Lots of talk lately about bulletproof coffee and people putting butter in their coffee, huh?
People drink it for energy, focus, mental clarity, metabolism and satiety. While there are absolutely health benefits derived from butter (especially from the short chain fatty acid butyrate) and coffee (it’s packed with antioxidants and polyphenols), the heavy hitter in bulletproof coffee is the medium chain triglycerides (MCTs).
MCTs are naturally abundant in coconut oil or you can purchase straight MCT oil, a more concentrated delivery of medium chain triglycerides.
Bulletproof coffee is made by blending coffee with butter and either coconut oil or MCT oil. There are dozens of variations possible including egg yolks, collagen, cacao powder, whey protein & more.
For today, we’re looking just at MCTs. What are medium chain triglycerides and what do they do?
A Word of Warning
Let me start out by making one thing incredibly clear: there is NO magic weight loss secret. There is nothing that can replace a consistently clean, fat-loss friendly diet. You can’t workout enough to compensate for a diet full of garbage. You can’t supplement to counteract the damage caused my constantly eating junk. Bulletproof coffee is not a fairy dust drink that will trigger fat burning.
The only magic is YOU and the decisions you make.
Bulletproof coffee doesn’t burn fat. It’s not a hack or weight loss quick fix.
With that said, there are certainly individual factors that have the power to magnify the results of your clean eating and intelligent exercise. There are ingredients that can increase energy & mental clarity.
However, if you haven’t mastered eating clean 80% of the time or more, THAT is where you need to invest your energy. THAT is where you will get your results. Don’t think that adding something like bulletproof coffee will have ANY impact if you aren’t eating clean.
For the Science Folks
Let’s talk about medium chain triglycerides. One of the ways we classify dietary fats is by the length of their fatty acid chain. Like carbohydrates and proteins, fats are chains of their building blocks – fatty acids. We characterize fats as either short chain, medium chain or long chain. The majority of the fats within the foods we eat are classified as long chain fatty acids. These long chains require an intricate digestive process to allow them to be digested and absorbed.
Medium chain fats (we’ll refer to them as MCTs – medium chain triglycerides) are metabolized very differently than long chain TGs. Because of their shorter length, they’re more soluble in water, allowing them to be metabolized much more easily. In fact, MCTs bypass the long digestive process that LCTs have to endure.
They are absorbed rapidly into the blood stream. When you consume these MCTs you get a quick energy boost and, because fat is such a long-burning fuel, you don’t get the energy crash that follows carbohydrate consumption (or the rise in blood sugar and insulin).
MCTs give you instant fuel the way carbohydrates do, but without the energy crash, insulin response or potential for fat storage. Not only that, butstudies have shownthat MCTs actually improve your metabolism of glucose (sugar) by enhancing insulin sensitivity.
MCTs are sent directly to the liver where they are processed to provide immediate fuel for our muscles, cells and brain. Our metabolic rate increases, our energy increases and we get much more mileage out of MCTs as fuel than we ever would from carbohydrate.
Because they bypass the “traditional” digestive process, they are often tolerated more easily by people without a gallbladder or with other digestive challenges and sensitivities to dietary fat.
Best of all, because they avoid they long digestive process of LCTs and are used more immediately for fuel, they’re very unlikely to be stored as fat, in so long as you don’t consume MCTs with a moderate or high carbohydrate meal. They should be consumed only with other fats, proteins or non-starchy vegetables.
Where Do You Find MCTs?
MCTs occur naturally in coconut oil, however you can also buypure MCT oil. Medium chain TGs are also naturally occurring in other foods like dairy products, but in far lower amounts than what we see in coconut oil.
For more on bulletproof coffee, check out one of my most popular podcast episodes! It’s all about bulletproof coffee, MCT oil and how it has helped my fat loss journey!
You might have questions about alternative variations of the traditional BP coffee, decaf coffee, bulletproof tea or the use of sweeteners and you can read my thoughts on those questions in this bulletproof coffee Q&A post.
