Einstein said: ‘Things should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler’
The health and nutrition community has got itself all very excited this week.
The announcement of the new 400-600-600 calorie advice plan has ruffled a few feathers.
Personally, I’m actually not particularly anti this new idea.
As a country, we need to lose weight. 2000-2500 calories a day for the average person who gets up, walks to the car, drives to work, sits at their desk all day, drives home, sits on the sofa then goes to bed is too much food. Even if this average person also throws in a dog walk, a quick walk round the park at lunchtime, or even a couple of workouts a week – its still too much food, especially if you are trying to lose weight.
I really like the idea that we suggest people break down their calories into three meals a day. I also quite like that breakfast is the smallest, as we tend to be less tired and more distracted in the morning, so its often the easiest meal to steal a few calories from.
Much like the five-a-day campaign, although perhaps not optimal, 400-600-600 is going to be a step in the right direction. Its easy to visualise, easy to count and pretty achievable.
But, the thing is, a calorie ISN’T a calorie. 100 calories of spinach will have a very different effect on how you feel vs 100 calories of Cornflakes.
We need to teach people how to get satisfied with less food. Most of us can’t rely on our hunger these days, we’ve lost our innate ability to know how much we need to eat; we’ve played with processed foods, we get poor quality sleep and we don’t spend enough time outside.
McDonalds and Greggs are the listed healthier food partners of the 400-600-600 plan. We’re going to see 400 calorie breakfast pasties and 600 calorie burgers, and people are going to continue thinking there’s something wrong with them when they’re ravenous an hour after eating.
We have to start teaching people the importance of nutrient density; that is, the amount of nutrients you get per calorie is more important than the calories themselves. If you look for the most nutrition you can get, your ability to eat intuitively will return and calorie counting will be unnecessary.
If we can start to think of hunger as our bodies request for nutrients, and eat to keep ourselves topped up, we will naturally become less hungry and our bodies will start to use their stored fuel (fat).
I think this 400-600-600 plan is a great place to start from for the average person, I love the simplicity, but, it is just a little too simple. We need to learn how to satisfy ourselves with these intakes, not learn how to find a way to fit whatever we want to eat in our daily calorie count.
I can help you work out how to get more nutrition into your calories, and show you the right way to lose weight and improve your health, without feeling hungry and deprived all the time. I’d be delighted to speak to you about how this might look for you – please get in touch to arrange a chat.