One of the greatest challenges of following any diet program is figuring out exactly how to incorporate it into your personal day-to-day routine. In this chapter, I’m going to show you how seamless the transition to a healthy lifestyle can be. An important part of this is rethinking your relationship with your grocery store. Being a smarter, savvier, healthier shopper just takes a little understanding about all the foods vying for your attention.
Sticking to the 5-Factor Diet requires you to make healthy choices, but that’s not always easy to do when visiting the supermarket. How you shop and where you shop play a big role in whether you’ll cheat on your diet. Use my 5-Factor shopping rules to ensure that every trip to the market is a healthy one.
Even if you’re not a morning person, make an effort to do your grocery shopping early in the day. Your body will thank you for it. Getting to the market early offers more than just avoiding the late-afternoon crowd—you’ll also have your pick of the freshest foods available because most markets set out their produce and fresh meats in the morning. You can pick the best cuts of meat and choicest fruits and vegetables, thereby increasing your odds of choosing foods that are still packed with nutrients. Shop later in the day and you’ll be stuck with older foods that have been picked through and, most likely, have lost nutrients.
Shopping for food when you’re hungry is a recipe for disaster because your body desperately craves anything to fill its void, preferably something high in sugar and fat. That’s why you should shop right after your first meal (breakfast) or your second meal (midmorning snack). That way, you’ll feel satiated and be less tempted to pick up foods that aren’t good for you.
5-FACTOR GROCERY STORE RULES
Most grocery stores share similar layouts, keeping their most healthy and nutritious foods around the perimeter. Do a lap around the store—going in one big rectangle—and you’ll likely find almost all the foods on the 5-Factor Diet, including your produce, dairy, and meats. Avoid the inside aisles as much as possible; this is where you’ll find most of the foods that are higher in fat and lower in nutrients. The only exception to this rule is the frozen food aisle, which is usually not on the perimeter. This is one of my favorite aisles when shopping for the 5-Factor Diet. (See “The Frozen Food Aisle is A Dieter’s Best Friend,”.)
Never go to the supermarket without a well-thought-out list. Without a clear plan, you’re more likely to buy bad foods on impulse. You may also forget to buy enough 5-Factor Foods. Remember, you need to eat foods from all five 5-Factor categories at each meal in order to achieve the best results, so missing even one of the five will hold back your progress.
I know you’re busy, so simply copy the “5-Factor Must-Have Foods Shopping Checklist” and you’ll guarantee that you always have the right 5-Factor Diet foods in your kitchen.
Once you find a store that carries all of the 5-Factor Diet foods, avoid frustration and shop only at that one store whenever possible. Being familiar with the layout of a store makes it much easier to get what you need quickly and avoid the aisles with bad foods. If you’re regularly popping into unfamiliar supermarkets, you’ll increase your risk of getting lost and walking past unhealthy goodies that may tempt you.
Most dieters shy away from the frozen food aisle—and why wouldn’t they? It’s home to some of the most tempting, fattening foods around, from ice cream and frozen pizzas to those man-size TV dinners whose packaging has more nutrients than the actual food inside. If dieters do venture into this aisle, they probably zip past all the frozen desserts en route to the packaged—and pricey—diet meals put out by Healthy Choice and Weight Watchers. If this sounds like you, then you’re missing out on all the great things the frozen food aisle has to offer—especially when it comes to implementing the 5-Factor Diet.
Every food has some sort of nutritional value, but its protein, vitamins, and minerals have a shelf life. From the moment a food is picked, caught, or killed, a nutritional clock starts ticking. Everything that happens to the food from that point forward ages it, affecting how much nutritional value you’ll get from it when it finally finds its way to your mouth. As more people handle the food, the risk of it being tainted by things like bacteria or viruses increases. Every person that touches the food causes more bruising, which can make it spoil faster. The longer a food sits in a box or on a truck, the more it deteriorates. Even exposure to sunlight can degrade some of the important nutrients.
