The Best Meal Plan to Lose Fat Faster (Eat Like This!)

 

Swap Processed Foods for Minimally-Processed Alternatives

If you've attempted a weight loss diet plan of your own, then you're probably aware that at the end of the day, weight loss is all about calories in versus calories out. Scientifically speaking this is the basic law of thermodynamics for any fat loss diet, but what this simplistic model fails to account for is how the various foods you put into your body then go about affecting these two variables. The truth is that you also need to pay close attention to the types of foods you're ingesting everyday AND also how you go about ingesting them in your weight loss diet, as that's what makes all the difference.

The first swap you'll want to do with your weight loss diet is to stick mostly with minimally-processed foods. Not only are these less processed foods beneficial when dieting in the sense that they generally provide more nutrients and keep us fuller for longer, but they also have another benefit that has to do with something called the thermic effect of food, which is the amount of calories that our body burns to metabolize and actually use the foods that we ingest. And one of the unique fat loss benefits about unprocessed foods is that in most cases our body burns significantly more calories when digesting unprocessed foods than it does when compared to their processed counterparts.

For instance, one study compared the caloric burn required to digest and metabolize two minimally processed sandwiches consisting of whole grain bread and real cheddar cheese versus two highly processed sandwiches that instead consisted of white bread and processed cheese. Although both meals consisted of virtually the same amount of total calories and protein, the more processed sandwich had a 50% lower thermic effect and as a result, the body burns significantly less calories digesting it than it did with the whole grain sandwiches.

Similarly, a six-week randomized controlled trial has subjects stick to a diet consisting of either less processed whole grain foods such as oats, brown rice, and whole grain bread versus a calorie and macronutrient equated diet consisting of more processed refined grains instead such as cereal, white rice, and white bread. What they found is that the group that stuck with whole grain foods burned on average roughly 100 more calories per day just from digesting and metabolizing their food than the processed food group did. To put this into perspective, given that the average person burns roughly 100 calories to jog a mile, you'd essentially be doing the equivalent of jogging an extra mile a day just by choosing to incorporate whole grain, less processed foods as opposed to more processed foods for most of your meals. If you crunch the numbers over three months, this simple change would theoretically enable you to burn 2.5 pounds more fat just by making that switch.

Distribute Calories Towards the Beginning of the Day

Next, let's dive into how you then go about distributing your meals (aka calories) for your fat loss diet. Research indicates that there does seem to be some indirect fat loss benefits to allocating more calories to your meals early on in the day, and is something that I've personally noticed as well. Now obviously this does vary for the individual and may depend on when your workout takes place, I would highly suggest even if you're intermittent fasting, for example, to at least experiment with just shifting more of your calories to your first meal of the day as it does seem to have some unique benefits in terms of enabling you to control your cravings, burn more calories and potentially create greater fat loss results in the long run as a result.

Illustrating this, a recent 2020 paper and another similarly designed 2015 paper compared the effects of using a more front-heavy distribution approach by allocating more calories to breakfast versus a back-heavy approach by allocating more calories to dinner instead. What the researchers found is that subjects using the front-heavy approach not only experienced significantly less hunger and significantly less cravings for sweets throughout the day, but they also experienced greater overall energy levels. This meant that they were able to adhere to the diet more easily and they likely burned more calories throughout the day from fidgeting, walking, and just moving more in general because of their increased energy levels.

In fact, this protocol was also repeated in a longitudinal weight loss study which found that subjects using a front-heavy approach lost more weight, decreased their waist circumference to a greater degree, and reported greater hunger control over a period of 12 weeks when compared to a group that used a back-heavy approach by simply swapping the breakfast and dinner calories. This indicates that there does seem to be some indirect fat loss benefits to allocating more calories to your meals early on in the day.

Choose Highly Satiating Foods

The last swap for your weight loss diet plan is to not only choose mostly unprocessed foods to include in your diet, but choose the ones that are highly satiating. As this will enable you to better adhere to your diet and minimize any excess snacking you may be doing that's sabotaging your calorie deficit. For example, even with calories equated for, simply swapping whole grain bread for oats instead will provide a 25% greater effect on suppressing your hunger. And similarly, swapping brown rice for whole grain pasta or boiled potatoes would provide a 30%, or 60% boost in satiation respectively.

So what I'd suggest is look over the satiety index and experiment with swapping some of these more satiating foods into your diet and seeing how your body and appetite responds.

Sample Fat Loss Meal Plan

To put everything together, let's go through a sample meal plan that not only incorporates these various tips but also tastes great. I'll use roughly 2,100 calories for this meal plan, but keep in mind that you'll want to adjust the portion sizes based on what's needed for you to be at a calorie deficit. This is going to vary for everyone.

Breakfast: Protein Pancakes

To start, we'll be allocating most of the calories towards breakfast with protein pancakes made completely of highly satiating, minimally processed foods. For these, first blend the oats to make an oat flour, and then you want to add the rest of the ingredients into the blend. Then simply cook them over a pan and top them with peanut butter, sugar-free syrup, sautéed apples, or whatever you'd prefer.

Lunch: Baked Salmon, Boiled Potatoes, Sautéed Asparagus

For lunch, we'll be tapering down the calories slightly but still sticking with satiating, unprocessed foods - baked salmon, boiled potatoes, and a side of sautéed asparagus.

Snack: Orange and Protein Shake

To keep you going until dinner, you can have an orange and even plant in a protein shake as well, depending on when your workout is.

Dinner: Baked Chicken Breasts and Roasted Veggies

For dinner, we'll continue tapering down the calories slightly with baked chicken breasts and a side of veggies roasted in olive oil.

Dessert: Greek Yogurt Parfait

And then after dinner, to help satisfy whatever sweet cravings may have popped up, we'll make a simple high-protein Greek yogurt parfait consisting of zero percent fat plain Greek yogurt mixed in with cinnamon and stevia for sweetness, and then topped with frozen mixed berries and a tablespoon of chia seeds.

So hopefully that meal plan gives you a little more insight into how you can start planning your meals based on what I went through, while still keeping everything tasty and satisfying. And just keep in mind that although some of the swaps I mentioned here can definitely help speed up the fat loss process, just know that at the end of the day, adhering to a calorie deficit is what's most important. So experiment with your diet and stick to what you find works best for you and your lifestyle.