The All-Day Fat-Burning Diet: The 5-Day Food-Cycling Formula That Resets Your Metabolism To Lose Up to 5 Pounds a Week (6 page)

I believe that added sugar is the single worst ingredient in the modern diet, especially as it pertains to fat loss. Numerous studies show that eating excess amounts of added sugar can have harmful effects on metabolism, leading to insulin resistance, belly fat gain, high triglycerides, and increases in dangerous low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol.
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Sugar is fattening, partly because it doesn’t get registered in the same way as other calories by the brain, making us eat more. Not surprisingly, studies show that people who eat the most sugar are at a high risk of future weight gain and obesity.
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That’s frightening since our average sugar consumption has skyrocketed in the past 75 years with the advent of glass bottling technology, refrigerated vending machines, and the use of high-fructose corn syrup as a cheaper sweetening option.

At a very basic level, sugar makes you fat because it’s quickly broken down and its glucose component spikes your blood sugar. As a result, insulin is released to remove all that excess sugar from the blood, and it’s stored in your muscles, liver, and fat cells. The important thing to note is that your muscles and liver can store only so much in the form of glycogen before a “spillover” occurs. This leads to any additional sugar or carbohydrate being stored as fat.

Insulin
is not your friend if your goal is to lose fat. Since insulin is a storage hormone, elevated insulin levels force you into fat-storing mode. Conversely, when insulin levels are low, your body can start breaking down fat for fuel—if the conditions are right.

But the problem with sugar doesn’t just stop there. Sugar is actually 50 percent glucose (the form of sugar we just discussed that your body actually uses to produce energy) and 50 percent fructose. The latter is arguably even more devastating to your health and waistline. For years, the medical and dietary community has mainly been concerned with the glycemic index (GI) of foods, which only accounts for the glucose-mediated rise in blood sugar after eating a specific food. The glycemic index typically ranges between 50 and 100, where 100 represents the standard, an equivalent amount of pure glucose.

Foods with carbohydrates that break down quickly during digestion and release glucose rapidly into the bloodstream tend to have a high GI; foods with carbohydrates that break down more slowly, releasing glucose more gradually into the bloodstream, tend to have a low GI. A lower glycemic index is ideal since it suggests slower rates of digestion and a muted insulin response. Carbohydrates with a low glycemic index include slow-burning foods like beans and legumes, whereas breads and cereals tend to have a much higher glycemic index. It’s no surprise, then, that the latter are more heavily involved in the development of diabetes and obesity.

The trouble is that nowadays almost all fast foods are loaded with high-GI carbs. Just walk into your local Starbucks and look at all the food options in the display case. What do you see? Bagels, muffins, scones, and a host of pastries. These are all high–glycemic index carbs that spike your insulin, increase your fat storage, and take you on an up-and-down energy roller coaster.

Now back to fructose for a second, because this is really important to understand: With all the attention that the glycemic index has received, many people have forgotten (or are completely unaware) that fructose is potentially a bigger problem. After all, the GI does not account for the fructose content in foods. And since table sugar is
50
/50 glucose and fructose, we’re overlooking a big piece of the puzzle. The trouble with fructose is that it cannot be used by our cells. It must first be metabolized by the liver and converted into glucose before it can be shipped to the rest of our cells to be of any use to us.

But here’s the problem—our liver can process only so much fructose at once. It is a rate-dependent process, where any excess ends up being converted into uric acid and triglycerides. Think of it as an assembly line where parts move down the conveyor belt as workers deal with them in a timely fashion. Now, what would happen if the speed of the conveyor belt increased? Obviously, the workers would not be able to keep up and parts would be flying off the belt and piling up on the floor. That’s what happens in your liver when you consume too much fructose. And here’s the worst part—it doesn’t take a lot of fructose to create this problem. Drink a can of soda or a bottled juice, and you’re already there.

The only ways to avoid this backup and spillover into triglyceride formation are to eat less fructose (ideal), slow your intake of it, or exercise intensely (which is the only known way to increase your liver’s ability to handle more fructose at once).

Understanding this is very important, especially if you’re a relatively sedentary person. If you train like a pro athlete, then you have some more wiggle room, but the average person simply doesn’t.

So fructose is bad news. Here are just a few more reasons why.

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Fructose forces your liver to create fats, which are exported as very-low-density-lipoprotein (VLDL) cholesterol (the most dangerous kind), leading to dangerous blood tryglicerides and cholesterol levels, fat around your vital organs, and, ultimately, heart disease.
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Fructose increases blood levels of uric acid, leading to gout and elevated blood pressure.
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It causes a buildup of fat in the liver, potentially leading to nonalcoholic fatty liver disease.
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It causes insulin resistance, which ultimately leads to obesity and type 2 diabetes.
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Fructose doesn’t tell your brain that you’re full, making you eat more total calories.
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Excess fructose consumption may cause leptin resistance, throwing body fat regulation out of whack and contributing to obesity.
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When I talk about fructose, the most common question that arises is whether fruit, which contains fructose, is bad for us. The short answer is no. Fruits aren’t just watery bags of fructose; they are real foods with a low energy density and lots of fiber. That fiber slows the release of fructose from the stomach into the liver. Since fructose metabolism is a rate-dependent process, the natural fiber found in fruit is the key. Knowing this will help you understand why eating an apple is much better for you than drinking apple juice. In fact, did you know that, ounce for ounce, apple juice and Coca-Cola have the exact same amount of sugar? Yup, 0.11 gram of sugar per milliliter. Crazy, right?

