Transcription
For the past year, I've been eating the same breakfast every single morning. And it's one of the biggest reasons I've gone from being hungry all day long and out of shape to barely thinking about food and staying effortlessly lean year-round. It's built on a principle I call carb hacking. And once you understand how it works, you'll never eat breakfast the same way again.
This one meal keeps you full for twice as long as anything else you could eat in the morning. It's loaded with every essential nutrient your body needs. It only takes 5 minutes to make, and it's cheap. So, when I show you what this is, you might think I'm crazy or an idiot. In fact, just a year ago, I probably would have thought the same thing. And yet, it works better than any healthy breakfast I've ever tried.
Before I show you what it is and why it works so well, we first need to break down why the breakfast that most fat loss experts recommend is actually silently ruining your physique. Because, once you see how the breakfast you've been told to eat hijacks your hunger hormones and sabotages your metabolism, you'll understand why the mainstream is actually fighting against your biology and how by doing the opposite you're actually working with it.
What most experts will tell you is the best breakfast for fat loss is oats, often with some protein powder and some frozen fruit or something very similar. I ate this breakfast every single morning for years. It was a disaster. Here's how this works against your biology when it comes to fat loss.
In just a single serving of 70 g of oats and 100 g of frozen fruit, there is roughly 65 g of carbohydrates. This may sound like a good thing. Carbohydrates are meant to give you lots of energy. But, here's the thing about carbohydrates. Every single gram of them, regardless of the source, breaks down into sugar. So, within 30 minutes, as the sugar is broken down by your digestive system, your blood sugar starts to spike. After this meal, your blood sugar continues to rise for the next 30 minutes to 2 hours.
This elevated level of blood sugar is very toxic. When excess sugar is in your blood, it begins to fuse to the outside of your cells. This is a highly inflammatory process called glycation. Picture sugar caramelizing on a pan. It's the same idea, except it's happening to all of your cells throughout your body. This makes people age faster, develop wrinkles, and causes body-wide inflammation, which is the root cause of essentially every health issue.
It is what comes after the spike that is what's wrecking your physique. Because your body wants to bring its blood sugar levels back down as fast as it can, it releases another hormone called insulin. And if you've ever noticed that come mid-morning after eating carbohydrates for breakfast, you all of a sudden cannot stop thinking about food, you're in a bad mood, and everyone seems annoyed. Well, this is because of what insulin does. Insulin's job is it essentially knocks on the door of your cells. It tells them to open up so sugar can move out of your blood and into the cell, where it gets burned for energy.
Now, here's the massive problem. After 2 to 3 hours of consuming this meal, your blood sugar starts to come back down. In most people after a high-carbohydrate meal like this, it will at least to a very minor degree go below your baseline level. And for many people it goes well below this level. This state is called reactive hypoglycemia. Now, you certainly don't want high blood sugar levels, but you also don't want low blood sugar levels either. In this state your body essentially thinks it's run out of stored body fat, and as a result you get ridiculously hungry. Hence why come 10:00 a.m. after this meal you're suddenly starving.
Now, this begs the question. Why has this happened? Why has your body allowed your blood sugar to go below baseline? Your body has the ability to turn its own fat into glucose and keep blood sugar at an ideal level. So, why is your body not done this? Well, it all comes back to that hormone insulin. When insulin is elevated, it acts like a lock on your fat cells. To burn stored body fat, your body relies on a hormone called hormone-sensitive lipase. Hormone-sensitive lipase is what pulls fat out of storage and releases it into your bloodstream as fuel.
Now, this enzyme, it certainly lives up to its name because hormone-sensitive lipase is very sensitive to the hormone insulin. Insulin actually shuts it off completely. So, as long as your insulin level is high, your fat is biochemically locked away. You could be running a marathon and your body it still would not touch it. This is why with marathon runners, regardless as to their body fat levels, they're often consuming sugar gels the entire time. And the thing with insulin is that when it rises after a high carbohydrate meal, it actually stays elevated for hours, even after your blood sugar is back at baseline or below it.
So, now your blood sugar is lower than your body wants, but your body can't access its stored fat to use it for energy. In response to this, it does the only thing it can. It fires off a powerful hunger signal to your brain telling you you need to eat immediately. As far as your body's concerned, your tank is completely empty and there's no way to refill it other than going and finding more food. So, then what happens is well, you're starving and you have to eat again. Likely you'll have some more carbohydrates and then a few hours later after this next meal, you crash again. And this cycle goes on all day.
It is this vicious cycle right here as to why 95% of diets fail. It's also why you can eat a massive meal of oats or bread for breakfast and still be starving come 10:00 a.m. The bottleneck or limiting factor for 99% of people in regards to looking so good that every single person you know is asking for your secret is appetite. It's how hungry are you? So, when you start your day by eating something that starts this hormonal cascade that makes you hungry all day long, it makes perfect sense as to why most people don't look the way they want to look.
