IMPORTANT: 9 Foods You Shouldn’t Be Eating

1. Fast Food

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Hopefully this one doesn’t surprise anyone but fast food, as good as it might taste, is never going to give you the body you’re looking for.

Just for the record, fast food is anything fried, deep fried, grilled, broiled… do I really need to explain fast food?

2. Sugary Food

Another food we need to be avoiding is anything with sugar in it.  Cake, cookies, confectionery come to mind, but don’t forget that sugar is found in thousands of other foods, particularly those found in sealed packets in your local supermarket!
You’d be surprised how effective completely cutting out sugar can be.  Don’t try and go completely cold turkey on it though, set a goal of 7 days without sugar and see how you go.

3. Sugary Drinks

Worse than sugary food is sugary drinks.  Soft drinks, orange juice, tea or coffee with added sugar, just about any drink you can think of has sugar in it.  Orange juice sounds healthy, but it is laden with sugar.

If you could do one thing to dramatically decrease your sugar consumption, just stop drinking sugary drinks!  Water is great and the more you drink it the less you’ll feel like these other excuses for thirst quenchers.

If a soft drink doesn’t have sugar in it then it probably has something worse – artificial sweeteners.

4. Artificial Sweeteners

Aspartame, NutraSweet, Equal, Sucaryl, all of these refer to chemicals which taste sweet and purportedly contain no calories.  Unfortunately evidence points to the reality that although they aren’t sugar, they can affect our bodies even worse than sugar can.

And another thing, show me someone who has lost weight from drinking this stuff – then answer this question (if you can find someone), do they look healthy?

5. MSG

MSG doesn’t sweeten our food, what it does is make savory food taste better.  If that’s all it did then we’d be away laughing, unfortunately it affects our brain cells in such an adverse way that, well, quite simply it kills them!  Many will bluntly tell you it causes cancer.

Sure, MSG may not make you fat (though that is debated), but it sure won’t make you healthy.

6. Bread

“Surely you mean white bread, not bread?”, you ask.  Nope, I mean bread, period.  That great smelling substance baked on a daily basis around the globe.  If your goal is to avoid and get rid of stubborn fat then you should also avoid eating bread as much as possible.  It is very hard for your body to digest and makes one sluggish and sleepy after eating.
If you must eat bread, eat it in the evenings after a healthy amount of fresh salad and vegetables.  This will allow your metabolism to kick in and do its job during a good night’s sleep.
NOTE: If your daily job involves heavy labour you can probably get away with the lunchtime sandwich.

7. Other grain based food

I’ve taken away your bread, and yes, now I’m going to take away your pasta, corn, chips, wraps, rice and noodles and anything else made from grains.  It doesn’t mean you have to say goodbye to your favorite dish forever, if you’re like me you’ll always want the freedom to enjoy a good pizza from time to time.  But the fact remains, unless we are extremely active, grains do not make a positive influence to our health.

8. Alcohol

Another thing that’s hard for your body to digest is alcohol.  In moderation it doesn’t have too much of an effect, but every little bit adds up and if you’re really serious about your health and fitness goals you should consider going cold turkey (bar special occasions).

There is the argument that a single glass of red wine during a meal will aid digestion and as such, consuming it is a good thing.  Before you take on this advice though, consider why the food you are eating is causing you digestive issues.  I would say that if you’re going to have a glass of wine in the evening, have it as a treat, not as a fix for indigestion.

9. Combinations of the above

Image by PetitPlat by sk_ via Flickr

Not only should you try and avoid each of the above types of food, but combinations of the above can be even worse.

Some examples:

• fast food combos (fast food + sugary drink)
• donuts (sugar + baking)
• beer (sugar + yeast + alcohol)

The 9 out of 10 Rule

Lots of people out there will claim that you should be avoiding unhealthy food like a plague – that is despising it to the point you don’t even let it come near you.

As noble as this is it is also practically impossible (whether or not you are able to resist yourself).  Are you going to refuse to eat a birthday cake someone has just baked for you?  Are you going to scoff at your 9 year old niece’s first attempt at chocolate chip cookies?
Instead of aiming for 0% bad food, I like to stick to the ’9 out of 10 rule’.  This simply states that if you eat well 9 times in a row, then you’ll get away with eating junk the 10th time.
The theory is that, like many things your body can handle poor nutrition if, by and large it is used to good nutrition.  The healthier your body is, the better it will handle a one-off cheat meal. Just as your body can get away with a late night every so often, so it can handle less-than-ideal nutrition once in a while

In practice I try to follow this by having no more than 1 cheat meal and 1 or 2 cheat snacks in any given week.  And of course, they’ll always be the cheat days to deal with – Christmas Day or Thanksgiving (for you Americans).

Begin war now!

So there you have it, 7 foods you should be avoiding if you want to lose flab and look great.  I suggest you use the snowballing method: start with one, such as sugar, get that under control and then move on to attack another one.

