Know How Much You're Eating with a Food Scale!

8.6oz of rotisserie chicken which has around ~450-550 calories

First things first guys, for the average, everyday client I normally don't advocate using food scales and measuring your food and knowing all of your macros that you're eating down to a T! A lot of the time it's just too much for first time clients to take in and do right away. In reality it isn't necessary for many, not all, people to measure their food precisely, and you can still achieve amazing results and look great in the mirror.

What if you're looking to take your fitness goals to the next level though? Then you should get a food scale! When I say take your fitness goals to the next level I'm talking about getting super lean, getting ready for a bikini or physique show and so on, or I can be talking about someone who wants to build strength and muscle while minimizing fat gain. With all of these goals the bar is set higher and harder to achieve; you really have to zero in on your diet to see spectacular results. Now most of the foods we eat today all have nutrition labels, with the helpful information like serving size, calories, fats, carbs, proteins and so on, but when you're strict diet most of those foods with labels become obsolete. You'll find that you're eating mostly meats, none of which are created equal in size or calories, veggies, and healthy fats. None of these things have nutrition labels and if they do they usually go by ounces or grams, how the hell are you supposed to know how many calories you just ate? I don't know about you but I sure as hell didn't know what 8oz of chicken looked like, or 3 grams of almonds looked like when I first started. That's why having a good food scale really helps, preferably one that can measure in pounds, ounces, and grams. You weigh your food and you either google the calorie information or you can download one of the many apps for your smartphone, my favorite is "myfitnesspal" and search on there, and viola now you know how many calories you have in front of you.

In the case of these almonds you could either use a measuring cup or weigh out 30 grams worth, which I had no idea what 30 grams of almonds looked like, but now I do! 1 serving of almonds, or 30 grams has approximately 27 individual almonds and has about 170 calories, and now I'll remember that forever! This is why having a food scale is beneficial; after a while you start to get familiar on your own with portion sizes, and how many calories certain sizes of foods have, to the point where you won't even need the scale anymore!

If you’re going to eat beef, make sure it is grass fed beef here’s why!

Before I explain why grass fed beef is way better for you let me just talk about a couple of types of fats… We have omega 3’s, which I know you have all heard of, and we also have omega 6’s; basically they’re both polyunsaturated and considered to be essential fatty acids, EFA’s, because we have to get them from food, our body’s cannot produce them from other fats.

Omega 3’s are considered to be anti-inflammatory, while omega 6’s are inflammatory, meaning that when consumed in too high a number omega 6’s can cause all kinds of terrible diseases like: Coronary artery disease, hypertension, cancer, arthritis and so on. That’s why keeping the ratio between the two fatty acids low and close together is very important. The only thing is today that so many foods have obscene rations, for example grain or corn fed cows can have a ratio of as high as 20:1 omega 6’s to omega 3’s. Just to put in in perspective scientific studies show that a ratio as small as 4:1 omega 6 to omega 3 is enough to cause health problems. Organic grass fed beef can be anywhere as low as 3:1 to 2:1 omega 6 to omega 3 ratio, not bad at all…

So how do you know if the beef you’re getting is grass fed or grain fed? Generally most of the time ordinary grocery stores aren’t going to carry grass fed beef, and keep in mind just because it says “organic” does not mean it’s grass fed! Places like Wholefoods, Fairway, and even Costco has grass fed beef; don’t get me wrong not all of their beef is grass fed you do have to look for it, or ask someone to help you. When I was at Costco the other day looking at ground beef I came across their Kirkland Organic ground beef, but it didn’t say grass fed, I had to look on the website and discovered that it was.

So some of you still might be scratching your heads as to why grass fed is so much better than grain fed. Think of it this way… Cows weren’t meant to eat grains or corn, they were meant to eat grass! They’re fed corn and grains because it’s cheaper to do so, but also so much more unhealthy for them, and remember you are what you eat! Also just to point out I mentioned earlier that omega 3’s are anti-inflammatory, meaning they help treat against all of the above disease I mentioned; so it wouldn’t be a bad idea to supplement with some additional fish oil and omega 3’s daily as we tend to not get enough in our diet. If you have to have your beloved red meat, especially with summer time around the corner and all bbqing going on try going grass fed instead.