Turbo Tuna Dubliner Melt

This morning, I ran out of my comfort food (vienna sausage and scrambled eggs), so I had to improvise. I saw a can of tuna and I remembered how I used to like tuna sandwiches. Since I had all the ingredients on hand, with the Turbo Cooker at the ready, I decided to whip up a new comfort (ehem, healthy) food.

Let me share my quick and easy way to a Turbo Tuna Dubliner Melt on Honey Wheat:

Drain a can of Chunk White Albacore Tuna (Starkist Very Low Sodium seems to be my new favorite).

Toss with sea salt, freshly ground black pepper, chopped sweet onions, sweet pickle relish, and light mayonnaise (I'd put capers and chopped celery if available). Load tuna mix and a thick slab of Dubliner cheese on slices of honey wheat bread.

Turbo toast until cheese melts.

Slap warm slices together.

Enjoy with favorite greens on the side. Yum! Healthy comfort food.

Book Review: "Conquer the Fat-Loss Code" by Wendy Chant

Conquer the Fat-Loss Code is nothing short of a complete strategy to lose fat, raise metabolism, shed unwanted pounds, and remain fit for life. Wendy Chant has presented a book that not only explains the science behind the body’s reactions to food and exercise, but also details how to take advantage of these natural tendencies.

Chant’s book is a quick read because she explains the fat-loss code in simple, readily understandable terms. She also outlines all the principles involved in optimizing fat-loss (like the meal plan cycles) in straightforward bulleted paragraphs and in-a-nutshell “Conquer the Code” boxes for quick comprehension and reference. Testimonials to the success of the Fat-Loss Code (inserted in the book as “What the Code Crackers Are Saying”) are short stories that add to the credibility of the method.

Chant’s book is also a long-term guide because it has a complete 8-week planner that lists daily food suggestions, weight training and cardio schedules, and a feedback log complete with the day’s affirmation. The book not only explains the fat-loss code, it also provides the tools you need to apply the code to your particular situation. Chant even fine-tunes the program to differentiate plans for men and women, and those aiming to lose less (or more) than 30 pounds.

Of course, a plan is only as good as its Plan B. So, Chant also includes tips and tactics for special days like weekends, travel, and holidays, plus a special section on what to do if you fall off the wagon. And it goes without saying that the chapter on “Quick Tips for Ultimate Success” merits a permanent bookmark.

The last section of the book could be the most precious gift from Wendy Chant: it features her own recipes for breakfast, shakes, soups, salads, vegetables, entrées, and desserts. And to round out her comprehensive book, she adds an appendix of the Beginner’s Home Workout and several pages of references and scientific basis for her fat-loss code.

Anyone who has tried any kind of diet or regimen for losing fat (and maybe did not achieve the desired results) deserves to try Wendy Chant’s method. The science is sound, the code is simple, and this book is the key.

License To Eat Fast Food

Stripped from today’s headlines:

Obesity An 'International Scourge'
Conference Warns Of Global Fat Pandemic's Consequences

"Obesity is an international scourge," Prof. Paul Zimmet, the chairman of the meeting of more than 2,500 experts and health officials, told delegates in a speech opening the International Congress on Obesity. "This insidious, creeping pandemic of obesity is now engulfing the entire world."

An average adult is supposed to require only about 2000 calories of food per day to stay healthy. When the World Health Organization says that more than 1 billion adults around the world are overweight, with 300 million of them considered obese, I’m not surprised. It’s really very easy to exceed our daily food intake quota, especially in the more industrialized nations where everything is biggie-sized. With all the excess calories we consume getting stored in the body as fat, we’re kicked into the obese category quicker than we can say, “Burp.”

So, having too much time on my hands, I went surfing for the nutrition information on some of our favorite fast food places (interesting how they all provide these numbers now for public consumption – pun intended). I culled the calorie and fat count of their biggest and smallest burger items (all their other burger choices have nutrition values in between) from Wendy’s, McDonald’s, Burger King, and Carl’s Jr.:

Wendy’s
Big Bacon Classic = 580 calories, 29 grams of fat
Jr. Burger = 280 calories, 9 grams of fat
http://www.wendys.com/food/pdf/us/nutrition.pdf

McDonalds
Double Quarter Pounder with cheese = 730 calories, 40 grams of fat
Hamburger = 260 calories, 9 grams of fat
McDonald's Menu Items Nutrition

Burger King
Triple Whopper Sandwich with Cheese = 1230 calories, 82 grams of fat
Whopper Jr. = 370 calories, 21 grams of fat
http://www.bk.com/Nutrition/PDFs/brochure.pdf

Carl’s Jr.
Double Six Dollar Burger = 1522 calories, 110 grams of fat
Low Carb Six Dollar Burger = 490 calories, 37 grams of fat
http://www.carlsjr.com/content/downloads/nutrition.pdf

Now, for my radical idea...

The Health Department should issue “License To Eat Fast Food” cards specifically for dining in fast food restaurants. They can be called “License To Overeat” or “License To Stuff Yourself” cards, whatever. The idea is to have different fast food eating clearance levels.

For example, if you want to have a Carl’s Jr. Double Six Dollar Burger (1522 calories) for lunch, you should be able to present a “License To Eat Fast Food” card with a LEVEL G (for Gorge) clearance. Which means you must be underweight (Body Mass Index of less than 18.5; refer to http://www.nhlbisupport.com/bmi/), a professional athlete, a body builder, or practicing for an eating competition.