Let me know how you get on!

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10 comments so far

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1. 

   Comment by Frank
   6 July 2009

   I am on a quest to lower my body fat, I can deal with eliminating all bread for a while , but what do you think about plain old fashion oatmeal while trying to decrease bf? Also what about fruit? Doesn’t the fructose effect the body?

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2. 

   Comment by Elliot Wilson
   26 July 2009

   @Frank Oatmeal is an option, but remember it is still a grain and still affects your body the way normal carbohydrates do. To decrease body fat I’d recommend sticking to fruit and vegetables for carbs as well as plenty of healthy fats and a good portion of protein.

   As for fructose (from fruit), to me it’s a question of how strict you want to be on yourself. Fruit does have an effect on your body, but the in most cases the benefits (natural vitamins and antioxidants) mean you don’t have to be too worried about your blood sugar levels. If you do want to get strict then make sure to limit indulging in fruits which have a high GI.

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3. 

   Comment by Jenny
   16 August 2010

   I was shocked to see bread on the list. It shouldn’t have been as shocking as it was, to be honest. Can you recommend some healthy alternatives to bread?

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4. 

   Comment by Elliot Wilson
   12 January 2011

   Bread, pasta, cereal, oats even rice – if you want to fast-track weight loss efforts the fastest way to do it would be to stop eating all of these foods.

   Get your carbohydrates from vegetables and fruit (in that order) and save other foods for a treat every now and then (i.e. no more than once a week).

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5. 

   Comment by Lisa
   5 February 2011

   I’m not sure I agree with cutting grains entirely.

   I’ve never been overweight and always been lean, and I eat oatmeal or a whole-grain bagel every morning. I pair it with some natural peanut butter and an orange. My body fat is quite low — maybe even too low for a woman, but that alone has me convinced that it’s possible to lose flab and still eat what I like.

   For the rest of the day, my meals are veg and fruit based with other non-organic proteins. Maybe that’s the secret?

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6. 

   Comment by educated
   7 February 2011

   When you post nonsense,especially bro-ish, non researched back regurgitated info, try and back it up with science.
   Where is your research to back the the dangers of artificial sweetners, moderate alcohol or even moderate consumption of fast food??
   Articles such as yours are the reason people remain in the dark about what and how to eat because you continue ,quite wrongly, to espouse the “evils” of one food group i.e Carbs. Jenny who posted above, Bread is okay, be aware of how much you eat. For weight loss, what you eat isn’t nearly as important as HOW MUCH! This article is so ridiculously alarmist, I had to comment.I am a drug free,200 plus body builder type who currently sits at 10% bf quite easily and I’m a diabetic, so the glycemic index means more to me than most, and aside from alcohol, which i dont consume at all, I eat just about everything else, including sugary stuff. Now I have to watch contents, but in moderation, I consume just about anything I want. I suffered under the misinformation which you are spreading now until I found experts such as Lyle Macdonald, Alan Alaragon,Martin Berkhan, Jamie hale, JC Deen, James Krieger etc. If anything I’ve said is wrong and you can back it up with research, have at it. I welcome a debate on this issue.

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7. 

   Comment by Elliot Wilson
   12 February 2011

   Hi “educated”,

   I’m not sure what “body builder type” means. If what you doing is working then go for it.

   Had a quick look at some of the names you’ve thrown and it is more puzzling than anything – most of them would be in agreement with the majority of what I’ve said.

   I agree that some bread is okay. I eat it once or twice a week. (Though on some weeks I’ll go without completely).

   Check out Whole Health Source (http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com) if you’re really interested in the science. Refined sugar and grains (in particular wheat) have introduced a myriad of health problems when the foods are added to a traditional diet which has up until then enjoyed good health.

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8. 

   Comment by Lisa
   12 February 2011

   Me again. Got the comment notification for this and just realized I’d written non-organic proteins in my first post. LOL. Take out the non! I think I meant non-meat.

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9. 

   Comment by jessie
   25 January 2012

   Im 12 years old 113lb 4ft 11in (overweight) and trying to get abs and i need a few tips im not really sure what to eat because ive searched up soo many things that im confused and i really need help

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10. 

    Comment by Elliot Wilson
    25 January 2012

    Hi Jessie, if I was you I’d avoid grains (bread, pasta etc) and sugar, and stick to eating natural foods. Lots of fresh vegetables, plenty of meat, as well as nuts, seeds and fruit. Don’t drink juice or soft drink, stick to drinking water or unsweetened tea (try soda water or water with lemon and ice in it, if plain water is too boring). Don’t count calories, just eat as much as you feel like (if it’s natural whole foods as mentioned above.

    Remember, you are allowed to cheat every now and then (especially at your age) but the great thing is, the longer you eat healthy the less you’ll crave unhealthy food. I WISH I started eating healthy as young as 12!

    Have you checked out Mark’s Daily Apple (www.marksdailyapple.com)?

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