The thing with oats is that they're not even the worst carbohydrate source at doing this. They are actually what is referred to as a complex carbohydrate, meaning they increase your blood sugar at a slower rate that also doesn't peak as high. And therefore, when you consume them, your blood sugar also comes back down in a much more steady manner in comparison to other types of carbohydrates. With other foods such as white bread, which are referred to as simple carbohydrates, the effect of this is even sharper. Your blood sugar shoots up faster, insulin floods in faster, and the crash on the other side is even steeper.
But another massive problem with oats, and this is one very few people talk about, is that they contain a compound called phytic acid. Phytic acid is essentially a mineral magnet. It is part of a category of compounds referred to as anti-nutrients. When you consume phytic acid, it grabs nutrients and minerals such as zinc, iron, and magnesium from your meal, and it locks them up so your body can't absorb them. And the degree to which it does this is rather shocking. A study conducted by Larson, published in the British Journal of Nutrition, found the body only absorbs 11.8% of the zinc and 4.4% of the iron from a standard bowl of oatmeal. And other studies have shown it actually binds with the nutrients from the other foods you consume these oats with.
Now, what does this mean it when it comes to fat loss? Well, it connects to a deeper rule about hunger that most people completely miss. Hunger as a whole is very multifaceted, and there are many factors that affect it. We just saw this with the blood sugar example. But, a major factor in this hunger equation is how many nutrients have you consumed, and more importantly, how many have you absorbed? Your body is looking for every nutrient it needs to run. B12, vitamin A, K2, choline, iron, zinc, you name it, every single essential nutrient, hence the name, your body it needs them. And it will keep you hungry for as long as it needs until it gets all of these nutrients. So, when you eat a food that is high in this potent nutrient-blocking compound, you're less likely to feel full because your body still hasn't gotten what it needs.
As you can see, if you're looking to lose fat and get in the best shape of your life, eating oatmeal or any high-carbohydrate meal for that matter is generally not a good idea. It's certainly not optimal, and I used to eat this every single morning. I thought this was the best thing I could possibly be eating in order to look great, but I was very wrong. When I ate this for breakfast, I was hungry 24/7. I spent most of my life thinking about food. It got to a point where I'm not joking when I say this, either. I would literally dream about burgers. This made getting in shape and, more importantly, staying in shape, because, I mean, who really cares if you only look good for a month, essentially impossible.
Luckily, however, it certainly does not have to be this way. So, what should you have instead? This breakfast right here is the breakfast I have eaten basically every day for the last year, and it has taken me from being starving all day long to basically never thinking about food. What I eat every morning is beef and eggs. Specifically, it's around 150 g of beef and three whole eggs. That is literally it. And I choose these two foods very specifically due to how they affect your biology. The biology of what's actually happening inside your body when you start your day eating this versus oats or any high-carbohydrate meal for that matter is night and day.
The first thing is with your blood sugar. Beef and eggs have essentially zero carbs, so your blood sugar barely moves. It rises slightly and stays slightly elevated for roughly 2 to 3 hours. Then, after 3 hours, because the spike was so small, it slowly comes back down and never drops below baseline. So, you never get this reactive hypoglycemia. Then, because your insulin also stays low, your fat cells stay completely unlocked, so your body can actually access its stored body fat as fuel.
But, by no means is this the only way that this meal impacts your hunger hormones. Beef and eggs are both extremely high in healthy fats. Healthy fats trigger the highest release of CCK. This is a powerful satiety hormone produced in your gut that tells your brain that you're full. But the greatest part about this meal in regards to both overall health and fat loss is actually its nutrient profile. The vast majority of people have no idea just how nutrient dense these foods are. In just three whole eggs, it gives you complete protein with one of the highest absorption rates of any food on earth. Plus choline, vitamin A, K2, as well as the cholesterol your body needs, which actually acts as the precursor or building blocks your body used to make many hormones such as testosterone, estrogen, and every other quote steroid hormone. And then in regards to beef, well, meat from a nutrient standpoint is actually the perfect food. It contains every single nutrient that we humans need. And because meat doesn't contain any anti-nutrient compounds, these nutrients that are in beef, we can actually absorb them and therefore use them. So because with this meal, your body is getting every single nutrient it needs to run, you're not going to stay hungry due to a deficiency that it is desperately trying to fix.
Because I eat this breakfast every day, most days I'm not hungry until at least the early afternoon. Often it's not until dinner. In fact, because this meal is so satiating, many days when I eat a similar meal for dinner the night prior, I'm so satiated that come the next morning I'm still too full to eat and I don't want to have my breakfast till the afternoon, which I mean technically is still breakfast. Break-fast. But calling your afternoon meal as breakfast it it still feels a bit weird.
