasoline I don't get fat.
I didn't "dismiss" these, of course these are useful techniques that help people. My point is to not associate non-scientific properties to having kale smoothies or avoiding carbs.
Losing weight is great. Many ways to do it. To say there are such things as "super nutrients" distorts the real process at work here, which is reducing over-eating.
As for a calorie being a calorie, you're misunderstanding my argument. I'm not saying all _foods_ will have the same impact on you biologically. Of course not. Human biology is extremely complex and people should eat a balanced diet.
But what happens too often is people confer special, almost mythical properties to foods or nutrients (like kale, or omega-3 fatty acids, or plant-only diets, or carbs, etc) when the most fundamental process is calories in vs calories out.
Yes, it's possible to lose weight and still be unhealthy (just eating 1500 kcal of McDonalds per day, e.g.), but most health benefits associated from dieting come from weight loss, not isolating particular properties or compounds or ingredients.
Not trying to take anything away from what you accomplished, just trying to sort out where the health benefits are coming from: it's weight loss. From reduced caloric intake.
Personally, I like fasting. In an era when food is available 24/7 I think it helps teach self-discipline and clearly reduces the likelihood one will overeat.
I also like vegetable-heavy diets. Clearly good for you. But to say kale smoothies have "super nutrients" is not scientific. While it's tempting to confer special properties on the foods which have helped transform your life, most likely these are just methods to reducing over-eating.
Congrats again.
The second sentence here is the reason why the first sentence is exactly wrong. The best way to maintain the calorie deficit necessary for weight loss is if you can find a way to not feel hungry while maintaining that calorie deficit. But that calorie deficit is absolutely the most important goal of a weight loss plan, and is a necessary and sufficient condition for its success.
>As if fasting or kale give you more energy (they don't).
Your comment implies that all food is more or less equal, which doesn't seem to be the case. Couldn't the OP's change in "energy" reflect the reduced intake of hormones and other unhealthy additives that are present in the supply chain for most meats and other processed foods?
The biggest problem people have is overeating, bottom line. I honestly have several strict vegan friends who are obese -- at the end of the day a calorie is a calorie.
My only issue when people recount stories like yours, as inspiring as they are, is they associate non-scientifically-provable properties to their eating. As if fasting or kale give you more energy (they don't). Or carbs are automatically evil by themselves and cause weight gain (also wrong). There is no such thing as "super nutrients" -- there are only nutrients. It's like when people talk about going on a "cleanse" from "toxins" in their body, it's just nonsense.
I wish high schools would teach everyone how to track their calories, it's a super useful skill that would help many in understanding how much a penalty there is in eating those Five Guys fries. But "I lost weight from [insert special diet here] wow now I have [amazing qualities]" just exaggerates the basic underlying process of reducing caloric intake.
And for the record I'm 6'2" & 168 lbs / 76 kg with 5% body fat (measured via calipers), training for multiple athletic events, so I'm not saying this as someone who struggles with following strict diets.