Snack Ideas for the Cleanse *Whole Wheat Tortilla with light mayo, lettuce and lean turkey or chicken, dark leafy lettuce, sprouts, pickle slices, sliced tomato.
*1 Tablespoons of Natural Peanut Butter and an apple sliced
*Boiled Egg and an orange
*1 serving of cottage cheese mixed with frozen berries.
* Grapefruit and 1 egg and 2 egg whites scrambled
*2 ounces of lean Turkey rolled with a pickle or rolled
*2 ounces of Raw Almonds and a piece of fruit.
*Brown Rice Cake with natural peanut butter
Herbal Cleanse Dietary Guidelines To help your body cleanse waste and restore itself to a more vibrant and healthy state, the food you eat daily while on the system is very important. It is best to consume foods that are low in fat and in their natural state. Following are the Herbal Cleanse dietary guidelines:
• Eat eight to ten servings each day of vegetables and fruits. A serving is one cup of raw vegetables or one-half cup of cooked vegetables, or a medium-sized piece of fruit. It is best to eat vegetables and fruits in their natural form, either raw or lightly steamed.
• Drink at least 8 glasses of water each day.
• Eat starchy foods such as brown rice & oatmeal; in the whole grain form & avoid processed starches such as white bread and white rice.
• Reduce your dietary fat intake to as low an amount as possible during the cleanse. This means reducing or eliminating the use of butter, margarine and high-fat salad dressings. It also means cooking with water or vegetable broth rather than oil or butter.
• Scrupulously avoid all fried foods.
• Be sure to avoid sugar (table sugar or sucrose). If you want to eat something sweet, reach for a piece of fresh fruit.
Eat 5-6 SMALL meals a day! That is every 2-3 hours!
Increase Your Metabolism
Eating 6 meals a day will boost your metabolism, helping you to burn more calories all day long. In fact, by eating super-clean, high protein foods at each of your six meals, you will find that your metabolism goes into overdrive, becoming extremely efficient at burning off calories. Burn Calories with the Thermic Effect of Food. Frequent eating revs up your metabolism due to the thermic effect of food. This is because the breakdown and absorption of food itself requires a substantial number of calories. This is known as the thermic effect of food. Foods have a thermic effect ranging from 3% to 30%. Protein foods create a thermic effect of up to 30%. This means that 30% of the calories from foods like turkey, tuna, and salmon are burned simply by digesting them. Complex and fibrous carbohydrates burn about 20% of their calories through digestion. This includes broccoli, spinach, corn, green beans, etc.
On the other end of the spectrum are fats and refined carbohydrates. They have an extremely low thermic effect of about 3%. This is one of the reasons that dietary fat is stored so easily as body fat. As you can see, what you eat matters even more than how much you eat.
Maintain Peak Energy Levels
You will feel 10x better by eating smaller, more frequent meals. Your energy level will soar and your hunger cravings will be destroyed. This is because eating 5 to 6 meals per day helps maintain a balanced blood sugar level, preventing hunger attacks. This is in direct contrast to the calorie depriving diets that send your blood sugar levels into havoc, with too many peaks and valleys.
Build Muscle
You will also find it easier to build and maintain muscle. The more muscle you develop, the faster your metabolism becomes. Frequent meals help promote muscle growth by regulating insulin levels and providing a steady flow of amino acids into the muscle cells. By eating approximately every three hours you are constantly delivering a steady output of insulin, which is necessary for muscle growth and glycogen storage. Insulin plays a major role in transporting glucose and amino acids into the muscle cells where they can then be used for recovery and muscle growth. Are you starting to see the many benefits of eating 6 meals a day? Frequent meals also allow for more efficient use of vitamins and minerals. Your body simply becomes much more effective at processing these vital nutrients.
Work on getting into the habit of eating on a consistent schedule. This requires a bit of meal planning, but it is certainly worth it. It is very important to get your body into the habit of knowing when it will be supplied with nutrients. This way, your body won't fall into dreaded hunger attacks and cravings. Instead, it will always know that a steady flow of nutrients will soon to be supplied. The key is to center your diet around lean protein, fruits, vegetables, and healthy fats.
