Healthy Lunch vs. Unhealthy Lunch

So you followed our advice on breakfast, so what’s next?  Lunch, of course.  Let’s see how the Fantasy Healthball Food Formation works for lunch. 

If you can plan out your lunch ahead of time and have it with you, you can make sure it is healthy. That may be your best bet for encouraging routine and consistency.  If you are more of a forager at lunchtime, there are plenty of healthy choices. When Americans think lunch, we often think sandwiches. Sandwiches can be very healthy allowing you to hit the “meats” and the “milks (cheese)” and the grains.  Go for the whole wheat or whole rye bread or leave the bread out entirely. Watch that mayo, depending on what kind it is it can be 100-200 calories an ounce. Salads and soups are also popular lunch items. We think having a salad drenched in dressing and bacon bits is a lot like ordering the hot fudge ice cream sundae with low-cal whipped cream. It is easy to turn innocent foods into hardened criminals, or should we say hardened arteries?

 

There is no perfect formula of what to eat for lunch versus breakfast or dinner. Just keep in mind the general proportions of the Fantasy Healthball Food Formation and the variety and nutritional value of the food. A good time to think about such things is when you are driving by, instead of driving through, the multitude of fast food restaurants.   The LAST thing you want to be doing is driving around hungry without a particular destination in mind.  You may be amazed how creative you mind can be talking you into fat and greaseland.  Avoid it by by bringing your healthy lunch with you or having a particular healthy destination before getting in the car or walking to the place. 

Consider our post on calories and the Food Formation and then think about: Big Mac, large fries, and a chocolate shake – about 1,500 calories. That is getting in the ballpark of a DAILY allowance of calories! Numbers like that are pretty hard to swallow!  — Jim Ballard

Serving Sizes Made Easy

Our last post clearly illustrates the importance of paying very close attention to “serving size.”  The nutritional information on the side of a package doesn’t necessarily equal the total amount of food or drink.  It relates to one serving.  For example, I just pulled out of my pantry a bag of pretzels.  To be specific, they are Trader Joe’s Low Fat Honey Whole Wheat Pretzel Sticks.  The nutrition label says “Calories 110.”  Don’t be fooled to think there are a total of 110 calories in the bag, because the information applies to each serving.  The label says each serving size is 10 sticks and there are 12 servings in the bag.  In other words, every 10 sticks (not the whole bag) equal 110 calories. 

Don’t let serving sizes trick you.  A box of twelve fat-free cookies might say 50 calories per serving.  That doesn’t sound too bad until you see that serving size is only one cookie.  That means each cookie is 50 calories, which can add up fast. 

Serving sizes, as well as calories and fat, is part of why fast food has a deservedly bad rap.  When you super-size it, you super-size the calories and fat.  You just don’t need it and it really isn’t good enough to be worth it.  When you are going to allow yourself something that is high in calories or fat, make sure it is an exceptionally wonderful food or drink, not just an extra fistful of French fries.  

How many calories your body needs to be active varies, of course, from person to person.  It depends on such things as your normal level of activity and your metabolism.  A truck driver will generally need fewer calories than a construction laborer, if they both have similar bodies. 

It is all about calorie in, calorie out.  If you take in more than you need, without burning them off, you will gain weight.  You’ll lose weight if you burn off more than you need, without overdoing it.  More on this in our next post!  — Jim Ballard

Eat Smart: Fat, Sugar, Sodium, Calories

Behold the magical food:  fat-free!  Fat free?  So does that mean healthy?  Unfortunately, as we’ve said before, fat isn’t the whole picture.  These days you can find fat-free cakes, brownies, and cookies at the grocery store.  However, take a look at the calorie count, and the sugar and sodium.   Calories rule.  When you are trying to lose weight, it is about calorie in, calorie out. 

Fat-free foods may be a part of a healthy diet, but cannot be eaten with reckless abandon if you are getting hit with too many calories. 

Another ingredient I personally like to avoid is high-fructose corn syrup.  For one reason, the words themselves scare me.  Sounds to me like it is sugar that is extremely high in sugar.  Since we are not doctors, we’re not going to get into the studies that link high-fructose corn syrup to weight gain, high blood pressure, and other health problems, but instead we’ll let some examples of foods high in high-fructose corn syrup speak for themselves:  soda, candy, cookies, cakes, jam, jellies, pancake syrup, sweetened cereals.  Sounds like those fall into the “use very sparingly” category to us. 

Sparingly, by the way, is “once in a while” not “I’ll only drink two sodas today instead of five.”

You may also want to keep your eye on sodium content as it has been linked to high blood pressure.  The daily limit is set at 1,500-2,300 milligrams.  Though this may sound like a high number, sodium seems to be in everything.  According to their website, a can of Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup has 890 milligrams of sodium per serving, a half a cup of condensed soup.  The standard sized can says it contains 2.5 servings.  That means eating one can of soup gets you just about to the daily limit.  So don’t even think about those salted crackers on top!  At Fantasy Healthball’s Diet and Nutrition section, we aren’t militant about what you can and can’t eat.  We just want you to be smart about it by knowing what is going in your mouth and what it is going to do once it gets in your body.  - Jim Ballard

Weight Loss – Don’t Get Too Hung Up on the Numbers

A post from Andrew, the FHB Spokesmodel:

Football is a game of numbers. We all know that. The glory goes to those with completions, receptions, rushes, yards gained, fumbles recovered, interceptions, tackles, field goals made, and above all else, touchdowns. When we look at the box score and the breakdown, those are the things we all see. However, they are only a part of the game. Statistics don’t capture everything that happens on the field. So, like the reserve player on special teams who makes a great block on a kick off to spring a return guy or the offensive lineman who opens an alley  for a speedy running back to dart through, I was recently reminded that numbers aren’t something that tells the whole story. Here’s why.

All summer long I have been riding my bike regularly, building my endurance and speed as I went and watching my clothes get looser and looser. My riding even expanded to the point where I have ridden as many as five to six days a week and attempted a hard century in Maine (chronicled in an October entry). All during that time, I was watching, and perhaps watching too much, as my weight melted away, starting at 325 pounds at the end of May 2008 and dropping to around 240 pounds. Wow, I thought. 85 pounds is a lot of weight, that’s more than two five gallon jugs of spring water. I actually began to be concerned that the weight was coming of TOO quickly, because knowing that muscle is heavier than fat and that my legs are now much more muscular than before, the fat loss would have been even greater. So, I followed the logical route and bought a second scale. WHAM! A reading of around 285 pounds. 

I was about to be discouraged, but then I really thought about it and what it means. I have lost 40+ pound of fat and gained some serious muscle in six months by following a good exercise and diet regimen. I rode a difficult and hilly century in Maine a year before I was planning on doing one and weighed 40 pound more than I actually thought I did! I am riding strongly at 285 pounds and doing at that weight what my brain thought it was doing at 240 pounds. I have great objectives to work on over the winter and into 2009. Don’t get too hung up on the numbers. Stats are nice but it is what you actually do that contributes to your personal victory over flab and moves you towards the better health bowl game.  — Andrew