Episode 12: The Wise Eats Diet Plan Part 1 – Change Your Diet, Change Your Life

In Episode 12, we’re diving deep into diet philosophy and exactly the types of foods you should be eating to lose body fat, build lean muscle, and optimize your life. This is Part 1 of the Wise Eats Diet Plan. Among the topics discussed:

  • The Wise Eats Diet Philosophy
  • My Personal Diet History & Relationship with Food
  • The Foods We ALL Should Be Eating & Avoiding
  • Best Sources of Carbohydrates
  • Grocery Shopping Tips & Tricks
  • Importance of Hydration

Episode Timestamps

  • Intro: What you can expect out of the Wise Eats Diet Plan. (00:30)
  • Bring it back to the diet basics. Forget all the garbage, lies, and nonsense out there. Become the best version of yourself. (02:30)
  • Wise Choice Nation: Subscribe to my free newsletter at WiseChoiceNation.com. When you do, you’ll instantly receive a welcome e-mail containing the full list of Wise Eats Approved Foods, Drinks, and Supplements. Building your diet based on these real foods will help you lose weight, build muscle, increase energy, fight depression, prevent disease, and feel amazing. (3:55)
  • The Wise Eats Diet Philosophy. (4:30)
  • Why your entire existence is defined by the things you’re putting in your body. (5:00)
  • What is real food? (5:30)
  • My diet history: Junk food, deep fried food was LIFE. Burger King, pizza, fry daddy, fried foods galore. Gordon’s Food Service, Bosco Sticks. (6:30)
  • The fitness website that changed my outlook on fitness/nutrition. (7:30)
  • The foods we should ALL be consuming on a regular basis. (8:30)
  • Health benefits of vegetables and some of my favorites. (9:15)
  • How I went from a junk-foodaholic to a vegetable addict. (9:45)
  • CARBS: EAT THEM. My favorite sources other than vegetables. (10:10)
  • Recipes! Wise-Eats.com/SweetPotato, Wise-Eats.com/MegaPowers. (10:25)
  • Foods to avoid at all costs and what I do when I crave them. (11:00)
  • 2009 Wes vs 2019 Wes. (11:30)
  • How my cheat meals are different today and why they can be a good thing. (12:15)
  • The disgusting list of ingredients in fast food and your body as a food filter. (12:30)
  • More on my cheat meals and overcoming junk food addiction. (13:15)
  • Avoid processed foods! Read nutrition fact labels, ingredient lists, and be accountable. (13:40)
  • Grocery shopping: My favorite past time. (14:30)
  • Local farmer’s markets will change the way you shop for groceries. Eastern Market in Detroit, Mount Clemens Farmer’s Market. (14:45)
  • My favorite places to shop for groceries. Costco, Trader Joe’s, Amazon, Vince & Joe’s. (15:45)
  • Grocery shopping tips and tricks. Stay away from processed snack foods. (15:50)
  • How frozen processed junk helped me lose 90lbs but left me skinny and sick. Low-calorie philosophy is WRONG. Shout out to Mike Dolce.  (16:30)
  • Hydration: How much water should you be drinking in a day? (17:15)
  • The good old days when Hi-C Boppin’ Berry, Soda, and Kool-Aid were life. (17:45)
  • Water is my #1 priority each day! (18:30)
  • Our water filtration system of choice: The Berkey. (18:50)
  • Why many popular home filtration systems are NOT the way to go. (19:00)
  • If you don’t filter your water, YOU BECOME the filter. Shout out to Shawn Stevenson.(19:20)
  • Part 1 Wrap Up: Going from super fat, to super thin, to super fit. (19:45)
  • Reminiscing about the day I found the fitness article that changed my paradigm. (20:20)
  • Changing your diet habits can be tough, but I’ve been there, and if I can do it, you can do it too! Make small changes and they will add up to permanent changes over time. (20:45)
  • Subscribe on iTunes & YouTube! Like, comment, and review! (21:45)
  • Don’t forget to go to WiseChoiceNation.com for your free copy of the Wise Eats Approved Foods List. (22:00)
  • Blooper Reel. This show is much more difficult than I thought it was going to be. (22:55)

Join Wise Choice Nation!

