Critique my Refrigerator and Pantry

From time to time, I catch shit from people about things I choose to eat and drink, like Coke, jelly beans, Pringles, etc. But unless you've been inside my fridge and watched me eat on a daily basis, what the fuck would you know about my day to day diet?

So in the interest of full disclosure, I hereby present pictures of my fridge contents:

Above is the business part.

Top Left:

• Bottles of Gatorade. These are used during swimming, biking and running. Behind the Gatorade bottles are my bottles of Endurox R4, which has been my preferred recovery drink for 15 years.

Top Right:

• Coffeemate, low fat Hazelnut. Yes, it contains sugar. I like it.
• Behind the Coffeemate is coffee. For years I used to ship 100% Kona coffee here, and it was delicious, but I don't drink as much coffee as I used to (3 small mugs in the morning), and I am good with Starbucks or Gevalia or whatever looks good at my grocery store.
• Bottles of Infinit. These are here for the Tour of Sufferlandria. Normally, I only use Infinit for rides of 3+ hours or when I both swim and run in the morning before work. For the Tour, I'm drinking it every stinking ride because I want the caffeine and race-type fueling. I have 3 custom Infinit mixes that I use as needed--for Monday-Friday of the Tour I am using my lower calorie mix, and for Saturday and Sunday I'm using my fairly high caffeine, higher calorie mix.

Second Shelf, Left:

• Eggs, eggs, eggs! The small bowl has hardboiled eggs. I eat one for breakfast every day.
• Herring. This is a snack food for me. I like it from time to time. 

Second Shelf, Right:

• One container of brown rice.
• One container of a chicken/vegetable dish that was in my freezer, that I will eat either for lunch or dinner today depending on how I feel. It will go over rice.

Drawer, Left:

• Various protein snacks live in here, such as string cheese (sometimes Cheddar), braunschweiger (yep, I love that stuff), regular American cheese, Canadian Bacon and Lox, depending on what I'm in the mood for. The lox and Canadian bacon are for when I do a swim/run combo and I need to eat a significant snack after, which consists of an English muffin buttered with one of them on top.
• Corn tortillas (you can't see them). For when I want a bit more carbs with dinner (to soak up some sauce) or an ad hoc tortilla wrap.

Third Shelf, Left:

• Homemade banana/wheat germ muffins (in the bags). I eat one of these for breakfast every day, with a hardboiled egg. Gluten! GMO wheat! Sugar! Canola oil! These things will surely kill me!
• Behind the muffins is a big chunk of Parmesan cheese, that I periodically grate to go on top of salads or rice.

Third Shelf, Right:

• Cherry tomatoes, for salads
• More containers of brown rice. I made about 8 cups for the week, and it keeps well.
• Yogurt. This is what I consider dessert, when I want it.
• Bread. GMO wheat! For when I want toast or the odd sandwich.

Bottom Drawer, Left:

• Lemons. I use these when I roast a whole chicken. The chicken is stuffed with 2 separated heads of garlic, a halved lemon and some rosemary.
• Salad greens. I could buy the greens loose, but I'm lazy and I like the easy variety of the packaged ones.
• A small container of pignoli. For salads.
• Garlic. You can't see it, but there are 4 heads in there.

Bottom Drawer, Right:

• Coke! Because I like it during long runs on the treadmill in winter, to load up calories before long workouts, or when I've delayed a mid-day run or bike past lunchtime and need calories but can't eat lunch because then I'd need to wait even longer. On average, I probably drink 1.5 Cokes per week.

Above is the door. It contains condiments (ketchup, mayo, mustard, BBQ sauce, Chinese sauces), grated Parmesan (in the Jewel container), Starbucks espressos for emergency caffeine, almond milk (used in my breakfast muffins), a package of coffee (because it wouldn't fit in the freezer), bread crumbs, lemon juice, spare Coffeemates, Kringle Cream (it's awesome), Limoncello (it's also awesome), English muffins (which I will swap out for the homemade ones in late spring) and...BEER.

Above is the main part of my (smallish) freezer. In here are chicken (whole roaster and drumsticks), some steaks, some fish (salmon), a chuck roast, coffee, meatballs (in the Dean's containers), a Lean Cuisine (I usually eat one of those for lunch), and various containers of tasty things I've cooked in bulk and then frozen so I can use them on weekdays when I have zero time to cook. Also stuffed in there are a couple of slices of my deep dish pizza and lasagna in the tinfoil.

