Is “Calories In Calories Out” a good diet program?

The “Calories in vs. Calories out” diet is the most cookie cutter way to lose weight. It’s simple to follow because it outlines the basic rules of calorie intake. According to the diet, if your body burns more calories than you consume in a given day, you’ll lose weight. While it may be true, I believe it’s an oversimplification.

I don’t typically recommend this diet program to my clients because it doesn’t account for the nutrient quality of the food, just calories. Also, different types of foods affect each individual in various ways. More specifically, food affects the hormones that regulate when and how much we eat. How your body reacts to different food is also dependent on metabolism.

The fact of the matter is that many people who try the “Calories In Calories Out” strategy ignore the quality of the food. Macro-nutrients like proteins, fats and carbs contain unique calorie densities. A meal full of only protein won’t satisfy the hunger of most people because protein only contains 4 calories per gram. Fats contain 9 calories per gram. Macro-nutrients go through different metabolic pathways and affect the body differently.

This is why I believe that the most important aspect of weight loss is to use a calorie calculator in addition to a Macro-nutrient calculator. This way, you’ll have an easy way to determine what to eat everyday in order to reach your goals.

Of course, there are many fad diets that can help with weight loss. However, the most reliable way to lose weight is eating in a calorie deficit with healthy foods that you enjoy eating on a regular basis.

I highly suggest that anyone trying to lose weight utilizes a calorie deficit program first before going to a fad diet. Nevertheless, if you’re looking for a program to help motivate you to achieve your goals, I’d recommend the Lean Belly Ritual Program in the link below.

http://bit.ly/LeanBellyRitualProgram

Hope this helped you learn more about CICO!

BMI Calculator

Body Mass index is necessary for finding your ideal healthy body weight. This calculator uses your height and weight to determine your Body Mass Index or BMI.

After using the calculator, the illustrations below will help you find where you stand health-wise.  It's important to remember that BMI simply identifies where you currently stand.  Utilize this tool to help determine what adjustments are needed in your diet, in order to improve your overall health.

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What is the group of food to eat in order to gain weight?

Eating calorically dense foods is what’s going to help you put on mass. Foods that are calorically dense are high in calories but don’t fill up your stomach very fast. Examples: cheeseburgers, quesadillas, milk, bread, peanut butter, bacon and eggs.

However, it depends if you want to build muscle or if you’re just looking to get fat. Especially because this depends on the food groups you want to focus on.

As others have mentioned, fat is the macro-nutrient that is the highest in calories. Therefore, eating a big meal from McDonald's will help with gaining weight but not necessarily good for building muscle, due to the negative effect fat has on protein synthesis.

Here’s a great video for a (relatively healthy) Homemade Mass Gainer that I used while struggling to gain weight: Calorie Calculator

Gaining healthy weight is much more useful for longevity and maintaining your metabolism. Examples of Healthy Medium-High Calorically Dense foods: Sweet Potatoes, Nuts, Avocados, Quinoa, Tahini and Fruit.

Is it possible to not gain weight on a calories surplus?

Technically no, a caloric surplus/deficit is the end-all-be-all for weight gain/loss. However, you can easily get around this.

Eating in a caloric surplus implies that you eat more calories than your body burns in a day. The easiest way around this is to increase your activity level. That way, even if you eat enough food to be in a caloric surplus, lifting weights or cardiovascular exercises can burn enough calories to put you in a deficit.

Activity level should always be included when calculating calories needed per day (depending on your goals) but many people neglect to include it.

Here’s a great tool I use that helps you calculate how many calories your body burns daily using your height, current weight and activity level: Calories Calculator

If I weigh 195 pounds, how many calories should I be getting each day to lose weight?

This mostly depends on your Activity Level. If you don’t do any cardiovascular training or weight lifting: 2000 calories/day at your weight will result in about 0.5lbs weight loss per week and 1750–1800 calories/day will result in 1 lbs per week.

If you’re fairly active, you’ll need about 2050–2300 to lose 0.5–1.0 lbs per week, respectively. As you can see, the amount of calories needed to lose weight is very dependent on the calories you burn on a regular basis.

Of course, your Age and Height play a factor as well. Here’s a great tool that helps you calculate how many calories your body burns daily using your height, current weight, age and activity level: Calorie Calulator

I wouldn’t recommend you lose more than 1 lb a week, unless you’re severely overweight — then I’d recommend you talk to your doctor first and ask him/her if losing more weight per week is the healthiest option for you.

Calories Calculator

Companies within the fitness industry want everyone to believe that they can lose/gain weight strictly with the use of their expensive products. It's unfortunate, because this misconception leads people to end up disappointed by the results.

The only way to truly lose or gain weight has to do with your calorie intake. The below calorie calculator will help you determine the amount of calories needed to reach your goals, whether is losing that stubborn belly fat, or pack on muscle!

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Can you have any sugar while on the Ketogenic diet?

Carbs are generally a no-no when it comes to Keto, as I’m sure you know. Sugar is the most simple carb out there, however I’d argue that it depends what kind of sugar we are talking about because they’re not all bad.

Fruit contains sugar, and I find that fruit doesn’t break my Ketosis as long as I have it with a high fat meal. However, everyone's body reacts differently so you’d have to do your own research to see how your body reacts.

Here’s a helpful video I used to educate myself about carbs when I first started my Ketogenic Diet: Carbohydrate Education - YouTube