10 Random Diet Hacks

10 Random Diet Hacks to make the dieting process easier.

Measure your high calorie foods

It is easy to over consume on things such as cooking oil, nuts, peanut butter, cream, butter and rich sauces. Anything that you consume fairly often that is calorie dense is certainly somewhere you can save calories. Start weighing these foods out and reading the labels so you have a better understanding of how much you are consuming.

Find lower calorie snacks

Find low calorie alternatives to common snacks that you consume. If you like a snack have a look and see if there are any suitable alternatives that can satisfy your savoury or sweet tooth for less calories. I am a big fan of creating a calorie deficit with minimal fuss. This is one way of achieving that.

Track the weekend

Mon – Thurs we tend to be in a routine with more control over meals and snacks. We tend to know what’s for dinner; we are less likely to consume alcohol and we socialise less. Many people track no problem Mon-Thurs because of the structure that is in place and the commitments they have. It is very common to see a clients food diary on MFP fully logged Mon-Thurs then partially logged or not logged at all Fri-Sun. Lets face it when we get to the weekend we let things slide, we socialise more, we eat out more, we move less and we have more fun. A dieting strategy I like for those who fall into this category is to track the weekend only (Fri-Sun). This gives you control over the days you tend to be a bit more kamikaze. It allows you to see exactly what you consume over these days and the act of tracking gives you accountability. Control, Awareness and Accountability are 3 things that we could all do with when trying to lose weight.

Find healthy foods that you love

You don’t need to eat every fruit and vegetable that ever existed. You don’t need to be eating a different meal every day. It’s ok to eat the same thing two days in a row. Make life easy for yourself. Yes its good to have a varied diet but if you can hit your protein goals, fibre goals and get regular portions of fruit and vegetables by consuming the same or similar foods, you are going to make progress. One thing I have learnt from those that are lean and strong, they tend to eat similar foods each week. Find foods you love and eat them, it will make shopping a whole lot easier and you will become good at cooking a select few recipes as well.

Plan your meals for the week ahead

You plan your workouts in advance; you plan your nights out in advance so why not plan our meals as well or at least some of them. Am I saying follow a diet plan? No. I am saying be organised. Get your menu for the week up on your white board in the kitchen, base your food shop around that and get into a routine. I like to do this for dinners and it helps us to stay one step ahead and in control.

Eat leftovers for lunch

Making life easy for yourself and being prepared are key traits to have when dieting. A simple strategy to make sure you have a well-balanced meal for your lunch is to use leftovers from the previous nights dinner.

Let your food settle

Something I am bad for is knowing when I am full. I will finish my dinner and immediately look for something else to eat. I know through practising this however that if I wait 5mins and drink some water the feeling of wanting to eat more goes away. Its like my brain needs a few minutes to catch up with my body.

Consume more fruit and veg

You cant put 10 diet hacks together without mentioning fruit and veg. More importantly mentioning ‘food volume’. To successfully diet I strongly advise you to eat ‘more food’ but ‘less calories’. To do this we need to be consuming higher amounts of low calorie foods ie fruits and vegetables. A simple formula for doing this is adding a fruit bowl to your breakfast, a side salad to your lunch and a large portion of vegetables for dinner.

Walk when you are on the phone

A bit random I know but we do need to look for ways to move more and increase NEAT. This is a simple way of doing that. Get your earphones in and take a walk for those long calls that would otherwise have you sitting down.

Start the day on a positive

This could refer to a number of things. But let me give you some examples. The first thing you do should be a positive action; it sets you up for the day puts you in the right mind-set and reminds you that your health and well-being is a priority. What happened yesterday can no longer be fixed so lets focus on starting today right. For me this could be something simple like consuming a large glass of water, which is helping me towards my hydration target. Going for a 30min walk before breakfast, which is helping me towards my step target. Having a high protein breakfast, which is helping me towards my protein target or reading a book and learning something new.