Beer Belly

[grathan]

I've done diets where I've allowed myself to drink as much beer as I want and still lose weight 3-5 lbs/WK. You need to either count calories (if you don't know how many then don't eat it, stay under 2000/day, phone apps can help with this.) or another diet I have done is only eat once a day(as much as you want, aim for midday, you won't eat as much as you think).

 

[Nightshade]

I'm looking for homebrew tips on avoiding the beer belly. Obviously there are light beers. These sacrifice flavor, but if you have any really good light recipes then pleas share.

The other angle, though, is ingredients. Not all calories are equal. 100 calories from cake or cheese are more likely to beocme fat than 100 caleries from whole wheat bread. What are good homebrew ingredients to use and which are best avoided for making your beer have as many good calories as possible?

I am just going to put this here in case this hasn't been mentioned yet in regards to any difference in how you get calories.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/11/08/twinkie.diet.professor/index.html

Wht this article and the prof. who ran the experiment concludes is that a calorie is a calorie regardless of how it gets into the system...now nutritional intake is another story of course.

 

[CGVT]

Look up Gary Taubes and watch his videos on Youtube.

Keep your insulin under control

Don't eat grains (except in beer of course), corn, starches and sugars. Eat carbs from veggies and keep them down to somewhere between 50 and 100 grams per day.

You will lose weight and your cholesterol #s will come down

 

[theexternvoid]

Thanks for the info on beer styles to target. That's all I really wanted since eating less and moving mroe is a given. I tend to brew high gravity imperial IPAs, which sounds like a bad choice of brew for keeping the weight down.

Side note, as for calorie sources it does matter due to psychology. You burn simple sugars from things like cake and potato chips faster than complex carbs like whole wheat bread. This makes you feel hungry sooner, increasing the odds that you will snack. I wasn't clear on that originally. A good carb is one that burns over time so that you don't get hunger cravings too soon. It's easier to not eat if you aren't hungry! I was wondering if things like avoiding rice filler or choosing wheat vs. barley might make a difference in the post-drink cravings based on how quickly the body burns them.

Also, if you want to know why it takes longer to burn a complex carb, I think your body actually "mashes" the carbs into sugars just like in the mashtun! Just like it takes a full hour to make the carbs into something yeats can eat, such carbs in your body are like getting a slow but steady stream of energy for an extended period. Easting refined sugar is putting yeast into pure sugar water that blows the top of the carboy and then feels starved for food the next day!

 

[chalmer9]

Anyone in here who thinks that certain calories make you more fat than others are 100% wrong.

Healthwise is a different story, but you will gain just as much weight eating 6000 calories a day of chicken breasts as you would Snickers bars.

 

[tennesseean_87]

In the last few months I have started playing Dagorhir. It is a medieval foam fighting game/group. Nerdy? Yeah but I flat out do not care. I do not wear tights or speak in a fake accent. (I do wear period garb however) There are no "spells" being cast, it is pure combat. If you have never tried to fight someone with forceful blows via hand held weapons, I can tell you it is one of the most exhausting things one can participate in.

Do you make period drink to consume?

 

[edecambra]

Every time weight issues come up, I always get this Mad TV bit stuck in my head.

Video Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKs0oEIVOck

Ha! "We're like black dudes that way"

 

[earwig]

Anyone in here who thinks that certain calories make you more fat than others are 100% wrong.

Healthwise is a different story, but you will gain just as much weight eating 6000 calories a day of chicken breasts as you would Snickers bars.

This isn't true as someone else pointed out. Your body will burn more calories breaking down protein than it will Twinkies.

 

[RugenBrau]

Realize that a good stout can have less carbs than a weak light beer...

+1 for this post!

 

[Zamial]

Do you make period drink to consume?

Next year at the week long event I may attempt to disprove a theory that medieval people did not drink water and only drink small beer for the duration. But I do make ales and meads that are period but I would REALLY like to make a stien beer with period equipment. One day when my pocket contains more than lint I may attempt it...

 

[divrguy]

Never ever sacrifice a beer for the sake of less calories. Make great beer, don't drink too much and exercise! Everyday, not once or twice a week! Every day! Just my 2 cents...

 

[nukebrewer]

This isn't true as someone else pointed out. Your body will burn more calories breaking down protein than it will Twinkies.

+1

On a related note, after a certain amount at one time, your body can't process any additional protein, so it just gets rid of it. That's why on diets like the Ducan diet, you really have to pay attention to hydration and fiber intake to keep you regular. Unlike carbs, protein doesn't get converted to fat when more than the body needs is consumed. It just goes away in the #1 and #2 streams. You're also at increased risk of kidney stones on that diet for the same reason.