I’m not sure how, but it’s already the end of October! It’s crazy how time flies. Halloween is only a few days away. For some people (including me, for most of my life) Halloween marks the beginning of the downward eating spiral through Christmas. There’s candy in the house for weeks and just when it’s finally cleared out its time for Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is a massive day of indulgence with a week of leftovers and as soon as you work through those, the holiday parties begin. Between holiday parties and cookie swaps, there’s food everywhere, all the time.
It can be totally overwhelming. You’re in this frenzied tail-spin until you wake up in January feeling exhausted, bloated and 10 lbs heavier than you were before Halloween. Let’s break that cycle, shall we?
I know Halloween can be a tough holiday for parents who, while they certainly don’t want to restrict their child from the fun of the holiday, they dread the constant sugar-induced hyperactivity and attitude problems. I’m all for enjoying tradition, but I believe there are ways to make the most of Halloween traditions without making the focus the candy and treats. It IS possible to have a healthy Halloween and embrace moderation while still enjoying the holiday to the fullest!
Try to switch the focus this year to some of the non-food aspects of the holiday. Have a family pumpkin-carving contest. You can even use oranges and let your kids “crave” a face into the peel with a plastic knife. Emphasize decorating the house or let your kids decorate their rooms in a Halloween theme. Go on a hayride, tour a haunted house or go apple picking. (C’mon, you know you’re impressed by my crazy pumpkin carving skills!! haha. That’s my puppy, Oakley, in pumpkin form)
Don’t keep those bags of candy in the house the week leading up to trick-or-treat. Make fun, healthy holiday treats together like roasted pumpkin seeds, apple crisp or banana ghosts.
Trick or treat is another thing all together. Kids come home with buckets full of more candy than they should optimally eat all year and wolf it down in a matter or days or weeks. There are a ton of strategies out to keep your kids from becoming sugar monsters. Here are a few of my favorites:
Host a buy back. When your kid comes home with their big bag of treats, assign a monetary value to either the whole haul or to select pieces. When they trade it in, they get the cash.
Offer a non-food incentive for their candy. Is there a pair of sneakers your son has been begging for? Offer a swap – candy for sneakers.
Let them pick the 5 pieces they want most and take away the rest. Maybe you can let them continue to pick 1-2 pieces per week for the next few weeks.
At the end of the day, letting your child consume an entire bucket of candy, whether its over a few weeks or a few days, is not the best strategy for their health, for their emotional relationship with food and certainly not for their behavior and focus. Get creative; there are tons of awesome ideas out there!
Beans are a confusing subject. Lots of people assume they’re a super food but its time we really ask: Are beans healthy? They’ve been touted as this nutrient-dense, protein-packed power food yet Paleo and Primal advocates say they are off limits. What’s the scoop? I can honestly say that beans and legumes are one of those foods that just won’t fit into the “sometimes” category for me. They are a “rarely” food. Yes, I love peanut butter as much as the next person but I’ve found I can easily satisfy that craving with sunflower butter (its amazing!) or cashew better.
Beans, peanuts and soybeans fall into a category called legumes. From the 10,000 foot view they look like they’re packed full of nutrients, but when you dig a little deeper, you’ll find that’s not really an accurate depiction. Here are some of the reasons you might want to re-think beans.
Phytic Acid/Phytates
The phytic acid in legumes binds to critical nutrients such as iron, zinc, calcium, magnesium and copper and prevents them from being absorbed. So the stellar nutrient deck you’re looking at when you pick up a can of beans? It’s misleading. They phytates will keep much of that from ever being absorbed.
Protease Inhibitors
Proteases are the enzymes required to break down protein into it’s building blocks, amino acids, so they can be absorbed and utilized by the body. Legumes contain protease inhibitors, meaning they impair the breakdown of protein. Once again, the protein you think you’re getting based on the nutrition facts is misleading. These protease inhibitors keep much of that protein from being broken down for use by the body.