Head over to WiseChoiceNation.com and subscribe to my free newsletter. When you do, you’ll immediately receive a welcome e-mail containing the full list of Wise Eats Approved Foods, Drinks, and Supplements. Building your diet based on these real foods will help you lose weight, build muscle, increase energy, fight depression, prevent disease, and feel amazing.

What’s Next?

In Part 2 of the Wise Eats Diet Plan, we’ll discuss protein, fat, supplements, cooking, my daily diet regimen for optimum performance, and more!

Recipes Mentioned in This Episode:

Brands/Products Mentioned in This Episode:

  • The Dolce Diet
  • Berkey Water Filters
  • Trader Joe’s
  • Mount Clemens Farmer’s Market
  • Costco
  • Amazon.com
  • Taco Bell
  • Burger King
  • Hi-C Boppin’ Berry
  • Black Cherry Kool-Aid
  • Whopper
  • Big Mac
  • Gordon’s Food Service
  • Eastern Market Detroit
  • Bosco Sticks
  • Double Quarter Pounder w/ Cheese
  • Cheez-Its
  • Captain Crunch

Movie Clips: Weird Al “Fat” Music Video, Mike Dolce on The Dolce Diet, The Joe Rogan Experience
Editing Animations Thank You: Darin Roberts aka Misteredit1 on YouTube
Website Design Thank YouDoeringDesign.com
Podcast Logo Thank You’s: Mike Guertin (MGSignsDesign.com) & Darin Roberts

Submit questions, comments, feedback to WiseEatsPodcast@gmail.com. Thanks for watching, listening, reviewing, liking, subscribing, and sharing. Be good to yourself, be good to others, and make wise choices!

WELCOME TO EPISODE 12

What’s up wise guys and gals? Welcome to Episode 12 of Wise Eats. Today, we’re diving deep into diet philosophy and exactly the types of foods you should be eating to lose body fat, build lean muscle, and optimize your life. I originally wanted this to be one of the pilot episodes of the show because there’s so much confusion these days. So many diets to follow, so many workout regimens to choose from. So many greedy corporations trying to sell garbage and lies and personal agendas instead of educating people about what actually works. But I’m hoping to change all of that with Wise Eats. We’re bringing it back to basics – Telling you the tactics that will truly help you become the very best version of yourself. We’re all different with varying nutritional needs, beliefs, and goals, but no matter what YOUR diet philosophy is, there are some simple truths that apply to all humans in general, and that’s what I want to get into with today’s episode. We’re not talking shortcuts or quick fixes here. No pills, no potions, no macro restrictions, just what works coming from someone who has overcome some of the worst diet habits imaginable.

WISECHOICENATION.COM FOR A FREE GIFT

Before we dive in, head over to WiseChoiceNation.com and subscribe to my free newsletter, if you haven’t done so already. When you do, you’ll immediately receive a welcome e-mail containing the full list of Wise Eats Approved Foods, Drinks, and Supplements. Building your diet based on these real foods will help you lose weight, build muscle, increase energy, fight depression, prevent disease, and feel amazing. So, get over to WiseChoicenation.com right now, sign up for free, and get that list of approved foods delivered instantly.

THE WISE EATS DIET PHILOSOPHY

Now, the idea behind the Wise Eats Diet Plan is a real simple philosophy that you may have heard before and that is to EAT REAL FOOD. We eat for optimization, plain and simple. No soda, no processed foods, no junk food, take out, or added sugar. Of course, we all have these things from time to time, myself included, but as a general rule, you want to be consuming foods from whole sources, because the nutrients you fuel your body with make up your physical appearance, attitude, mental clarity, energy levels, creativity, mindfulness, and so much more. Literally your entire existence is defined by the things you put into your body. When you put in nothing but junk, that’s what you’re going to get back out. Tired, sick, depressed, and worst of all, imprisoned both mentally and physically from lifestyle-related choices.