 

[3sheetsEMJ]

Next year at the week long event I may attempt to disprove a theory that medieval people did not drink water and only drink small beer for the duration. But I do make ales and meads that are period but I would REALLY like to make a stien beer with period equipment. One day when my pocket contains more than lint I may attempt it...

Ive heard of mead but what is stien beer? And how would you make it with period equipment? That sounds interesting...

 

[Zamial]

Ive heard of mead but what is stien beer? And how would you make it with period equipment? That sounds interesting...

Stein beer is made from super heating granite rocks and lowering them into the wort to make it boil. Period stuff would be a mostly wooden brewery... barrels are expensive and heavy...

 

[chalmer9]

This isn't true as someone else pointed out. Your body will burn more calories breaking down protein than it will Twinkies.

The difference is incredibly minimal, but believe what you want, I don't care.

 

[KeyWestBrewing]

Stein beer is made from super heating granite rocks and lowering them into the wort to make it boil.

That's pretty badass!!!

 

[TheSlash]

Anyone in here who thinks that certain calories make you more fat than others are 100% wrong.

Healthwise is a different story, but you will gain just as much weight eating 6000 calories a day of chicken breasts as you would Snickers bars.

Thanks. I was going to say something, blah I still will since there are MANY misinformed people in this thread. =)

Calories are calories when it comes to weight loss. Where they matter is in health and composition.

Protein surely does get converted into fat. If you eat over maintenance.

Funny enough, one of the things the body cannot convert to fat and store is alcohol. However it prioritizes alcohol detoxing and stores everything else you ate as fat. However beer has more than just alcohol, unlike pure spirits. So if you want to get smashed, have a small protein only lunch, then binge at night on straight liquor. Impossible to store any fat.

Also, your body can use as much protein as you throw at it. We are finding out large amounts of protein are still being digested up to a day later. Whey protein has an absorption rate of 10g per hour, where most animal proteins are 5g per hour. So that 100g protein steak you ate will take 20 hours to fully digest. These are the reasons the warrior diet (one large 2000 calorie ish meal a day) work so well.

Personally, I use intermittent fasting to keep weight in check. I fast 16 hours a day and eat in an 8 hour window. I'll eat a 600 calorie lunch, then a 1400 calorie dinner, normally including a beer or 2. I maintain sub 10% body fat eating what I want this way.

Another mind blower.... 6-8 small meals a day is BS. I mean it CAN work, but the dedication and margin for error make is not work for 99% of the people. People just eat too much food.

leangains dot com is a great resource to start reading about a way to eat that will change your life. I've got 5 friends and a fiance all dropping weight like mad on this. We can all still drink! yay.

Sorry if this sounds like a piss post, I get into this stuff and love showing people a way they can manage their weight easily for life.

Eg. I wake up at 8, drink black coffee, eat 600 calories at 1pm. Get home at 7pm and eat about 1400+ calories between 7 and 9pm. Then I don't put another calorie in my mouth until 1pm the next day.

 

[TheSlash]

This isn't true as someone else pointed out. Your body will burn more calories breaking down protein than it will Twinkies.

but but but, the thermogenic percentage based off the difference in structure of a kcal is so miniscule it would never matter. You could literally drop some crumbs from your mouth and even it out.

 

[earwig]

I won't waste my time posting links you won't click. If you really belive all calories are the same just search Bing/Google and you'll quickly find 100s of articles that explain why they are not.

 

[TheSlash]

I won't waste my time posting links you won't click. If you really belive all calories are the same just search Bing/Google and you'll quickly find 100s of articles that explain why they are not.

Never said they were all the same =) Fat has a low thermogenic effect, protein has a high one. But the effect is so miniscule you'd be better off waving at someone for 30 seconds. Would probably burn more calories than the difference. Just saying, people worry about the wrong stuff. The big picture is what makes the difference.

Better to watch total calories than the type of calories or base any decision around a thermogenic effect. People use that to justify eating 6+ times a day. Or to argue you won't lose weight eating snickers bars only.

Not realizing it is based off total food processed and not by how often you eat. A larger meal has a larger thermogenic effect, more small meals have more small thermogenic spikes. Averages out.

There are articles for everything. I can find you 1000's saying to eat 6+ times a day, yet I can show you a whole new wave of people eating 1-2 meals a day and getting leaner and better blood profiles in 1/2 the time. 6+ small meals with tons of supps is an industry gimmick to keep most people fat and sell product!
But its ok, not like I do this for a living or anything.

Did you read the link for leangains I posted?

 

[el_horno]

Beer belly is a myth? What say you?