Above is the door of my freezer. Butter (butter keeps extremely well in the freezer), more coffee, and containers of various tasty things like pesto (I make a huge batch every August and dole it out as needed throughout the year), pasta sauces and rice toppings. And a few small ice packs.

Above are the top shelves of my pantry (it's a closet). Some cooking vessels, including a lobster pot, a tart pan and my good cookie sheets, and on the lower shelf are my flours (gluten! GMO wheat!), rices (brown and jasmine), sugars (brown and white granulated), and spare food wraps.

Above is the remaining shelves of my pantry. Lots of good things in there! Various sauces for Chinese cooking, couscous, sardines, tomatoes and tomato sauces, Chinese vegetables, olives, anchovies, beans, soups, sauerkraut, salsa, wheat germ, almond milk, ketchup, pickles, coconut milk, chile sauce, canned fruit, garlic chili paste, and there's a bunch of pasta in there.

So yes, I do eat some processed foods, I do eat some sugar (aside from naturally occurring in the fruit I eat which is typically bananas, dried figs, prunes, and seasonal fruits like berries, mangos), I do drink beer and the occasional aperitif or cordial (I have a pretty good wine rack in my dining room, too!), and I do take in engineered sports nutrition. I prepare my breakfast and dinner foods from scratch, and go out to eat maybe once a week or every 2 weeks, preferring sushi, good Italian and lately Caribbean.

I didn't take pictures of other food areas, like spices, oils and crackers. I use a lot of olive oil. Salads are topped with olive oil and creme of balsamic. I have fallen in love with the specialty Triscuits--cracked black pepper, sweet potato and roasted sweet onion. Sometimes I'll have a few with cheese on top as a snack, or have a few with dinner. I have a bag of fun size Paydays that are in reserve for long bike rides or whenever I feel like it. I have a package of Keebler cheese/peanut butter crackers that I like when doing long (3+ hour) rides. I have some jelly beans.

I cook on weekends only unless I have a day off work. Broiling a steak or fish or chicken does not constitute cooking to me. Cooking is a dish requiring prep time, at least 5 ingredients, and some watching. I've come to know a bunch of recipes in my favorite cookbooks that I make over and over. Pasta sauces are for when I'm training > 15 hours per week. Rice toppings are good any time. The pizza and lasagne are once a year deals, since they take a shitload of time to make. I'm still trying to decide if/when I will make my annual batch of green chile--it's another dish that takes the better part of a day to make, but I have no room in my freezer currently! I can now start extracting containers from my freezer, and when I have removed 4 or so, then I can make my next thing and freeze it. What happens is that by summer I have a whole bunch of different things in there to choose from, which is really nice, and they supplement grilling outdoors. In summer, I'm usually training like a beast and eating more pasta, and there are many pasta sauces I like that require very little time, and so I will make one when I feel like it (spaghetti carbonara, walnut pesto, sausage/cream, on and on!) and eat it for a few days.

Could I eat more cleanly? Of course. But I do pretty OK, I think, eating appropriately for the amount of training I'm doing, a good amount of fruits and vegetables (I have fruit for morning snack and on top of salads and in some rice toppings, and dinner features a lot of vegetables and some at lunch), a good amount of lean protein, appropriate use of starches, and I'm not a big dessert person. I do indulge in the occasional McDonald's, but that's about it for out to eat junk food. In my daily diet, most of my sugar comes in the form of sports nutrition. There's that little bit in my coffee, breakfast muffin and lunch. Sometimes I go through a phase where I'll have tuna and vegetables for lunch. It's healthier than a Lean Cuisine, but I also like a hot meal at lunch. I don't feel like I'm sacrificing. EVER. Do I think my racing would be better if I cleaned up my diet even more? Fuck no. It's important to me to enjoy life even though I train fucking hard. Good food is one of the rewards of hard training. I'm cognizant of the need to replace and top off my glycogen stores, not get fat, and time my meals and snacks based on my training. This is what works for me. Time to finish breakfast!

I love food--I love shopping for food, I love making food, and I love eating it. But I am also aware of nutrition, and I think I have it covered!