Saponins
Saponins freak me out. No lie. These anti-nutrients actually have the ability to poke holes in the outer membrane of your red blood cells leading to inflammation and, in sensitive individuals or after repeated exposure, can actually cause your red blood cells to rupture.
Lectins
Lectins are proteins within legumes that actually evolved as toxins to protect the legume from predators. Unfortunately, because lectins are capable of crossing the protective barrier within your digestive tract, these toxins have been associated with tremendous inflammation and autoimmune disease.
You have to check out thisamazing articlefrom The Paleo Diet that points out that based on this collection of anti-nutrients, legumes actually deliver 66% less protein than chicken or turkey and 61% less than beef, pork or seafood.
It is important to note that nuts also contain a few of these anti-nutrients, such as phytic acid. However, they do contain slightly fewer than legumes but more importantly, we don’t rely on nuts as a primary source of calories and nutrients the way many people do beans. We also tend to eat nuts in smaller portions. There’s no question that you should take care with nuts and not consider them a dominant source of nutrients or protein but legumes are definitely a bigger offender!
With all that said, I’m not condemning beans and legumes, I’m just sharing why I choose to avoid them. There are certainly FAR more significant dietary threats like processed foods and artificial ingredients. However, there are also healthier choices than beans and legumes and there’s a reason beans and legumes don’t fit into the paleo and primal schema. For fat loss and optimal health, I choose to avoid them and I wanted you to know why.
I get emails and private Facebook messages every single day with people asking the same type of question: “Is fruit OK to eat for fat loss?”, “How many calories should I be eating?”, “How many times each week should I workout?”, “Can I eat peanut butter and still lose weight?”
I do not have the answers to any of those questions.No one can answer those questions except YOU. There are lots of people in the diet and fitness industry who will take your money and tell you exactly what to eat, when to exercise and how. They’ll tell you what’s off limits, what’s fair play and answer the above types of questions all day long.I have an issue with that.
Have you ever used a GPS system to get some place? You diligently follow the prompts – the automated voice directing your every turn. Get off course? No problem. You keep going down the wrong road until you’re rescued by “recalculating!” and then you obediently turn and merge only as you’re told. You arrive at your destination and have little idea how you got there or how to get back. You hardly noticed the scenery or the road conditions; you were too busy focused on the careful turn-by-turn directions. You certainly couldn’t get back without similar assistance.
Following someone else’s food and nutrition rules is a lot like that – you put your head down and follow someone else’s rules. Unfortunately, you don’t have the benefit of “recalculating!” to save you if you get off course. Sure, there’s benefit to basic guidelines for fat loss nutrition. But they are only a benefit if you realize they are just that – guidelines. They only “hard and fast” fat loss rules are the ones you create as you learn your body and how you respond to different types of food. Following someone else’s prescription can backfire – it can prevent you from developing the awareness of your body, your hormones and your needs that is ESSENTIAL if you want long-term success.
Our bodies are different. What works for me might not work for you. You might tolerate certain foods that I can’t. You might be able to enjoy fruit and peanut butter every day and lose fat while I can’t. If you have these types of questions let me answer you this way: I can act as your compass but not as your map. I can point you in the right direction based on my personal experience, education, and research but I cannot draw you a turn-by-turn map for your fat loss journey. That’s YOUR job. When you understand the general direction in which you need to go for both health and fat loss, you’re the one who has to see how the smaller details work, or don’t work, for you. You’re the one who has to pay attention to how foods, lifestyle factors and workouts impact your results, your hormone balance, your energy, mood, hunger and cravings. That’s your job.
To be successful in achieving fat loss that you effortlessly maintain for life, you need to pay attention. YOU need to chart the course. As you get further and further into your journey, it needs to become increasingly customized to what works for you. You want to follow a course by compass, not by map. Set out to find your own answers to questions like:
What foods satisfy my cravings?
What foods send me into a downward binging spiral?
What foods keep me fullest, longest?
What foods give me the most energy?
What foods do I look forward to eating?
What are the most manageable foods to prepare?
What are the most convenient and satisfying snacks?