That’s why the frozen food aisle is the 5-Factor dieter’s greatest ally. Here are my top five reasons why you should no longer fear the frozen food aisle.
When you buy frozen foods such as fruits and vegetables, they are flash-frozen almost immediately after they’re harvested, so fewer people handle them. They’re usually sealed in packages that are impervious to light. Time essentially stops, leaving all of the foods’ nutrients sealed inside.
This means that when you buy a frozen strawberry at the grocery store, it’s as nutritionally fresh as the day it was picked. After a good thaw, it is young and delicious again. On the other hand, a fresh strawberry in the produce aisle has an unknown history. It may have been picked out of state, then sifted, sorted, crated, warehoused, packaged, and trucked to a distribution center before being delivered to your local grocer and put out for display. It may have sat for as long as 10 days being touched by strangers and exposed to light. By the time you eat it, that strawberry is old. In fact, the FDA and the USDA have compared many fresh fruits and vegetables against frozen versions and found the two have relatively equivalent nutrient profiles. In fact, in some cases, certain nutrient levels are higher in the frozen foods.
BENEFITS OF FROZEN FOOD
I love raw vegetables, but sometimes a bag of frozen mixed veggies or stir-fry veggies is more convenient. Fresh vegetables require a lot of cleaning and chopping. With frozen veggies, all that hard work has been done for you. Just grab a bag of mixed vegetables and they’re ready to be added to a stir-fry or made into a side dish. Frozen meats and fish are even more of a time-saver. With no cleaning involved, just thaw and you’re ready to cook—mess free!
A lot of my clients think frozen foods are more expensive, but ask yourself this: How many times have you thrown away fresh chicken, fish, fruits, or vegetables because they sat around in your fridge too long? We’ve all done it. With frozen foods, you rarely have to throw anything away because it has spoiled; most foods stay fresh for months in the freezer.
TIPS FOR BUYING FROZEN FOODS
I’m big on berries, but they aren’t in season as often as I’d like. Luckily, I can always find them in the frozen food aisle, along with any other out-of-season fruits I may be craving.
I recommend you keep a big bag of stir-fry vegetables in the freezer. Why? Because a lot of dieters stick with eating the same veggies over and over again. Don’t get me wrong; eating vegetables is good, but different vegetables often have different amounts of vitamins and minerals. If you’re eating the same one or two vegetables, you may be getting a lot of, say, vitamin A while missing out on iron or vitamin C. Eating a handful of stir-fry veggies (I like to steam them) gives you an assortment every time, so you’re guaranteed a balanced mix of nutrients.
Having lots of healthy food around is terrific, but it’s not always practical to buy a 10-pound tray of fresh chicken breasts from the meat department! But you can find these foods in the frozen aisle, along with fruits and vegetables that come in 5- to 10-pound bags. Buying in bulk may seem like a space eater in your freezer, but it works to your advantage. It guarantees that you’ll always have healthy foods to eat (and less space to stock unhealthy options). By keeping the freezer well stocked, you’ll never run out and be left reaching for something off the 5-Factor Diet when you’re hungry.
When you shop for healthy foods, you’ll come across many low- or reduced-calorie foods. They may sound good, but it’s important to know exactly what natural or artificial substitute you’re eating in place of sugar. Some of these sweeteners may be great for adding calorie-free flavor to your food, but many come with health issues of which you should be aware.
I have to break from my use of the number 5 for a moment because we need to examine seven common sweeteners used today: sucrose, turbinado, honey, aspartame, saccharin, sucralose (Splenda), and stevia. You should make your own personal decision about which sweeteners to use, based on the facts about these products, including what the manufacturers won’t tell you. Here’s the truth—and my recommendations—about sweeteners.
“My biggest problem was finding a diet that accommodated my busy schedule. Between work, travel, and my family, I had no time to get in shape. Your diet was so simple to follow, with suitable food choices and simple substitutions. The rapid changes I experienced only increased my motivation to succeed. Thank you!”
David Widman, M.D. AGE: 41 WEIGHT LOST: 15 lbs. in 4 weeks
Sucrose (or sugar). Sucrose is the most common food sweetener in the world. Extracted from sugar cane or sugar beets, it’s purified and crystallized, then stripped of all vitamins, minerals, fiber, amino acids, and trace elements. It may be nutritionally worthless, but because of its taste and the quick hit of energy it provides, sugar is a hard habit to kick.
Unfortunately, the fleeting burst of energy usually disappears as quickly as it came, leaving you feeling more sluggish than you did before eating. This effect is called “reactive hypoglycemia.” Think of it this way: Eating sugar is like accelerating your car by flooring the gas, then taking your foot off the pedal and letting the car go back to its normal speed. At a certain point, your car will slow down to the speed at which it was running before you hit the gas, then slow down even further (and eventually stop altogether). When you eat sugar, your energy levels ultimately dip below your baseline, which is why you end up craving even more sugar later.
It’s a vicious cycle, and it’s the reason why we obsess about sweet foods. But our consumption comes at a price. Just like highly glycemic carbohydrates, sugar causes an insulin surge that makes your body store calories as fat—even if you’re eating fat-free sweets. Research has shown that sugar has the same effect as other carbohydrates on blood sugar levels. Calorie for calorie, sugar raises blood glucose about the same amount as starches such as white bread and white potatoes.
Turbinado. You may not recognize its real name, but you’ve seen it in the light brown packets. It’s that dark brown, coarse, “raw” sugar that’s supposed to be better for you because it’s all-natural and chemical free. (White table sugar, by comparison, is processed with things like phosphoric acid, sulphur dioxide, and bleaching agents, to name just a few!) Turbinado is usually made by squeezing the juice out of crushed sugar cane, then spinning what’s left after evaporation through a huge centrifuge. Because it’s not chemically treated, it’s supposed to be richer in vitamins and minerals.
Wrong! The big mistake most people make is assuming that turbinado is healthier than table sugar because it’s unbleached. This assumption causes some people to use even more of it than they would regular sugar. People make a similar mistake when comparing white bread with breads that are dyed brown to seem more natural. But just because something is darker doesn’t always mean it’s better for you! White sugar and dark sugar may have different characteristics and tastes, but your body reacts to both in the same way, with a fat-storing insulin spike.
Honey. I don’t recommend honey. Honey producers make a lot of healthy promises, claiming honey can protect you against cancer and heart disease because it contains antioxidants and certain enzymes. The problem is, honey—no matter how unrefined and all-natural its producers may say it is—is still nothing more than pure sugar. To be exact, it’s an invert sugar—created by an enzyme in bee nectar—that’s an extremely dense, gelatinous form of easily absorbed sugar. At best, honey has only trace amounts of antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals. That’s true whether you’re talking about buckwheat honey, sunflower honey, or regular clover honey.
Honey should never take the place of fruits and veggies, which are far richer in antioxidants and have much less sugar. You get far more antioxidants and nutrients from a single piece of fruit than you ever could from pouring on honey and adding excess sugar to your diet. It’s the wrong approach.
Aspartame. You may know it by other names (such as NutraSweet or Equal), but aspartame is a low-calorie sweetener that is about 200 times sweeter than sugar. However, it’s not the best sweetener for use in hot drinks or cooking because it tends to lose its sweetness in high temperatures. That’s why coffee or tea drinkers who use aspartame may find themselves pouring in extra packets when reaching for their morning pick-me-up.
There is a great deal of controversy over this sweetener, especially because it’s made from methyl alcohol, which on its own is potentially toxic. Despite that, aspartame has been proven safe for human consumption. However, people with a rare hereditary metabolic condition called phenylketonuria (PKU) need to watch their intake of aspartame because it contains the enzyme phenylalanine, which they must avoid. That’s why some product labels print “This product contains phenylalanine” on them. If you’re pregnant, avoid aspartame because it’s impossible to know if your baby has PKU.
Personally, I don’t like the taste of aspartame but if you want to use it, I would prefer that you have it in small amounts only.