By eating 5 to 6 small meals per day, you will increase your energy levels, accelerate muscle growth, and speed up your metabolism without storing fat. In fact, frequent eating will actually allow you to eat up to 50% more calories without storing an ounce of it as fat.
Helpful Tips
•Plan ahead: write out a meal plan for the week
•Make a grocery list and stock up on exactly what you will need (feed your family this way too!)
•If you are going to work, pack your meals
•Eat within one hour of waking up so that you can fit all of your food in
•At first, you might have to eat "by the clock" to break old habits, especially during the first half of the day
Every meal should have protein and carbohydrates. But how much do you ask?
Protein: at least 10 grams
Carbs: under 30 grams
Why should you be eating this way?
•Carbohydrates are digested SLOWER when combined with protein
•Stabilizes blood sugar levels
•Protein is needed to burn fat and feed muscle
•We need carbohydrates for many functions, including fat burning. However, too many carbohydrates at ONE sitting causes the fat storage process
•Carbohydrates are designed to give us energy. If we eat more at one sitting than what we actually need for energy, our bodies store it for later (as body fat). Body fat is stored up energy that didn't get used
•30 grams of carbohydrates is an amount that your body can use for daily energy needs, without going into surplus
•The exception: after very vigorous exercise, carbohydrates needs may increase to 45 gram
Determining your serving size
You can use your own palm to estimate your serving size. Foods that have approx. 15 grams of Carbohydrates = palm size. Here are some examples:
1 slice of bread ~ 1/3 bagel ~ 1/2 english muffin ~ 1/2 tortilla ~ 1/2 cup rice, pasta, dry cereal ~ 1/2 banana ~ 3/4 cup berries ~ 1 tbsp regular jam ~ 1 small piece of fruit ~ 1 cup of milk ~ ½ c. cooked oatmeal ~ small potato ~ ½ c. beans –soy, pinto, garbanzo, navy, black, kidney ~ ½ c. hummus ~ 1 Sandwich Thin or Bagel Thin ~ 1 Pita Pocket ~ 1 Flatout Bread ~ 1 C. yogurt ~ ½ c. pure fruit juice ~ ½ c. corn or half of a corn-in-the-cob ~ ½ c. peas ~ ¼ c. dried fruit
Protein (10 grams) = half of a palm size
1/2 palm size of meat or tuna fish (ex. Tunafish sandwich meat) ~ 2 egg whites or 1 whole egg ~ 2 slices lowfat cheese ~ 2 light String Cheeses ~ ½ C. Cottage Cheese ~ 5 slices Canadian Bacon ~ 1 C. Canned Chicken (great as chicken salad sandwiches) ~ Palm size of chicken breast (love Costco’s Pre-cooked Rotisseri Chicken – can keep in fridge and take chunks off to snack on!) ~ 5 slices deli meat (turkey, chicken, ham, roast beef etc) ~ ½ c. Ricotta Cheese
Helpful Tips
•Veggies do not count as carbohydrates, they are "free" Eat as many as you’d like!
•Plan your meals ahead of time (make a menu/grocery list, and eat according to your plan – take the thinking & emotion out of it. Remember the purpose of food is to fuel your metabolic furnace so you can burn fat and feed muscle!)
•When in doubt, eat an Advocare Meal Replacement Bar, Advocare Snack Bar, Advocare Fruit & Fiber Bar, or Advocare Meal Replacement Shake. They are perfectly balanced to “rev up” your metabolism and burn the fat. Stock them in your car, office desk, purse, etc.
•Dining out: Eat open-face sandwiches with no other carbohydrate choice. For salads, make adjustments to added carbohydrates such as croutons, bread sticks, tortilla strips, etc. For Mexican food, fajita with corn tortillas are your best option.
When somebody commits to the 24 Day Challenge with me (on www.JoinEmily.com), I commit to mentoring them far BEYOND those 24 days! This blog is just a start! For even more, go to www.PepInYourStep.net!