If we polled 100 people who have lost 50 lbs or more, I bet they’d all have different answers to those questions and guess what – none of them are wrong!
Here are a few things I learned about my own food preferences and unique fat loss factors that I really could NOT have learned if I had been following someone else’s plan.
I am very sensitive to carbohydrates. Not only do they NOT give me energy, they do not fill me up and they make me retain a significant amount of water. I can eat carbohydrates, but my fat loss results are best when I only include them in my last meal of the day.
Dietary fat increases my energy and keeps me full. Starting my day with fat (usually in the form of MCT oil in my coffee) satisfies my hunger, keeps me full for hours, gives me energy for my workout and improves my ability to focus.
Volume is my friend. I eat a lot of green, fibrous veggies like brussel sprouts and cabbage. Its not uncommon for me to have as much as 2-3 cups at each meal. It takes me longer to get through my meal and fills me up.
I need to limit my protein intake. Yup, I said it. For months I was overeating protein. Any food, in excess, will prevent fat loss. I was overdoing it with the protein. I have to be careful of this one.
Bars are a major trigger for me. It’s hard to have just one. I’m better off avoiding protein bars completely and if I do have one I won’t buy a box, I’ll just buy one.
If I were to try to map out your entire fat loss formula, I’d be doing you a major disservice in the long term. The better you know your body and your individual response to food, stress and exercise, the more effective you will be at achieving your fat loss goals and maintaining them for life. Dig in, do the work, pay attention to your body and find those answers for yourself.
When you increase your blood sugar with a meal or snack rich in processed foods or very starchy carbohydrates, the sugar has to get out of your blood quickly. That’s insulin’s job – ushering insulin out of the blood stream and helping it find a place to go. However, as we’ve talked about before, insulin isn’t really effective at doing it’s job in many overweight people. Why? Because the chronic state of high blood sugar from constant carbohydrate consumption floods the body with insulin and we develop what’s called “insulin resistance”. When insulin is always hanging around, the tissues and cells that normally respond to it become immune. It’s kinda like how we get used to the brightness of the sun after being outside for a while. When you first step outside, the sun can sometimes be overwhelming. You squint, shield your eyes and look away. But, after a while, you’ve adjusted. It’s no big deal. You aren’t squinting and it doesn’t seem so bright. You’re used to it.
When insulin is always around due to chronically elevated blood sugar, your cells become immune to it. That is a problem for a number of reasons, but today we’re going to talk about what happens when insulin is no longer able to quickly remove that sugar from the blood and it just hangs around in the blood stream.
There’s a reason we need insulin to clear sugar from the blood ASAP. When it hangs around, it can become quite toxic. One of the things sugar does when left to linger is bind to proteins or fats that are naturally present in your blood. Not only does this render the protein/fat ineffective (and it can’t do what it’s in the blood to do) but it forms something called Advanced Glycation End Products (AGES). The acronym is really quite appropriate; these AGES age you.There’s absolutely no question that they accelerate the aging process.
AGEs cause destruction throughout your entire body. Through research, AGEs have been implicated in the development of diabetes, heart disease, Alzheimer’s disease, stroke, neuropathy and much more. They damage your cells, which is the starting point for almost all disease. They can impair blood flood and have been linked to asthma, eye problems and systemic inflammation.
From a cosmetic perspective, AGEs seriously impair skin health. The body sees these AGEs as foreign bodies, triggering an inflammatory response. This can lead to both internal and topical inflammation. AGEs are naturally drawn to the collagen and elastin within your skin. Collagen and elastin are then no longer able to do their job effectively. The result? Fine lines and wrinkles.
It’s important to note that you can also increase your exposure to AGEs from smoking or eating foods that have been cooked at very high temperatures (grilled, fried, etc). We certainly can’t eliminate our exposure to AGEs – they are naturally formed within our bodies, but reducing their prevalence by managing our blood sugar is KEY.The simplest way to do that is by eliminating processed foods, sugars and wheat products.