Every six months, the Health Department will give qualifying exams for the various “License To Eat Fast Food” clearance levels.

Average, healthy persons in the normal BMI ranges (18.5-24.9) will get a LEVEL E (for Eat Healthy) clearance. They’re allowed to order anything on the menu that doesn’t have the words “Big,” “Double,” "Triple," or “Whopper.”

People who are in the overweight and obese brackets (BMI of 25 and higher) will get a LEVEL C (for Control) clearance. They can order anything on the menu that has the words “Low,” “-Free,” and “Diet,” with a maximum of 3 items per 3-hour period.

How to implement that is another story (not to mention the flack it’ll raise from the Hefty-and-Happy crowd). But hey, it’s an idea. After all, “Global Fat Pandemic” deserves some serious thought.

If you’re interested in an easy way to compare nutrition information among the 12 leading fast food restaurant chains, here’s a site with a handy search interface: The Fast Food Nutrition Fact Explorer.

Just Say No

I have a new weight maintenance tool. I call it the “Just-Say-No“ technique because all you have to do is say, “No, thank you.” You don’t have to measure and weigh what you eat; you don’t have to take some funky pills; you don’t have to hop on a treadmill! How easy is that?

By responding, “No, thank you!” during potentially weight-maintenance-damaging situations, you can lose from 100 to 1000 calories every time. And you won’t even feel it! Here are the opportunities you can cut off those calories.

At the theater concession stand:
“Would you like butter with your popcorn?”
“No, thank you.” [Lose 220 cal.]

Also at the theater concession stand:
“Would you like to make your soda a large for just 25 cents more?”
“No, thank you.” [Lose 100 cal.]

At the coffee shop:
“Whipped cream?”
“No, thank you.” [Lose 150 cal.]

At the burger place:
“Would you like to supersize your order for just 99 cents more?”
“No, thank you.” [Lose 100 cal. on the soda, 500 cal. on the fries.]

With the boys:
“Another beer?”
“No, thank you.” [Lose 120 cal.]

At a party or at home:
“Second helping?”
“No, thank you.” [Lose 300-800 cal.]

For dessert:
“How about a vanilla milk shake?”
“No, thank you.” [Lose 1000 cal.]

Simple. A calorie refused is a calorie lost. Intake your calories wisely, is what I say.

So, next time someone asks you to an all-you-can-eat too-good-to-pass-up buffet apply the “Just Say No” technique and save yourself a few hundred hard-to-burn calories.

For more information on calories and how much effort you need to put into burning them (hint: you have to walk the dog for a little over an hour to burn the butter you added to your popcorn): Calorie-Count.com

Dieting, Eating Strategies, Fat Loss

I may just have accidentally stumbled on an article I had always wanted to write.

As a health/wellness writer, I’ve published pieces on stress, the fat-and-forty syndrome, backpacking, and other focused topics, but never one that can serve as a comprehensive guide to health and fitness. I planned on writing a simple bulleted guide that covers nutrition, weight maintenance, aerobics, and resistance training – the essential elements of a healthy lifestyle. But the most I’ve done is scribble pieces of a draft that gets shuffled around in a deep drawer marked “One of These Days” (oh, that’s a step up from being in the thick folder labeled, “You think?”)

Today, while surfing the ‘Net looking for the formula for how many calories a person burns at rest (don’t ask), I ended up here:

How Dieting Works by Marshall Brain of HowStuffWorks.com

Mr. Brain had the information I was looking for. And I quote:

“At rest (for example, while sitting and watching television), the human body burns only about 12 calories per pound of body weight per day (26 calories per kilogram). That means that if you weigh 150 pounds (68 kg), your body uses only about: 150 X 12 = 1,800 calories per day.

“Those 1,800 calories are used to do everything you need to stay alive:
- They keep your heart beating and lungs breathing.
- They keep your internal organs operating properly.
- They keep your brain running.
- They keep your body warm. “

The part I enjoyed best about Mr. Brain’s article was the section on weight loss myths:

“The myth that you can lose 54 pounds in 6 weeks - Despite what the ads say (I LOST 54 POUNDS IN 6 WEEKS WITHOUT DIETS OR EXERCISE!!! or LOSE 10 POUNDS THIS WEEKEND!), you cannot lose a pound of fat unless you burn off 3,500 calories. To lose 54 pounds in 6 weeks, you would need to lose 9 pounds in 7 days, or 1.3 pounds per day. That 1.3 pounds of fat is equal to 4,500 calories, so you would have to burn off 4,500 calories per day. The only way to do that would be to eat nothing AND run a marathon every day for 42 days. That's impossible. The only way to lose that much weight that quickly is either through dehydration or amputation. The ads are lying.”

With nothing better to do, I continued surfing until I found myself reading what I previously mentioned as the article I had always wanted to write. Obviously, someone already beat me to it. In 2002.

Eating Strategies for Permanent Fat Loss

It’s actually a handout created by Sheri Barke, MPH, RD, of the UCLA Arthur Ashe Student Health and Wellness Center. To learn more, explore the UCLA site she developed: Student Nutrition (& Body Image) Action Committee.

So, I can rest easy. The piece had been written. All I have to do now is bookmark and send the URL to my trainees. Thank you, Sheri Barke.