If you’ve followed my work, you’ll know that I’m a huge proponent of juicing. But I’m not talking about juicing fruit. Why? Because when you juice fruit, you remove the fiber and create liquid fructose, which—although it may contain some good vitamins and minerals—is a health disaster in the making. If you’re going to juice, and you totally should, focus on juicing vegetables. You can add in one apple or a pear for a touch of sweetness. But please don’t juice five apples or two melons, okay? You’re just asking for trouble.

So, to recap, eating fruit in its whole form is fine. Juicing it is not. And that holds true for those bottled, so-called healthy juices you find at Starbucks or your local grocery store. Look at their labels, and you’ll see that they contain a truckload of sugar. Look at their ingredient list and you’ll see why. Take Odwalla’s Original Superfood Fruit Smoothie Blend as an example. Although it’s cleverly disguised as a healthy green smoothie, it really isn’t. Its ingredient list looks like this:

Apple Juice, Peach Purée, Mango Purée, Strawberry Purée, Banana Purée, Spirulina, Soy Lecithin, Vitamin C (Ascorbic Acid), Kale, Wheat Grass, Barley Grass, Wheat Sprouts, Jerusalem Artichoke, and Nova Scotia Dulse.
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And
it contains soy! A green smoothie whose first five and thus more prominent ingredients are fruit juices and fruit purées? That’s not much of a green smoothie, if you ask me. It’s really a 450-milliliter dose of 49 grams of liquid sugar (more than in Coca-Cola), with just 2 grams of fiber. That’s certainly much less fiber than you would get if you made a blended smoothie at home.

If you made a predominantly fruit-based smoothie (in a blender, not a juicer) at home, you would get a lot more fiber. Let me illustrate by showing you one of my favorite (although higher-carb) green smoothies. In it, I put:

When I calculate the nutrient breakdown (using
cronometer.com),
I get the following amounts of sugar and fiber.

Sugar = 50 grams (about 25 grams of fructose)

Fiber = 14 grams

That’s a much different story than the bottled juice smoothie. Yes, this smoothie is higher in sugar, but much of it is buffered by a good amount of fiber. That’s the difference when you make things from scratch versus relying on sneaky food companies.

FAT TRIGGER #6:

Too Much “Frankenfood”

Throughout this book, I’m going to drill something into your head: For the most part, being fat is not your fault. However, it is your responsibility to change—never forget that. I hope that becomes particularly clear when you see the impact of this next section. It should be pretty evident that you need to cut yourself a little slack.

We humans have the same neurobiology as we did hundreds of
thousands
of years ago, but we now live in a much different environment. This has led us to eat more food without even being aware of it. Much of the blame rests in the hands of criminal food companies that have been allowed to get away with food-engineering nonsense for far too long. These products are sometimes called Frankenfoods. And you’re about to see how they’re destroying your body and making or keeping you fat.

There are many causes of obesity, but one indisputable fact is that calorie consumption has increased dramatically over the past few decades.
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It’s important to keep in mind that it is not some collective moral failure that has driven our increased calorie intake. Instead, since all behavior is driven by our underlying biology and its interaction with our environment, we have to consider how the changes in our food supply have altered the way our brains and hormones work. In other words, changes in our food supply have caused malfunctions in our bodies, which are designed to protect us from getting fat. This is a big reason for the increased calorie intake and weight gain,
not
a lack of willpower.

I want to show you exactly how this is happening, to give you a better understanding of why you have food cravings, why you can’t seem to pass on dessert even though you’re full, and why even the best of intentions is futile when the wrong foods are in your house. To make sense of all this, it’s important to first understand that your brain ultimately drives all your food-related behavior.
All of it.

Your brain is always collecting information from inside your body and from your external environment. It then integrates that information to select the appropriate internal (physiological) and external (behavioral) responses. When it comes to food, your brain is constantly juggling your internal energy status (do you have sufficient calories?) and environmental triggers to determine the most appropriate digestive/metabolic (physiological) and eating (behavioral) responses.

If your body is low on energy (fat stores, calories), your brain will prompt you to eat. Likewise, as you’re about to learn, when you see a TV commercial with a mouthwatering burger (environmental trigger), that, too, can lead to a greater desire to eat, even in the absence of hunger.

Much
of our ultimate behavior has to do with dopamine centers in the brain. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter intimately involved with rewards. When we do something or eat something pleasurable, dopamine centers in our brains like the ventral tegmental area and the substantia nigra light up like fireworks on the Fourth of July. These areas then send information to other areas of our brains that prompt us to take action to get more of that good feeling. It’s the same mechanism that creates a drug addiction or triggers any other type of highly rewarding behavior. Dopamine is a very important driver of behavior.

For instance, a study in mice showed that dopamine-deficient mice were totally unable to execute any goal-oriented behaviors. They would not even drink or eat until dopamine was surgically injected back into their brains.
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It’s that powerful! Dopamine thus plays a big role in how we select certain behaviors and helps to explain why eating chocolate cake is much more appealing than eating a boiled potato. More on that in a minute.

To help understand why eating certain foods is more appealing than eating others, we have to understand that our bodies (our brains, really) favor calorie density, fat, sugar, starch, salt, free glutamate, and the absence of bitterness. These are known as innate preferences. They are built-in factory settings that help explain why even babies prefer sweet foods over bitter ones.

As we go through life and eat various foods along the way, we develop “learned preferences,” which are sensory properties that have been repeatedly associated with innately preferred properties. For instance, if we grow up eating sugary cereal and the ingredients in that cereal (think sugar, food dyes, etc.) excite our dopamine centers, we will learn to want more of that food. We learn that this specific cereal makes us feel good, and so we want more of it. It’s classical conditioning at work, just like the famous Pavlovian study on dogs where the ringing of a bell triggered salivation due to the previous association of that bell with the arrival of food.