A few diet questions - Please help! :)

[Anonymous]

1- I love coco pops and corn flakes. Can I eat them in the morning if I am trying to lose weight?

2- Is it true that I should never mix protein with carbs if I'm trying to lose weight? (ex: never eat chicken with pasta/rice)

3- I love chocolate and I couldn't totally get rid of it. How many chocolate bars can I eat per week without gaining much weight?

4- I have a terrible memory. Is there any type of food/drink that can improve my memory?

Thanks! :)

[Prof_Don]

1) I say yes you can...just not every morning. The sugar spikes and crashes will jack up your appetite and your metabolism. I say eat that every other morning.

Make sure you eat a protein-based breakfast. Donuts and coffee are an ABSOLUTE no-no.

2) This is bogus. It's perfectly fine to mix protein with carbs; in fact after a workout, the body recovers best if you eat at least a 3:1 ratio of carbs:protein within 60 min of finishing your workout.

3) I say limit your chocolate to one bar per day, and make it DARK chocolate. The darker, the better.

4) Your memory is probably affected by the sugar spikes and crashes from eating a lot of sugar and "white" carbs.

Increase protein (it's nearly impossible to eat too much protein; do you see "low protein" being advertised on food products? Exactly.)

Decrease your carbs, starting with reducing your "sugar water" type drinks, aka "soft drinks". Drink water, milk (flavors like chocolate is perfectly fine), and tea. Treat "sugar water" type drinks as a sweet like candy rather than a beverage to drink with your meal.

Tea is very good for boosting alertness and memory (NOT the tea in bottles; that's tea-flavored sugar water).

ALL tea is good for you, but the overall best ones are green teas and rosehip/hibiscus teas (aka, the cool-looking-flavored ones in the store that are caffeine free).

Herb-wise, ginko biloba is taken for the purpose of boosting memory and mental alertness.

------------

Hopefully I helped. Add me as a friend and chat with me if you have any questions. :)

[jimmyjkd]

this guy has some very good point. better than mine. completely agree with you.

[Asker]

Thank you. :)

[Prof_Don]

You're welcome, QA.

I'm glad my nerdiness via looking things up online is useful. 8-)

[jimmyjkd]

if you want to loose weight it should be a high protein diet. you almost have to cut out the carbs completely. all those cereals are full of sugar. eat porridge, or fruit cereal. eat eggs for breakfast. the best to eat chocolate would after exercise to give you that energy. I have a snickers after I train.

the problem with not eating carbs at all, it will get to the point you will feel very weak and tired. if you do start feeling liked that, get some carbs in you. course you can eat chicken or any meat for loosing weight that's waht you should be eating if you want loose weight. avoid all pastas, soda drinks, junk food. you will need exercise for the diet to have any benefit. without exercise will just take longer.

if you want to eat chocolate, train hard with cardio.

[madmisskelly]

1. You may want to make a swap for something that is higher in protein. fiber and whole grains. Unless you are eating the exact serving size (less than one cup) you are getting way more calories than you need that are more than likely empty. You could probably do 2 eggs over easy, and a whole grain waffle (no syrup) with a cup of fruit and still be under 400 calories.

2. There is no proof that mixing protein and carbs has any impact on your diet. Your body will handle it the way it is supposed to.

3. I could stick to one chocolate bar per week. Pick one really really good bar of high quality dark chocolate (its higher in antioxidants) and eat one square a day.

4. Your memory could be improved not by food/drink but by habits. Eating, drinking healthfully and exercising will give you more energy and make you more prone to committing things to memory. You may need to find ways to get it to stick, reading it, writing it, and saying it out loud one right after another can work well sometimes.

[ivarei]

1. yes, but you have to account for that when planning your other meals.

2. that's a load of crap, a healthy serving of carbs + proteins = a balanced meal

3. again, it depends on what else you're eating. at the end of the day you have to be burning more calories than you're taking in.

4. probably not, but google it.

[ben890]

1. Not every morning. Start replacing breakfast with protein instead of carbs, it'll keep you fuller longer *and* it's better for you. Even bacon and eggs is better for you than sugary cereals.

2. I don't see why that should be a rule. It's best not to eat carbs in general, but if you're going to eat them, mixing them with protein is better than not.

3. Haha weeelll that's a lot of sugar. Try finding chocolate bars that are organic and less sweetened. Dagoba has one that only has 8 grams of sugar. You could probably eat one of those every day and not get any adverse effects :P

4. black beans, walnuts & almonds, green leafy veggies, berries, beets, cinnamon, fish

[raptor]

1. Best to cut the coco pops for breakfast. The corn flakes should be fine as long as you aren't adding a bunch of sugar to it. The others are right that you need to be consuming protein and breakfast. You could, if you wish, have a smaller serving of corn flakes as a side to a protein meal, using that to cover your carbs. (but not all the time).

2. That's complete bullsh*t and should be forgotten.

3. You really just have to look at the nutrition labels for these (pay attention to sugar most of all), dark chocolate is best overall.

4. There's a tea for that.

You can use a sinlge serving of coco puffs as desert occasionally

[jimmyjkd]

go to this bodybuilding.com, its the best site for any type of training and diet, for male and female.it will give you all the tips you need to loose weight and exercise. I can't recommend a better site. its not just a site for building big muscles. its everything.good luck.

[asche]

You can eat just about anything - in moderation - if you are trying to lose weight, so long as you are exercising regularly.

I don't quite understand why you wouldn't be able to eat cereal, or chicken with rice, and not lose weight hahah.

Why people set so much on "diets" nowadays, I'll never know.