Steve Turano: I am Steve Turano. Welcome to this episode of Body Performance. People ask me, Steve what is a good diet. Give me a good diet to follow. In general, my opinion, a good diet contains four qualities.
Number one, it's well balanced, and that means we eat something from all four food groups. Meats, fruits and vegetables, breads and cereals, and dairy. Yes, contrary to popular diet myth, a majority of our calories should come from complex carbohydrates, and also a well balanced diet gives you a variety of nutrients.
The second thing, your diet should be low fat. That's sort of a no-brainer, but remember this. You will lose weight on any type of diet that decreases your calorie intake, but because you eat something that's no fat, that's a little bit better, because remember fat requires no conversion to fat, it already is fat. So it sticks to your body quickly. Proteins and carbohydrates needed to be broken down and converted into fat. That itself takes time and energy.
Third thing is, a diet should be low in sugar. Not that sugar is all that bad for you. I mean after a very hard aerobic workout, you should have sugar to replenish glucose and glycogen amounts. But in general, a diet that's lower in sugar will be lower in calories, and also we want a diet that's lower in simple sugars, because they don't supply good amounts of energy for long periods of time.
Finally, a diet that's high in fiber. Why is that? Well, fiber number one, may contain calories, but we don't digest it. So, it doesn't add any calories to our daily calorie intake. Number two, fiber also ties up many of the calories in the other foods you eat, allowing them to move through your body.
So, well balanced, low fat, low sugar, high fiber. Love your body.
