Tag Archive for: calories

Reducing Calories Improves Immunity

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The two-year results from the Comprehensive Assessment of Long-term Effects of Reducing Intake of Energy (CALERIE) clinical trial—the first controlled study of calorie restriction in healthy humans—were released last week. The purpose of the study was to determine the benefits and hazards of calorie restriction. Animal studies have demonstrated that reducing calories up to 40% allows the animals to live longer, but at a cost: their immune systems become compromised and as a result they have more infections. On top of that, you can restrict that many calories from animals because you feed them, but it’s unrealistic in free-living humans.

After meticulously assessing each person’s basal caloric need, they asked half of the 200 subjects to restrict their calories by 14% and sustain it; if they required 2,100 calories per day, that’s a reduction of about 300 calories a day. That’s just two tablespoons of oil per day; skip the mayo on a burger and get a small order of fries instead of a medium, and that’s it. There are hundreds of little changes like that a person could make to reduce calories by 300 a day.

Under-eating just that little bit and maintaining it triggered an interesting effect: it stimulated the immune response to operate even better than before. I’ll talk about why (and a confirmation of what I’ve always said) on Saturday.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

P.S. The Super Bowl Webinar is over, but you can still watch the replay. Just click if you want to learn more about Reclaiming Your Power!

Reference: SCIENCE. Feb 2022. 375(6581):671-677

Your Holiday Eating Plan

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Over the years, the topic of “How should I eat during the holidays?” comes up over and over. We all want to try to avoid gaining the five to ten pounds during the weeks from Thanksgiving through New Year’s. Depending on your activity levels during the past year and a half with COVID restrictions, you may already be dealing with some extra weight. I think there are two parts to the solution of preventing weight gain during the holiday season.

Increase or Begin to Exercise

In my experience working with people, the holidays are so busy they stop doing what can help deal with stress and extra calories: exercise. Even a 20-minute interval session (found in the Basic Health Info section on drchet.com) can do wonders for relieving stress, and that may help you eat less when those extra calories are available. Or when it all gets to be too much, declare it’s time for your walk and take off.

Exercise isn’t designed to burn a lot of calories unless you really work out strenuously or work out for hours, but it helps keep your metabolism going: you use up your short-term fat storage, and your muscles continue to use energy to recover. It’s an effective way to help prevent weight gain.

Have an Eating Plan

The most important way to eat during the holiday is to have a plan. Strategize. You know when the holiday foods, treats, and goodies are going to be available; decide how you’re going to approach them. Here are the three most popular ways people have said they use.

To Here and No More
Many people decide in advance what and how much they will eat whether at parties or holiday meals. Maybe someone makes the best taquitos you’ve ever eaten and you want to have several. That’s fine. Skip other calorie-laden treats such as the cookies you’re not crazy about and opt for calorie-free drinks instead of calorie-heavy alcohol. Hosts will never be offended when you turn down a drink because you need to save room for the stupendous taquitos.

Another example: Paula and I almost never make cookies other than for the holidays—and when we make them, we’re going to eat our share. Baking days include a lot of soups and salads rather than heavier meals to at least partially make up for all the cookie calories.

Be wary of two things: sugar and salt. Both make you crave more so when you set a limit, you have to stick to it.

Just One Meal
Let’s face it: like Thanksgiving, most holiday gatherings center around one meal. Eat everything you want but in smaller quantities. This is similar to the first approach, but involves more foods you might only get at the holidays: oyster stuffing, gravy with mashed potatoes, or Mom’s special dessert. Eat the foods you love but in reasonable quantities. You can eat more lightly the day before and day after to compensate.

Stay the Course
You’ve worked hard to get your weight to where you want it to be, so you decide to stick to your meal plan. Adjust it to account for the holiday foods but don’t deviate. All foods count; stick to what has worked for you.

One more point: forgive yourself if you fall off the plan. It happens. Put it behind you and get a fresh start the next day.

The Bottom Line

The idea of holiday gatherings is to enjoy the company of others, and part of the celebration is food and drink. Decide on an eating plan, stick as close as you can to your workout plan, and you may not have to start the year by resolving to lose what you gained over the six weeks of the holiday season.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

It’s All About the Calories

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The paper advocating the carbohydrate-insulin model (CIM) for explaining the obesity pandemic, not only in the U.S. but throughout the world, was written by the leading experts in endocrinology and nutrition. There were experts who’ve conducted some of the major nutritional studies that you’ve heard about over the years, from the Women’s Health Initiative to studies on the ketogenic diet. This is an expert group.

I agree with their desire for more research in this area. They’re trying to find out what would constitute their definition of cause: what increases appetite? Does palatability drive food choices? What hormones impact how much a person eats? And more. Where I disagree is in their lack of acknowledgement of the energy balance model (EBM) as valid. I outlined a written response to send to the journal that would have been about five pages long. Here are my two primary arguments.