 

[sonofgrok]

The classic calorie is a calorie is a calorie argument is so played out. I swear most people get their nutritional advice from fat chicks on the view or something. This argument is like saying H2O is H2O is H2O. Try giving a plant nothing but pure H20... it will die. Bodies, like plants, also need nutrients and different foods have very different nutrient profiles. When you eat food, you are not only eating calories, you are also eating other things that your body needs and in many cases, other things that your body doesn't need. Feed someone the same number of calories of Twinkies and 100 calorie oreo snack packs for a year as someone getting them from vegetables and grass fed meats and you will end up with two very different health states at the end of that year.

Are calories an important aspect of health? Yes. Eat too many calories and it doesn't matter where they came from, you will probably gain weight.
Are calories the end all of nutritional health? Heck no.

Nutrition and health is a complex beast and that picture keeps becoming more complex. In the last 2 months I have read two different scientific papers related to this. One on a protein in modern GMO wheat that actually acts as an opiate making people eat more and another on cell absorption of foreign mRNA from the foods you eat (i.e. your cells may be expressing genes from plant and animal food that you eat). Each could have profound implications on nutrition and these are only two small recent discoveries that could play into the nutritional health picture.

 

[kroach01]

All calories are not the same!

Simple carbohydrates can be directly entered into the glycolytic pathway, and thus can be mobilized with minimal energy expenditure. Proteins need to be digested and deaminated so require more energy to mobilize. Similarly, complex sugars are less metabolically available then fats.
Thus, if you ate a diet of 80% proteins and 20% fat you add less calories than a diet of say 100% carbs.
Also, diets biased towards a particular type of energy source have their own metabolic implications as well.

Also, it's not technically true that your body uses all the protein you eat. There is a maximum your body will uptake, and this varies from person to person. It also depends on how digestible the proteins are. If you pound a monster steak, it will take a long while to digest so you could feasibly absorb most of the protein. But if you pound 100 grams of a protein shake in 5 minutes, the excess proteins will turn into fat.

 

[el_horno]

Speaking of calories, I thought this was an interesting study that was completed on monkeys over the past 25 years.

 

[TheSlash]

Everything excess except alcohol, fiber, and crap like splenda turns to fat, but that means your body still processes it. No one said calories are the same. The only thing that is the same is how much energy is in a kcal. See it is a unit of measure. If your body burned 3000 kcals of energy any given day and you eat 2999 usable kcals of energy, guess what, you lost weight. If you ate 3001 kcals you just gained weight. Not talking about health! That should be obvious that a mealplan of twinkies will lead to health problems.

 

[TyTanium]

Here's a fantastic article explaining why all calories are NOT the same for weight loss. Different foods have different metabolic effects on our bodies. A diet of 2,000 calories of fat/protein will be very different than 2,000 calories of carbs in terms of weight management.

http://eatingacademy.com/nutrition/do-calories-matter

 

[kroach01]

Everything excess except alcohol, fiber, and crap like splenda turns to fat, but that means your body still processes it. No one said calories are the same. The only thing that is the same is how much energy is in a kcal. See it is a unit of measure. If your body burned 3000 kcals of energy any given day and you eat 2999 usable kcals of energy, guess what, you lost weight. If you ate 3001 kcals you just gained weight. Not talking about health! That should be obvious that a mealplan of twinkies will lead to health problems.

Ok, so the number 3000=3000. I get that.

But with respect to the source of calories and how they affect the body's metabolism, saying 3000cal = 3000 cal is really not true at all if the sources are different. There were plenty of posts here saying all calories are the same. I guess in an absolute sense, irrespective of the human body and its metabolic pathways, that's true. 3 does mathematically equal 3.

If I sit down every day and eat one meal that contains my daily caloric content, I will not have the same metabolism as someone who eats five and gets the same caloric content.
If I ate the one meal that was 100% skittles and all of my caloric need, my metabolism would be different than having five meals that were broccoli but fulfilled the same caloric need.
In any scenario my caloric intake is the same. In all scenarios, the metabolic picture and my weight are going to be different.
It's all about the glycemic index.

Also, while alcohol can't directly be converted into fats it can inhibit lipolysis and cause fat to build up.

 

[sonofgrok]

That should be obvious that a mealplan of twinkies will lead to health problems.

I wish it was. There seem to be more than enough people that it isn't obvious to as evidenced by our growing obesity and diabetic problems. And if it is obvious it is only due to the brand name "Twinkie". A large number of the starbucks drinks people stuff their face with every morning are just as bad or worse.

 

[sonofgrok]

 

[Safa]

Eat less and workout....That's what I do, so I can drink this beer...

I don't exercise so I can end up looking better. I do it so I can eat whatever I want whenever I want and drink ungodly amounts of beer.

Its not that I like exercise. I hate it. I just love eating and drinking so much, its worth it.

OP: you're drinking beer, its got alcohol in it, its going to make you fat no matter how many calories it has.