WHAT IS REAL FOOD?

So, what exactly is real food? It’s things that come from the Earth, not a science lab. Things that were alive at one time. Fresh fruits, vegetables, free range chicken, grass-fed beef, wild caught fish, nuts, seeds, and grains. We want foods that are raw, organic, and as close to their natural source as possible. Farm fresh and locally sourced. That’s real food. Potato chips, cookies, cheez-its, and monster energy drinks are not real food; they’re poison. They’re scientifically engineered, modified in a lab, then loaded with chemicals, additives, preservatives and fillers. They’re marketed to generate profits but provide no real value or life force to your body. Now, this may seem like common knowledge to you, but it wasn’t always obvious to me.

MY DIET HISTORY & JUNK FOOD ADDICTION

Back in my mid-twenties, I didn’t understand what real food was. I’m sure I had a general sense of what was good and bad for me, I just didn’t pay it much attention. Back then, buy-one-get-one free whoppers from Burger King were life. I would buy entire large pizzas for myself, usually 2 at a time, spread over breakfast lunch and dinner. My most prized kitchen utensil back then was my fry daddy. French fries, mozzarella sticks, fried mushrooms, chicken nuggets, and bosco sticks were all I knew. My life was a constant cycle of junk food. At 270lbs and miserable, I stumbled across a fitness article very similar to the podcast episode I’m recording today. It told me to ditch the junk food and processed food if I wanted to change my body. Imagine that. I wasn’t going to get into great shape eating McDonalds and Taco Bell all the time? Get out of town! Call me naïve, ignorant, or just plain dumb. I simply didn’t realize the impact my diet was having in all areas of my life. Now, I understand proper nutrition, and hope this message can impact someone else who may be in the same spot I was.

FOODS TO FOCUS ON

So, what kinds of real food do we want to consume? Starting with the most important, it’s vegetables in all forms, especially green leafy ones. There are literally an endless amount of benefits for eating green vegetables, like fat loss and disease prevention, but they basically turbo charge your existence. For most of my life, I rarely ate vegetables outside of an iceberg lettuce salad. Today, I have smoothies, salads and stir fries made with all kinds of greens like kale, spinach, and broccoli. Any way I can think of to add vegetables to my diet, I do it, and the health benefits are dramatic! Just try a google search on any way to improve your health and fitness, whether it be getting better sleep, preventing cancer, fighting disease, becoming stronger, or feeling energized, and eating vegetables is going to be very high on the list of ways to accomplish these things. It simply helps with so many different areas of life. It took a long time for me to get used to it, but now I have them with nearly every single meal and can’t live without them. I know if my junk-food addicted self can grow to love vegetables, ANYONE can.

FAVORITE CARBS

My favorite carb sources other than vegetables include oat bran, quinoa, white jasmine rice, sweet potato, and fresh or dried fruit. One of my favorite easy carb recipes is the Slammin’ Sweet Potato which you can find at Wise-Eats.com/SweetPotato – Baked in coconut oil with cinnamon – the perfect complement for a lights out delicious meal!

FOODS TO AVOID

Now, I talked a little bit about the things you should be eating, but how about some of the things you should NOT be eating? For starters, eliminate fast foods, completely. No Taco Bell, Burger King or McDonald’s. I can already hear the 2009 version of myself cringing at the thought of eliminating fast food. But, it happened. I went from having fast food pretty much every day for most of my life to  barely touching the stuff. These days, it doesn’t even register to me as food. Of course, the idea of fast food sounds pretty good when I REALLY think about it, but then I just have my normal, delicious, healthy food that I prepared ahead of time and forget all about it. It’s simply not worth it to poison myself when I know the negative effects it will have on my mood, energy levels, and focus. Of course, I do eat out from time to time or for special occasions, but almost never fast food, it really is the worst of the worst. It’s usually some combination of refined flour, high fructose corn syrup, artificial flavor and colors, trans fats, salt, genetically modified toxins, petroleum products, cow feces, and antibiotics. Your body doesn’t even recognize these foods as fuel, so instead of digesting them, it stores them away as excess body fat. I cringe when I think that I’ve lived more than 2/3 of my life eating these types of foods on a regular basis. These days, my cheat meals consist of home cooked food or a dinner out with my wife, where I’ll fully enjoy myself for one meal then get right back to normal eating afterward.

