The Tilth Blog

Nutrition and Fitness

* Warning – I am not a nutritionist!
The recommendations are gathered from personal experiences and a smattering of professional statistics. I’m the one that you see at Rain City Video eyeballing the Butterfingers next to the register and occasionally giving in. I won’t bother with anything less than extra butter on my popcorn at the movie theater. When going to a nice restaurant, there will be cocktails before dinner, at least five courses taken down with wine, as well as after-dinner drinks. Between splurges, I am able to show a little restraint and that’s what I’m here to share.

I recently started conditioning my body for a recreational rock climbing trip to Thailand. As a rock climber, you need to have a lot of strength and keep body mass (fat and bulky muscle) down. The strength is what keeps you on the rock and keeping your body weight down means you have less to haul up the 85-foot or more wall of stone. There are also other things to help conditioning, such as flexibility, endurance, etc.

While trying to lose a few pounds for the trip, I also doubled the amount of climbing. Than seriously injured my forearm! After a couple of trips to the acupuncturists and several weeks of physical therapy (six weeks later…still injured), it dawned on me that maybe I need to take a look at how I’m feeding my body. I started feverishly devouring nutrition books to temper my angst of not being in the climbing gym only to realize that my poor nutritional habits contributed to my injury! Here I am, age 35, 19 years in professional kitchens, a college degree in culinary arts, owner of an organic restaurant, and I have no clue about nutritional health!

So I thought it might be fun to share some of the very basic nutritional facts I’ve come across that you may find useful. I first realized that I really have no conscious idea of how much calories, protein, carbs or fat I ingest in a day, let alone know what the recommended allotment is for my gender, age and activity level. So I found out what the recommended allotment was and then started to track my daily intake. The first couple of days, I noticed that I was in taking 90 grams of fat as opposed to the 40 gram recommendation. I had no idea how easy it was to consume 2 or 3 times the amount of fat needed. Eating organically certainly doesn’t rob you of fattening, delicious foods. Also, my protein intake was only half of what is required to assist in building muscle. If you eat well under your required amount of protein and you’re working your muscles really hard, they will start to cannibalize themselves. This was a major contribution to my forearm injury, as well as not doing strengthening exercises for the opposing muscles that are used for climbing. With my lack of knowledge at the time, I was purposefully doing this to keep any excess muscle (extra weight) off to make it easier to get up the wall.

With that as a preface, let’s talk about a couple basic nutritional and fitness tips that I hope will keep you all healthy, strong and free of injury. Keep in mind, I’m not talking about short-term dieting ideas here. I’m talking about lifestyle changes that will enhance your overall well-being.

ESTIMATED CALORIE NEEDS FOR ADULTS - USDA 2005 Dietary Guidelines

WOMEN SEDENTARY ACTIVE
(walking more than 3 mi. per day)
19 to 30 YRS. OLD 2000 2400
31 to 50 YRS. OLD 1800 2200
51+ YRS. OLD 1600 2100

MEN
19 to 30 YRS. OLD 2400 3000
31 to 50 YRS. OLD 2200 2900
51+ YRS. OLD 2000 2600

DAILY DIETARY RECCOMENDED INTAKE – National Academy of Sciences
* For more accurate figures that match your activity level, check out the DRI website.
PROTEIN CARBS FAT
WOMEN 44 g. 180-230 g 45-75 g.

MEN 56 g. 200-330 45-75

My recommendation would be to start an eating and exercise journal for 30 days. Here’s an example below of what my journal looks like. I use rough estimates of time and amounts of food and fill it out as often as I can throughout the day. You don’t need to put everything you eat in a measuring cup. Knowing the time of day you eat can tip you off as to when weight gain occurs. Do you tend to eat your biggest meal late at night when you’re stagnant? Do you tend to eat more fattening foods on particular days? Do your emotions have an effect on when and what you eat? Based off of this journal you can start to really see your patterns of what causes you to gain or lose weight, feel mentally healthy, physically healthy, and strong.

FOOD AND EXERCISE JOURNAL

DATE : 12/23/07 WEIGHT : 108

* Daily recommended for my gender, age, & activity level : 2200 calories, 88 g protein, 242 g carbs, 40 g fat.

TIME ITEM CALORIE PROTEIN CARBS FAT
8am ½ c. coffee 3 0 g. 0 g. 0 g.
8am 2 ea. vitamin c 20 0 4 0
10am 2 ea. Satsuma orange 62 1 16 0
12pm 1 ea. Apple 82 0 22 0
1pm 1 slice Banana bread 180 4 25 8
2pm 2 oz. Steak 120 20 20 15
3pm 8 oz. Protein drink 130 13 17 1
3pm 8 oz. Smoothie 55 15 22 0
5pm 1 c. Kale 60 4 10 5
5pm 2 oz. Steak 120 20 20 15
5pm 3 oz. fresh Mozzarella 230 15 2 18
5pm 1 c. Risotto 160 1 20 12
7pm 2 ea. Beers 300 2 26 0
7pm 4 ea. Shortbread cookies 300 2 40 12
7pm ¼ c. Cashews 200 5 11 15
TOTALS: 2102 102 251 101

AEROBIC EXERCISE : 35 min. – 11am - jog
ANAEROBIC EXERCISE : 1 hr. – 11:45am - physical therapy exercises, abdominal work, stretches.

As you can see from my example, it’s really hard to keep the fat grams down! Cashews, cookies and cheese seem to be the main culprits of this day’s entry. I gained a pound the next day from what I ate. It probably also didn’t help that almost all the fat I consumed was later in the day when I was stagnant and lounging about. You’ll also notice that I still was under my calorie allotment for the day. This tells me that I need to eat more nutrient-dense foods and less fattening foods. I also ate hardly any vegetables.

Creating a balanced diet is also a key to being healthy. It’s important to reach for nutrient dense foods. These are foods that contain the most nutrients for the least amount of calories. It’s necessary to get enough nutrients, vitamins, and minerals that your body needs. Eat a large variety of foods to help with getting all different types of vitamins and minerals. Drink at least 8 glasses of water a day. Try to eat at least 35 different types of foods a week. Keep nutritious foods around you at all times so you’re not tempted to eat junk food. Do not let your body get hungry. If you get too hungry, you’ll be tempted to eat more than you need and eat the wrong foods. Keep healthy snacks around (e.g.: fruit smoothie, fruit, baby carrots, etc.) Make smart choices when at the grocery store. Buying groceries is your biggest opportunity to eat right. A food pyramid that you trust is a good way to ballpark if you are eating a balanced diet. You can go on to the Oldways Preservation and Exchange Trust to find a variety of recommended food pyramids.

Generally, I’m a disciplined eater on work days. On the weekends, I cut myself a little slack. It’s important not to over-indulge on weekends, but there’s no harm in some small rewards. And when I’m dining out at Harvest Vine, Tilth or Café Juanita, I’ll eat whatever sounds delicious! Although, I’ll probably be sure to get a good run in the next day to balance out the gain.

Calorie intake can be controlled by cutting back “empty calories.” Theses are calories that are energy dense from sugar, fat or both, with hardly any protein, vitamins, or minerals (e.g.: doughnuts, candy, chips, etc.) In order to keep fat down, it’s best to stay away from these foods. Also cooking with less butter and cream (as much as I dislike saying it) will help keep fat down. Learn to replace the empty calories with calories that are nutrient-dense (e.g.: carrots, spinach, turkey, salmon, chicken, banana, berries, low fat yogurt, whole grain bread, quinoa, etc). Keep in mind that not all fat is bad, but if you want to maintain a certain weight you have to be at least aware of how much fat is in certain foods. Marbled red meat, butter, most cheeses, and most nuts are high in fat.

Check and see what your daily vitamin and mineral recommendations are as well. There is quite a bit of debate on whether vitamin and mineral supplements are necessary for the average person. On a daily basis, I take cod liver to help with tendonitis issues and flexibility, glucosomine for joints, and vitamin C for the immune system.
Exercise is a critical part of being healthy. A good balance of exercise would be an aerobic activity that helps your cardiovascular system (jogging, brisk walking, biking, etc), an anaerobic activity that helps your muscles (weight lifting, climbing, tai chi, etc.), and an activity the helps your flexibility (yoga). Find an exercise routine that is realistic for your lifestyle. Routines are helpful because we are creatures of habit.

Always make sure you’re warmed up and stretched before engaging in physical activity. If you work your muscles hard when they are cold, you could injure yourself. If you feel any sort of unnatural pain while exercising, STOP! Lay off of it and test it out the next day. If it still hurts, go see a doctor. Being injured for a long period of time is hard to deal with mentally and physically. LISTEN TO YOUR BODY! Be aware of over use injuries caused by repetitive motion. Work opposing muscles to reduce injury. Using the R.I.C.E. method (Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation) is good for immediate prevention until you see a doctor. Exercise not only keeps you fit, it improves self esteem, gives you a happier mental outlook, you’ll sleep more soundly, it keeps you centered and focused, and can prevent critical health issues.

What about the time it takes to do all this?! I know, I know, it seems like a lot to do. We can all make the time if we want to. It takes 10 minutes dispersed through out the day to do a food journal and you only need to do it for a couple of weeks or a month, to get enough data to get you on an eating lifestyle change. Get up earlier in the morning to exercise, find fun exercise activities that the whole family can do together, do yoga when you get home at night, go for a jog on your lunch break, whatever it takes! You will be a happier, healthier you, and everyone around you will benefit from your happy, healthy energy!

Book Recommendations:
“The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Total Nutrition” by Joy Bauer
“Nancy Clark’s Sports Nutrition Guidebook” by Nancy Clark