Is a flat stomach your ultimate fitness goal? These simple nutrition tips will help you get there. Better yet, they’ll help you get there without starving yourself, suffering constant hunger pangs or doing anything really complicated to your diet.
Who said weight loss had to be hard! Anyway, on to the tips…
Tip 1: Stop following the fads
Nutrition expert and author of ‘The Fat Burning Kitchen‘ Mike Geary states:
One of the most important messages I try to teach my readers in this world of heavy confusion is that your diet doesn’t need to conform to any of the fad diets… you don’t need to go “low carb” or “low fat”, or high or low anything for that matter to be successful in losing enough body fat to get lean enough to be able to see your abs. I like to try to simplify things for my readers.
According to Geary, when it comes to eating for a flat stomach the keys to succes are:
Balance: stay away from the extremes of no-fat, no-carb, low-fat, low-carb. Your body needs both fats and carbs to function properly. Depriving yourself of one or the other isn’t a sustainable nutrition strategy.
Eat whole foods: Fill your diet with plenty of nutrient rich foods that are as close to their natural state (unprocessed) as possible.
Tip 2: Get enough protein from quality sources
Getting a good amount of high quality protein every day is one of the first things you should do when eating for a flat stomach. There’s a couple of reasons for this:
1: Protein takes a lot of energy for your body to digest. This creates what fitness cook Dave Ruel (Metabolic Cooking) calls a metabolic thermo-charge. This also ties in nicely with tip #4 – revving up your metabolism.
2: Because it takes a long time to digest, protein keeps you feeling full for longer. This helps prevent hunger pangs.
3: Protein is an important building block for maintaining and building your lean muscle mass. Many fat burning diets ultimately cause you to lose muscle instead of fat. Eating enough protein prevents this from happening.
So… what are some good quality sources of protein?
According to Dave Ruel some of the best natural protein sources to include in your diet are:
- chicken and poultry
- eggs
- lean red meat
- fish
- pork
Tip 3: Eat the right carbs
There are lots of diets that treat carbs as if they were the enemy. In fact, it’s not carbs that are standing in the way of your much desired flat stomach. That is to say… it’s not all carbs. It’s true that there are some nasty carbs you probably want to stay away from. However, carbs are also an important source of fuel for your body.
Which carbs are the true enemy?
If you want to get rid of stomach fat, the ones you want to avoid as much possible are the simple carbs from processed foods such as sugar and corn syrup.
According to Mike Geary, one of the main reasons so many people struggle with unwanted body fat is that their diets contain WAY too much refined sugars an refined grains.
Ok, so which carbs should you be eating?
The best carbs to include in your diet if you’re trying to lose fat are complex carbs from high fiber sources like:
- fruits
- vegetables
- high fiber unrefined grains
Geary recommends looking for carbohydrate sources have at least 2-3 grams of fiber for each 10 grams of carbs they contain. In his book The Fat Burning Kitchen he provides an extensive list of the best fiber rich carb sources for a flat stomach.
Tip 4: Not all fat is bad
The same thing that applies to carbs can also be said for fat. It’s not all bad and your body does need it. The trick is to choose the correct sources of fat.
What fats should you avoid?
The most unhealthy type of fats which you should REALLY stay away from are (artificial) trans fats. These are fats from margarine and hydrogenated oils that are found in many processed and deep fried foods.
What are the best types of fat to include in your diet? A simple rule of thumb is:
When in doubt, go for as unprocessed as possible.
Some good sources of fat are:
- nuts and seeds
- avocados
- olive oil
- organic meats
- eggs
- coconuts and virgin coconut oil
- nut butters
Tip 5: Rev up your metabolism
One of the key players on your road to a flat stomach is your metabolism. A faster metabolism means that more of the food you eat is used as fuel and less is stored as fat.
When you start applying the tips mentioned above, like eating more quality protein, you will already start boosting your metabolism and putting your body into fat burning mode.
For some great additional metabolism boosting tricks, download this free report.
You may also want to try some metabolic cooking recipes. These recipes use the principle of metabolic thermo-charge and provide a safe, effective and sustainable way to burn unwanted fat and keep it off. You’ll also recieve 10 of these recipes if you choose to download the free report mentioned above.
Bonus tip: Stop chasing the magic bullet
It’s sad but true. A lot of people would have much better, faster and more lasting results if they spent the time they use looking for quick fixes, easy solutions and magic bullets on adapting some simple new habits and lifestyle changes instead.
Thousands of people every month are typing the search term “how to get a flat stomach in a day” into Goolge every month. Unless they’re considering liposuction, this is a completely unrealistic expectation.
It takes time to get rid of fat, just like it took time to accumulate it. If you’ve found yourself falling prey to the many ‘magic bullet’ systems out there… do yourself a favor and start thinking in long term, sustainable solutions.
Ultimately it’s the little things you do every day that determine your success. If you want a flatter stomach, applying the simple tips mentioned above every day is a great start.
You may also like:
- 3 Fat Burning Breakfast Foods You Should Start Eating Today
- 1 Simple Tip To Burn Belly Fat
- Fight Abdominal Fat With These Veggies
- The Secret To Losing Weight Without Counting Calories
The post 5 Simple Nutrition Tips For A Flat Stomach appeared first on FitPlaza.