Now some people like to have fruit with this meal. And when I started eating this way a few years ago, I thought this would be a good idea. And I did try that. I figured since it was relatively low carb, it would work well. But I was wrong about this. The hyper sweetness of fruit just made me want to eat more of it. And I've heard many people say the same. So for me personally, I do much better with just meat and eggs. I cannot emphasize just how much of a fat loss hack it is having a zero carb breakfast. I went from being hungry all day long and suffering to get in shape to having essentially zero hunger at all. And as a result, I can stay lean effortlessly.
Now, this one switch right here, ditching carbs for beef and eggs in the morning, is enormous on its own. But, here's the thing. You could eat the perfect meal for breakfast and still get nowhere if you're not doing this next thing. But, first, a quick word from today's sponsor.
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Now, back to that mistake that ruins your fat loss even if your breakfast seems perfect on paper. What many people do is they cook their meals in vegetable oils, which despite what their name suggests, are not made from vegetables. They are actually made using petrochemical derived chemicals, which extract the oil from seeds of plants like soybean, sunflower, and many nuts. Now, I could make a 3-hour lecture on the problems with these in regards to your health. But, in regards to fat loss specifically, these oils have a very interesting but problematic mechanism.
Now, when you first hear this, you might think I'm crazy. But, I promise, this is backed by very credible science. You know the term the munchies in regards to people that smoke weed. Pot smokers will often talk about how after a few puffs, they can demolish an entire pizza or ice cream or whatever these pot smokers are eating. The reason this occurs is because of the active compound in weed called THC. This is what is referred to as an endocannabinoid. How cannabinoids work is they bind to receptors in your brain called CB1 receptors. They essentially act as one of the many master switches for hunger. When CB1 gets activated, your brain starts firing off intense cravings. Your appetite goes through the roof, and you suddenly want to eat everything in sight. Well, vegetable oils actually do the same thing. When you consume linoleic acid, which is the main fatty acid in vegetable oils, what actually happens is your brain converts them into endocannabinoids, which then bind to the same CB1 receptors in your brain that THC binds to. As a result, the same hunger pathway that pot smokers describe as the munchies is activated. This is why you can't stop eating foods like french fries, which are deep fried in these oils. Instead, what you want to make sure you're doing is cooking in animal fats like butter or beef tallow. These are the fats that humans have always eaten, and therefore we're biologically adapted to consume them. So, that's the second best practice for an optimal morning routine. Make sure you're cooking your meal in healthy animal fats.
Now, the final thing I do in the morning to burn fat is very different from the first two. And to explain why this is so effective, I I it's better to use physics rather than biology. When a plane is taking off, it claws its way up the runway. As it takes off, it has to fight gravity, drag, and even its own weight. In those first few minutes, it burns nearly eight times more fuel per mile than it will for the entire rest of the flight. Then, something flips. It reaches cruising altitude. All of a sudden, it has momentum, and it's gliding straight through the air using very minimal fuel to what it was using during takeoff.
The reason I'm talking to you about airplanes is the same as true with everything. You know how when you've been eating good for a while and you're feeling good, people are coming up to you and telling you how good you look, asking for your secret. And all of a sudden, it feels effortless to stay on track with your routine. You no longer even want junk food. You see a donut and you feel nothing. You're completely locked in. Well, this right here is the power of momentum. Now, this works in the macro over months when months of being consistent stack on top of one another, but it also works in the short term.
This right here is why I start my days off with a short morning walk. When you start your day with this morning walk, you've already won the first battle. You feel great, and this momentum of feeling so good, it carries throughout the day. On top of this, walking also helps with your blood sugar. And studies have shown when people get morning light exposure, even if it's not super sunny, it sets their circadian rhythm, which is your body's internal clock that decides when you're tired, energetic, and even when you're hungry. Studies have also shown that when your circadian rhythm is aligned, you have significantly lower appetite in the evening. And it's this time right here where most people lose the war. For me personally, the correlation between whether or not I do this walk in the morning and whether or not I win the day as a whole in regards to my nutrition, my training, even my overall productivity is honestly ridiculous. So, that's the third thing I do every morning, a quick 30-minute walk.
By combining a low-carbohydrate breakfast cooked in animal fats with a morning walk, it is seriously going to transform your body composition without you even trying. You're no longer going to have to suffer all day long with intense hunger and cravings. I can confirm that I no longer I'm dreaming about burgers.
I'm also very excited to announce that for the first time in over a year, I'm taking on new clients for my 90-day fat loss challenge. In this challenge we work one-on-one together to design the perfect diet and lifestyle program that optimizes your biology. This makes your body melt fat off effortlessly while simultaneously sending your energy levels to an all-time high. Hundreds of people have already had life-changing transformations through this program. If you're ready to become physically unrecognizable whilst feeling better than you ever have, click the link next to the words work with me in the description of this video.
The reason most people have to sacrifice and suffer so much to get in shape and stay in shape is not because they're lazy or they lack discipline. It is because the way they're eating is working against biology. And the thing is at the end of the day biology it always wins. Which is why it is a great idea to act in accordance with it. Anyway, as always great speaking with you and I'll see you next time.