PROCESSED FOOD

Another poison disguised as food that you should avoid as much as possible is processed food. Chips, cookies, cakes, and snack foods are off limits. If you are buying something packaged, check ingredient lists and avoid chemicals you don’t understand. If it has some type of health claim like low calorie or low fat or low sugar on the package, don’t trust the marketing. Read nutrition fact labels and choose foods with simple ingredients. Educate yourself and take accountability for the things you’re putting in your body. When you sign up for my free newsletter at WiseChoiceNation.com, you’ll instantly receive a list of foods that I recommend as part of a normal, healthy diet.

GROCERY SHOPPING

Now, let’s talk one of my favorite past times: grocery shopping. I used to get everything done at the big supermarkets like Meijer or Wal-Mart. Now, I only go there as a last resort. First, I hit local farmer’s markets as much as possible. Fresh, local produce is the way to go. The closer to the original source, the better. We live in a suburb of Detroit and have a farmer’s market that meets two days per week to offer fresh vegetables and farm fresh eggs. This market was there my whole life and I never took advantage of it! Finally, a couple years ago I decided to try it out, and have been hooked ever since. I try not to buy my vegetables anywhere else. Next to growing your own, I think these markets are your best option. So, find out where your local markets are if you don’t know already. It will be a game changer.

MY FAVORITE SPOTS TO SHOP

My top three places to shop other than farmer’s markets are Costco, Trader Joe’s, and Amazon. When I do go shopping, I stick to fresh produce sections and avoid the middle aisles where most processed junk is located. The bulk of your time in a grocery store should be spent in those outside sections where the fresh produce and meats are located. I stay away from the majority of frozen items unless it’s produce or meat. Frozen dinners and packaged snacks are loaded with sodium, refined sugar, preservatives, and additives. I know because I used to eat them every single day multiple times a day, and they were a staple of my diet when I initially lost 90lbs. Sure, low calorie foods can help you lose weight no matter how processed they are, but all they’ll do is leave you skinny and sick just like they did me.

HYDRATION

You can’t talk diet without touching on hydration. Because I exercise in some form every single day, I usually have about a gallon and a half or more of purified water, but I challenge any person, no matter their fitness level is, to get at least a gallon per day. That might sound outrageous to some, but it’s not hard when you make it a priority. Back in the day, I hardly drank water at all – just pop, Kool-Aid, and fruit juice. I remember as a kid constantly waking up in the middle of the night so miserably tired and thirsty. I’d get up out of bed, do my sleepy eyed, zombie walk to the fridge, and suck down a heaping glass of ice cold kool-aid, Hi-C fruit punch, or Boppin’ Berry. It was the best thing ever, and I was completely oblivious to the toll it was taking on my body. Those were the good old days! But nowadays, water is automatic, and it’s my #1 priority when I wake up each day. By the way, the home filtration system I use is called the Berkey, but there are less expensive options out there. If water quality has not been a priority for you up to this point, it’s time to Wise Up.

CLOSING

That’s gonna do it for Episode 12. Please show your support by subscribing on iTunes and leaving a 5-star rating, which really helps spread the word. If you’re watching on YouTube, click that thumbs up button which shows you’re digging the show, and check out Wise-Eats.com, where you can find all of the recipes mentioned in this episode and much more. Finally, don’t forget to sign up for my free newsletter at WiseChoiceNation.com and instantly receive my approved foods and grocery list. These are exactly the foods I have on a normal basis and what I believe are best for health and performance. My goal is to help as many people get healthy and improve their lives as I possibly can, but I need your help in order to grow. I’m also always on the lookout for the best iTunes reviews, YouTube comments, and social media posts to share on the show, so let me know what you think! Thanks again for tuning in. Now go eat something fresh, do something good, and as always, make wise choices.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *