Introduction
Clean Eating Diet is a diet plan that will give you the answer to the million-dollar question: “Can I be on a diet, lose weight, and still eat carbohydrates (carbs)?”
The answer is, “Yes, you can!”
Another million-dollar question is “Can I keep my new weight forever, and never yo-yo my weight”?
Again, yes, you can. You can’t stay on a fad diet your whole life, and you can’t eat steak and eggs or drink smoothies forever. The Clean Eating Diet is a permanent dietary change that will introduce Clean Foods Superfoods to your diet, along with Clean Foods Superfoods Carbs or as you can call them, Clean Foods Smart Carbs. So, from now on, you will eat only Clean Foods Superfoods, and you will for the rest of your life. What’s more is that you’ll LOVE it!
Don’t worry, you won’t have to buy expensive supplements or exotic berries. You can add exotic berries to your diet, as they’re full of antioxidants, but there are tons of cheap Clean Foods Superfoods that are available in any local store.
Back to fad diets. Most fad diets agree on the following facts:
• Sugar is bad.
• Processed food is bad.
• Sodas are bad.
• Trans fats are bad.
• Drink more water.
• Eat move veggies with fibers.
• Eat more lean protein .
These are great pieces of advice, and are excellent starting points, but more than 80% of dieters yo-yo their weight over time, which means that fad diets don’t work.
Fad diets don’t offer solutions for appetite control in the weight maintenance phase. What happens is this: dieters get cravings for carb, but they eat the wrong ones, and so gain all the weight back. This causes the unfortunate weight yo-yoing to continue. If you solve this issue, you’re going to be permanently lean whole your life. By swapping processed carbs for Clean Foods Superfoods Smart Carbs, you’ll lose weight and keep it off.
This book will teach you everything about Clean Foods Superfoods Smart Carbs and will give you more than 100 recipes made with 100% Superfoods.
What are Clean Foods Superfoods Smart Carbs? They are:
• Non-refined carbs, full of vitamins, minerals, fibers and antioxidants.
• Carbs that have low glycemic index, which don’t spike blood sugar and insulin.
• Carbs that don’t disrupt your hormones.
• Carbs that don’t cause addiction and binging.
• Carbs that don’t stimulate your appetite.
The last 3 points make a MAJOR difference compared to any other diet!!
The points about hormones, addiction, and appetite are where the Clean Foods Superfoods Smart Carbs diet differs from regular nutrition advice such as “refined carbs are bad, eat whole-wheat bread” or “don’t eat white bread, eat fiber rich cereals for breakfast” or even “go gluten-free, buy gluten-free breads.” Such types of advice are “nutrition by numbers,” meaning that nutritionists compared macronutrients values of whole-wheat bread and white bread and concluded that whole-wheat bread has more fiber and vitamins and minerals than white bread, which is enough of a reason to suggest eating whole-wheat bread!
But what about micronutrients in wheat? What about our hormones, or the inflammations and appetite-revving that occurs after eating whole-wheat bread or “healthy, whole-wheat cereals”?
What about the emotional eating and cravings we get before bedtime? If we are to have cravings, how should we deal with them?
In this book, I’ll give you the solution and instructions what to do when you feel the urge to eat cookies or ice cream in the evening. I’ll prepare you for how to handle cravings, too.  
This diet book will explain all the tiny details about your cravings mechanism and give you the answers to these questions. You weight yo-yoing will end, as a result. I’ll also be speaking from personal experience, which further adds credibility to my suggestions and assertions!
My weight loss journey and my dieting mistakes are described after this introductory chapter. Through trial and error, and after countless hours of investigation, I was able to stop my weight yo-yoing and keep my new weight for more than 5 years.
The Clean Foods Superfoods Diet that I developed for my son’s ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) actually helped me and my hypothyroid as well. It might even help anyone who has autism.
If you educate yourself about hormones, inflammations, allergies, processed foods and cravings, you will be able to make better decisions. Let’s face it, the more we know about any subject, the more confidence we’ll have that we can resolve the issue .
When I was learning how to ski, I was afraid that I will fall. Once I mastered slowing down and gained confidence on the slopes, my fear disappeared. The same thing happened with driving, and same thing should happen with dieting. Once you know the ins and outs of all the hormones that influence your cravings, you’ll be confident that you can conquer any dieting issue.
There are tons of social temptations when you’re trying to lose weight and you need to have a solution for all of them. You almost need a script and very careful planning for some situations. What will you say to your well-intended mom when she hands you a plate of her signature cake you gobbled up whole your life? Trust me, you need a script when you hear “But you have always loved my cake,” or “C’mon, it is a special occasion,” or “You look fine, you don’t need to diet anymore. Just a little piece?” or “You can’t live on quinoa and tuna salads forever.”
Let’s begin our journey by learning about carbs. Carbs were default foods in ancient times. Civilizations were built on starchy foods. Egyptian slaves mostly ate starchy foods. People 100 years ago were eating a lot of starchy foods. But they were working hard, long days, and their starch was not the highly hybridized starch we eat today.
We can sit for entire days and eat hybridized, engineered, “lab designed” starches that are twisting our hormones. You can’t expect to maintain your weight in such an environment! Even today’s whole-wheat will spike your blood sugar and cause addiction. “Gluten-free” products spike blood sugar because they’re full of refined white rice flour. You don’t need any of that. You need carbs that are not disrupting your hormones or causing you to have addictions. You need carbs you won’t binge on. You need Clean Foods Superfoods Smart Carbs .