WHAT IS “PERCENT DAILY VALUE”?
Understanding Percent Daily Values—which is often shortened to “% Daily Value” or “%DV”—is key to deciphering any food label. These percentages tell you how a single serving of the food fits into a typical 2,000-calorie-a-day meal plan. (If you consume more or less than 2,000 calories, you need to adjust the Percent Daily Value accordingly.) At a glance, you can tell whether a food is high or low in a specific nutrient. For example, the label might tell you that a food provides 13% of your recommended daily value of carbohydrates or 35% of your fats. It’s also a snap to compare the nutrients in products against each other—just be sure the serving sizes match first. Sugars, protein, and trans fats don’t have a Percent Daily Value, so you won’t see a percentage listed for them. The FDA hasn’t determined yet how much protein the average person should consume daily. As for sugar and trans fats, the FDA doesn’t want you eating either, so it naturally doesn’t recommend any set amount.
Saccharin. Sweet’N Low and Sugar Twin are two brands of saccharin you’re most likely familiar with. Saccharin is so popular because it can sweeten both hot and cold foods and is low calorie. Some people have had concerns about the sweetener because older studies found that rats who ingested large amounts of the sweetener were at risk for cancer. New research has found saccharin is safe in the small amounts most people use. But I’ll be honest with you—I’m not a big saccharin fan. In fact, following a 1977 study in which rats got bladder cancer after being fed saccharin, Canada, where I am originally from, banned it from being sold. It still is not sold there, which should say something in itself. If you choose to use saccharin in lieu of sugar, I recommend the smallest amounts possible, just to be safe.
Stevia. Stevia is a natural dietary supplement extracted from the Stevia rebaudiana plant, and it has been used for decades around the world, especially in Japan. It’s about 300 times sweeter than sugar and is calorie-free. Go to any health food store and you’ll see it touted as the most popular natural alternative to sugar. However, the FDA hasn’t approved it for use as a sweetener. Why not? A few studies have shown that stevia may cause cancer and reproductive health problems, which is why Canada and some other countries won’t allow it to be used as a sweetener. The FDA does state that when used sparingly, stevia is perfectly safe—although the agency believes it could create health issues if approved as an artificial sweetener. Stevia is definitely an acquired taste; it can change the flavor of foods and beverages.
Sucralose (Splenda). Sucralose is 600 times sweeter than sugar and the newest low-calorie sweetener on the market—and is my sweetener of choice. It’s basically regular table sugar that’s been chlorinated, a process that tweaks it just enough so that it doesn’t make your blood sugar rise. It also retains its sweetness in hot and cold foods.
To this point, there haven’t been any negative findings in research on sucralose usage. In Canada, we’ve been using it for about 15 years.
Before I start working with clients, I give them reading material about nutrition. We talk everything through and I teach them how to cook, whether they want to or not. If they want to taste my food, they have to watch me cook it. Why? Because I want to empower them. Once they understand how their bodies work with the foods they eat, following the 5-Factor Diet is even easier. They gain a sense of confidence in the program, even when I’m not there. They can follow my advice without having to question why it works.
A lot of diet books tell you what to eat and maybe a little bit about why you should eat that way. But they don’t empower you to make good choices for yourself. Being able to decipher what’s in every single food gives you power. You can finally look through your fridge and cupboards and understand—maybe for the first time in your life—what will work and what won’t work for your diet.
WHAT TO EXPECT ON A FOOD LABEL
SERVING SIZE
SERVINGS PER CONTAINER
CALORIES
Calories from fat
TOTAL FAT
Saturated fat
Trans fat
Polyunsaturated fat
Monounsaturated fat
CHOLESTEROL
SODIUM
TOTAL CARBOHYDRATES
Dietary fiber
Sugars
Other carbohydrates
PROTEIN
VITAMINS AND MINERALS
Vitamin A
Vitamin C
Calcium
Iron
Vitamin D
Thiamin
Riboflavin
Niacin
Vitamin B6
Phosphorus
Magnesium
Zinc
LESS THAN SERIES
LIST OF INGREDIENTS
In this book you’re already learning the science of nutrition. How you apply that knowledge starts with understanding the foods you eat. That’s why knowing how to read a nutritional label is one of the most important lessons I can teach you. Here’s the information you’ll find on the label—and what those numbers mean to you.