Prior Research on Weight Loss

The authors talk about prior research showing that a low-fat diet doesn’t work long term; one of the authors was heavily involved in the weight loss study on a low-fat diet in the Women’s Health initiative. Their analysis was incorrect. The objective of that study was to compare a group of normally fed women eating the typical American diet of close to 40% fat with a group who was going to lower their fat intake to 20%. In the analysis, there were no differences in weight loss over the course of the study. The results suggested that a low-fat diet doesn’t work.

Here’s the problem: looking at the data from that study, what you see is that the women who were supposed to achieve a 20% fat intake couldn’t get below 28%. That doesn’t meet the goals of the study and thus doesn’t support their conclusion.

The Minnesota Starvation Experiment

My primary argument goes back to the research done on conscientious objectors during World War II. I’ve talked about this fascinating study many times, but here’s the short version: for a period of six months, 36 men who were conscientious objectors had their caloric intake cut by 25%. Their physical activity was also increased; they had to walk up to 22 miles per week.

What was unique was that they were weighed every week and their caloric intake adjusted based on weight loss or weight gain. If they did not lose the required amount, they were given less food. If they lost too much, they were given more food.

What makes that study even more consequential is the types of food that they were given to eat. The menu was very low fat and had virtually no protein; it consisted of breads and starches from root vegetables. In the CIM, that would be just about the worst types of food to eat to lose weight. But remember, the purpose of that study was to feed people foods that would be available after the end of the war. Every subject lost weight and lost it on a linear basis; most emerged looking emaciated. That’s the only study I’ve ever seen where people lost weight in a linear fashion over that period of time, and they did it eating an almost 100% carbohydrate diet.

The Bottom Line

There are many other aspects of the paper that I could comment on, but those are my two strongest points. I do believe that insulin is the most powerful hormone in the body; it does help store food as fat if someone overeats for an extended period of time. That makes it more difficult to sustain weight loss until the body is retrained to lose weight and keep it off.

But let me be clear: it always was, it is, and it always will be about the calories regardless of the source. Eat too many and you gain weight. Eat fewer and you lose weight. For sure, make better choices on the selection of the food that you eat and move more. But it’s all about the calories. Period.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Reference: AJCN. 2021. doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/ajcn/nqab270.

The Weight Loss Battle: Carbs vs Calories

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As a member of the American Society of Nutrition, I get a news feed that lets me know what’s being published in their journals. A recent article talked about the carbohydrate-insulin model (CIM) as a cause of the obesity pandemic. The debate surrounded the question of whether the energy balance model (EBM) that says calories in should equal calories out is adequate to explain the 70% overweight population in the U.S. Instead, a large group of researchers suggested that it’s time to research insulin as it relates to the highly refined carbohydrate intake of the population as the actual cause of obesity.

But that’s not all. The article suggested that insulin causes the body to store excess carbs as fat. More than that, to maintain blood sugars, it forces people to eat more carbs because they’re actually being starved, which drives hunger and is actually responsible for obesity. They went on to explain the fallacy of the EBM model and to deal with the criticism of the CIM model. In actuality, the researchers want to study the CIM approach, and this was a call for research to find out what really causes obesity.

To say it didn’t sit well in the nutrition and medical community is an understatement. Over 100K responses were generated in a couple of weeks, and I guess the nutrition Twitter world went nuts. Why? This is actually a battle over the ketogenic diet and everything else that focuses on counting calories. I’ll give you my opinion and why I believe what I do on Saturday.

The Insider Conference call is tomorrow night at 9 p.m. Eastern. If you have questions about your health or products, become an Insider before 8 p.m. and you can participate. Even if you only want to listen, you’ll learn something new to improve your health and the health of others you know.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Reference: AJCN. 2021. doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/ajcn/nqab270.

Improvements in the Nutrition Facts Labels

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The new nutrition facts labels are out and as promised, I’m going to tell you what I think is important about them. Let’s get right to it.

  • The listing of calories per serving is large enough that you can actually read it without searching for it. This is the biggest positive change; I had problems finding it at times and now, it’s the biggest type on the label.
  • The serving size is clearly identifiable. This should eliminate the misdirection food manufacturers used to use to suggest that a half . . .

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Reader’s Edition: How to Treat Obesity

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Thank you again for your responses to my question about obesity—you all did a great job. Some answers were short, and some went into a lot of detail. Just like last week, I’ve excerpted some of your answers. Enjoy reading what others have done and are doing, because if you have weight you’d like to abandon, you’ll find some tips in here to help you out.

A New Lifestyle
“It’s a lifestyle decision to make. Eat less by using a salad plate rather than a dinner plate—no seconds. Eat heart-healthy foods . . .

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If you're already a DrChet.com Member or Insider, click on the Membership Login link on the top menu. Members may upgrade to Insider by going to the Store and clicking Membership; your membership fee will be prorated automatically.