No one binges on broccoli, buckwheat or quinoa. Everyone binges on processed carbs.
Superfoods are the best nutrient-dense foods on the planet. They are whole foods in a natural state. They are not processed and don’t have anything bad in them. They don’t contain trans fats, food colorings, additives or chemicals.
The expression "refined carbs” has two meanings. The first one is that carbs processed in a factory have fibers from the grain removed, meaning all nutrients and antioxidants from the hull/bran and the germ are gone. The second meaning to the word "refined" is that the end product is finely ground. Carbs from breads or any product made with finely ground flour enter our blood quicker and raise our blood sugar levels, which leads to spikes in insulin. Insulin shuts down fat release from our fat cells and pushes carbs into our muscles for energy and into our liver for storage. Any extra carbs get turned into fat. A quick spike in blood sugar also means that there will be a quick drop and you will be hungry again sooner than you should be.
Our body can hold around 500 grams of carbs at any time. If the brain needs glucose, it'll get if first. Next in line are red blood cells. Then the body will check the storage space in the liver and muscles. If there is space, carbs will be stored there. If the liver and muscles storage is full, carbs will be turned into fat and stored in the fat tissue.
Liver and muscle storage acts as an energy buffer. If you're an athletic person with lots of muscles, guess what? You have more storage space, hence, you can eat more carbs every day! Your carbs storage space is limited, but your fat storage place isn't. So, all carbs you eat in a single day will get used for living (resting metabolism amount) + for some physical activities + storage space (brain, red blood cells, liver and muscles). Anything over that amount will be stored as fat. So, if you're doing a workout and have more muscles than average person, you will be able to eat a more carbs throughout the day, plus you will speed up your metabolism. That should be enough motivation for anyone to start exercising every day, preferably at least body weight exercises or a kettlebells workout. And if you like to take selfies, you will look much better after some stretching, a short warm-up, and at least a 10-minute workout. Just compare a selfie of your belly after sitting for 2 hours in front of the computer with one after a 10-minute stretching/warm up/workout. Your posture will change and your whole body and belly will look 10 times better!
Even oats, which are one of the Clean Foods Superfoods Smart Carbs, are better eaten in oat form than in finely ground oat flour used for oat dough. The finer the oats are ground, the quicker the oats’ glucose will go through the membranes of your intestines. So, you should avoid any dough and go for chewable carbs.
Clean Foods Superfoods Smart Carbs Diet suggests eating oats for breakfast, cooked in water and spiced with cinnamon, cacao, nutmeg, cloves, raw honey and some combination of Superfoods nuts, seeds and berries. Or mixed with kefir or Greek yogurt, and spiced.
My real chewability secret is to add 1 tbsp. (tablespoon) of sunflower seeds to my oatmeal breakfast. Sunflower seeds are perfectly sized seeds. I wouldn't slow my chewing for any smaller seeds (e.g. sesame seeds) and I would just crush any nuts (Brazil, Cashew, Walnuts, Almonds) and finish chewing. But sunflower seeds (and to a degree, pumpkin seeds) are just perfectly-sized, so I'm slowly chewing until I crash every sunflower seed. That extends my meal time and boosts satiety. I'm also afraid that sunflower seeds might prick my intestines and cause leaky gut and that also forces me to chew every single one of them. I'm probably exaggerating with the gut-pricking idea, but I'm less hungry if I eat slower .
The list of bad, dumb carbs is long and it includes:
• White bread and everything made with white, refined flour (cookies, crackers, donuts, cakes etc.)
• White rice
• Refined and processed cereals with added sugar
• Potato and anything that has "starch" in the name
• High-fructose corn syrup found in soda drinks and processed food
Bad, dumb carbs are completely opposite of Smart Carbs. Dumb carbs are low in nutrients and fiber because the hull and germ are removed. They are finely-ground, calorie-dense, easy to over-consume (there is nothing to chew on since there is no fiber), and have a high GI (Glycemic Index), meaning they are digested and absorbed quickly. Refined white-flour products are ideal for sneaking invisible fats, e.g. croissants, donuts, biscuits, and any bagged snacks. These are the bad carbs, carbs you want to stay away from.
Smart Carbs are complex carbs completely opposite to dumb carbs. They are full of vitamins, minerals and antioxidants, they are fiber-dense instead of being calorie-dense. They have to be eaten slower because there is fiber to be chewed on. They have low GI, meaning they are slower to digest and absorb. They're slow to release sugar in the blood stream, meaning you’ll have stable blood sugar levels.
Stable blood sugar levels means that there won't be an insulin spike, which translates into a longer satiety time. Having stable blood sugar levels also equates to the prevention of Diabetes. A long satiety time means you’re your appetite will be under control and the energy from the Smart Carbs will be released slowly. Dumb carbs release energy in bursts, and quickly after the burst, sugar in blood dips. Sugar spikes and dips result in a revving appetite and a hormone rollercoaster. When you're trying to lose weight, the last thing you need is a hormone rollercoaster. You want your hormones regulated and steady.
Examples of Smart Carbs are:
• Vegetables and fruits with low GI index (green leafy veggies, broccoli, celery, berries, apples, etc.)
• Legumes – beans and lentils
• Seeds – sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, sesame seeds, black cumin seeds
• Nuts – almonds, cashews, walnuts, Brazil nuts, pecan nuts
• Sweet potato, green peas, carrots, etc.
• Non-gluten grains like quinoa, buckwheat, brown rice, millet, amaranth, and oats