Serving size. This number tells you what quantity of the food was used to determine the nutrition facts. To make it easy for you to compare it to other, similar foods, the measurements are usually standard: The label will first list the serving size in lay terms (such as 1⁄2 cup or 6 pieces), then give you the metric amount (122 grams, for example).
5-Factor Fact: Most people eat a lot more than the recommended serving size. Try portioning out one serving size to get a better sense of how many servings you’re really eating when you have that food.
Servings per container. This number tells you the approximate number of servings the package contains.
5-Factor Fact: This information is amazingly helpful. Some foods have very small serving sizes so that the amount of calories per serving seems low. That is, until you do the math. Multiplying the “servings per container” by “calories per serving” will give you the caloric content of the entire package.
Calories and calories from fat. In addition to telling you how many calories you’re getting per serving, the label also shows exactly how many of those calories are from fat.
5-Factor Fact: Seeing big numbers in the “calories from fat” section shouldn’t always scare you. Good-for-you fats such as olive oil get all of their calories from fat.
Alicia Keys GRAMMY-WINNING SINGER/SONGWRITER
“Harley’s style of working out is 100 percent my style. It doesn’t take a lot of time out of your day, it’s motivating, and you feel good (especially when people take notice!). The focus is not on starving yourself but on healthful living, so you don’t feel like you’re missing out on the foods you love. Once you get started, you get addicted to looking, feeling, and living your best.”
Total fat. This number combines the fat grams from all four types of fats: saturated, trans, polyunsaturated, and monounsaturated.
5-Factor Fact: The FDA suggests that you eat no more than 65 grams of fat per day.
Saturated fat. This is the number of saturated fat grams contained in each serving.
5-Factor Fact: Your daily maximum of this unhealthy fat is 20 grams, according to the FDA. I suggest keeping your intake of this dangerous fat even lower.
Trans fat. This shows how many grams of trans fat are in each serving.
5-Factor Fact: In January 2006, the FDA began requiring all food manufacturers to list trans fat on their labels. That’s good news because before this it was tough to determine what foods contained this dangerous form of fat. Don’t expect to find a Percent Daily Value listed for this bad-for-you fat, because your body doesn’t need it. Keep your consumption of trans fat as close to zero as possible.
GOOD NEWS FOR ALLERGY SUFFERERS
Each year approximately 30,000 people in the United States require emergency room treatment and 150 die because of allergic reactions to food. Now, new food label laws may help prevent some of these problems. In January 1, 2006, the FDA began requiring that food labels clearly identify when ingredients contain protein derived from the eight major allergenic foods: milk, eggs, fish, crustacean shellfish, tree nuts, peanuts, wheat, and soybeans. If you’re allergic to these foods, read the list of ingredients; you should find any troublesome ingredient listed along with the source of the food allergen.
Polyunsaturated fat. This is the total number of polyunsaturated fat grams per serving.
5-Factor Fact: Unlike saturated fat, polyunsaturated fat doesn’t raise cholesterol levels. Rather, it actually lowers the amount of bad cholesterol lipids, called low-density lipoproteins (LDLs).
Monounsaturated fat. This is the total number of monounsaturated fat grams in each serving.
5-Factor Fact: Olive oil is an excellent source of monounsaturated fat, plus it makes a great base for salad dressing.
Cholesterol. This is the total milligrams of cholesterol per serving.
5-Factor Fact: Although your body needs cholesterol to assist with hormone production and other bodily functions, your liver manufactures cholesterol on its own. That’s why you should limit your daily intake to 300 milligrams.
Sodium. This is the total milligrams of sodium per serving.
5-Factor Fact: I’m not overly concerned about excess sodium in the diet because only a very small percentage of the population is sodium sensitive. Sodium is relatively benign and passes out of the body fairly quickly. The FDA recommends keeping your daily intake below 2,400 milligrams. Of course, if you have high blood pressure or kidney issues, then you should monitor your sodium intake more closely.
“For me, starting a new program was less about losing a bunch of weight and more about wanting to finally tone and shape my middle-age body. My butt and thighs were beginning to make a world of their own! I didn’t understand which foods were beneficial and which ones should simply be avoided, but the nutrition explanations in 5-Factor taught me what I should aim for with each and every meal.”
Andrea Cochran AGE: 44 WEIGHT LOST SO FAR: 7 lbs.
Total carbohydrates. This number is the total grams of every type of carbohydrate—dietary fiber, sugars, and other sources—per serving.
5-Factor Fact: The FDA suggests a daily total carb consumption of 300 grams or less. As you already know, I want you to eat only carbs with low to moderate glycemic levels. But food labels don’t tell you what the carbohydrates’ glycemic level is. To find out, go to the glycemic index database at www.glycemicindex.com.
Dietary fiber. This is how many grams of fiber—both soluble and insoluble—are in each serving. This amount is included in the total carbohydrates measurement, but dietary fiber affects blood sugar less than other types of carbs do. That’s why the American Diabetes Association suggests that if a food has 5 grams or more of fiber per serving, you can subtract this number from the carbohydrate total.
5-Factor Fact: Fiber comes in two types—soluble and insoluble—but nutrition labels aren’t required to list them separately. However, most manufacturers will tell you somewhere on the package how many grams of insoluble fiber their product contains.
Sugars. This is where you’ll see how many grams of sugar are in each serving. You may also see “sugar alcohols” or “sugar replacers” listed. Sugar alcohols don’t affect your blood sugar levels as much as sugar does, but they have a caloric value 10 percent greater than other carbs.
5-Factor Fact: If you see grams of sugar on the nutrition label but can’t find the word sugar on the list of ingredients, that’s because sugar sometimes goes by different names. Check the list for names like fructose (fruit sugar), glucose (dextrose), galactose (milk sugar), lactose (a combination of glucose and galactose), and maltose (malt sugar).
Other carbohydrates. This number—which isn’t on all labels—is a catch-all category for any other types of carbohydrates that may be in each serving.
5-Factor Fact: These trace carbs—typically various organic acids and flavenoids—don’t raise your blood sugar level very much, so don’t be concerned about them. Sometimes sugar alcohols are thrown into this category as well; sugar alcohols may include malitol, sorbitol, xylitol, and glycerine.
Protein. This is how many grams of protein are in each serving.
5-Factor Fact: Sometimes dairy protein appears on an ingredient list in the form of albumen, whey, or casein.
Vitamin and mineral percentages. All food labels are required to list vitamin A, vitamin C, calcium, and iron content. Other nutrients—such as vitamin D, thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, vitamin B6, phosphorus, magnesium, and zinc—are shown only if they’re added as a supplement.
You won’t see how many grams or milligrams of each nutrient are in a serving. Instead you’ll see what percentage of the recommended daily amount of that nutrient is contained in each serving.
Ingredients. Finally, a label lists all the food’s ingredients, arranged in descending order based on the weight of each ingredient.
5-Factor Fact: Because of the ranking of ingredients by weight, the first few ingredients listed are typically the bulk of what’s in the food. For a real eye-opener, compare the ingredients list of a processed food with its natural equivalent—for instance, processed, sugary fruit drink versus 100 percent fresh-squeezed juice. The differences will startle you.
Tracee Ross ACTRESS AND STAR ON THE TV SHOW GIRLFRIENDS
“Harley has taught me to love my body in a way I haven’t since I was 18. I just want to run around naked with a tattoo on my ass that says, “Body by Harley.” Harley has taught me how to keep myself toned, lean, and strong and still have that perfect amount of womanly jiggle so I look and feel good on and off screen. Since I met Harley, I am never more than two weeks from my ideal.”