Sports Nutrition 101

Somebody (not saying who) thought that working out for 3.5 hours with no calories going in would encourage more fat burning. Uh-huh.

DOH! Here's how I lay it down. This is part (mostly) science, and part (also mostly) experience. I've been at this awhile, and think I carry some street cred. If you don't believe the science part, get yourself 2 books: Physiology of Sport and Exercise by Jack H. Wilmore and David L. Costill, and Complete Guide to Sports Nutrition by Monique Ryan (although there are other good sports nutrition books out there, but I will stand by Monique all the way). Read them cover to cover and then check back with me if you think I'm full of it. If you don't know what glycogen is, Google it and read all about it.

When you are exercising, your body needs to burn carbohydrates. It can get those carbs from 3 places:

1. Glycogen stored in your liver (about 400 calories worth)
2. Glycogen stored in your muscles (1400-1800 calories worth)
3. Circulating glucose (sugar) in your bloodstream (depends on how much is there)

Exercising at less than 60% of Max HR (WHO DOES THAT???) will burn almost 100% fat.

When you exercise at 60-80% of your Max HR, about 50% of the energy comes from muscle glycogen and blood glucose, about 50% from fat, and a small amount from protein (muscle breakdown). The percentages of carbs vs. fats depends on the intensity.

When you exercise at over 80% of your Max HR, about 75% of the energy comes from muscle glycogen and blood glucose (fat can't be utilized effectively at this intensity).

Stay with me here, I'm getting to the point.

As a person becomes more fit, their body is able to burn a little more fat during aerobic exercise. This is accomplished by spending the bulk of the training time at 60-80% of Max HR.

A couple of things should stick out to you, but in case they don't, let me point them out (they are subtle but true):

1. If you spend too much time exercising at over 80% Max HR, you are teaching your body to burn glycogen preferentially for fuel. Your body just gets used to it. This is why I preach DO YOUR EASY STUFF EASY. There's a "dead zone" that is 80-85% of Max HR (depending on your fitness) that can be a waste of time to spend any of your training time in. Better to go easy or hard. And if you are going to go hard, GO HARDCORE AGGRO while you're at it!
2. If you put sugar into your bloodstream WHILE YOU EXERCISE, your body can use it pretty effectively.
3. If you don't put sugar into your bloodstream WHILE YOU EXERCISE, your body is going to exhaust its glycogen stores faster, which won't make you a better fat burner--it will just use up your glycogen faster, and if you exercise long enough, it will make you bonk faster!!!!

See if by not feeding yourself while you exercise you could make your body burn lots of fat, then why would someone eat during an Ironman? We all have TONS of potential fat calories (I, little Yard Gnome that I am, have over 43,000 potential fat calories) available. But like it or not, our bodies are going to go through that glycogen and whatever is in our blood before it starts tapping on those mega-fat stores. Our bodies need to preserve a few things: our brains, which live off of pure glucose (see this is why the first sign of impending bonk is that your judgment gets weird, or you get dizzy) and our internal organs. Our brains would rather shut down our muscles (i.e., make you stop moving) than risk injury to the internal organs. This is the extreme form of bonk.

Bonking occurs when your body cannot meet its carbohydrate needs during exercise from a combination of glycogen and blood glucose. But it's a little trickier than that. Let's say you exhaust your glycogen stores and then dump sugar into your bloodstream. It may be too late! You need to put so much in at a constant rate (generally to tolerance--my rule of thumb is to try and take in 50% of the calories I am burning, a little more while biking) so that your GI tract is able to process it and your metabolism keeps the "switch" turned on so that you keep using that circulating blood glucose for energy. You've all read or heard about athletes whose digestion shuts down, and that inevitably leads to a bonk or else they need to stop and wait it out until their GI tract recovers.

I ALWAYS take in sugars while exercising, even for as little as a 30-minute workout. Why? Because then I am always training my gut to process those sugars and send them to my working muscles. EVERY DAY. Now, of course that means that the stuff I take in during exercise counts towards my daily calorie needs, and of course it does, and maybe that means I get to eat less "food" than otherwise, but the tradeoff to me is clear. My body is trained to utilize fuel, and a side bonus is that I am not starving once I finish a workout (well, except when it's 2 or more hours, then pretty much I'm hungry).

How many people do you know who swear by "I just drink water when I train" and then watch them after a workout and they just undid all their hard work by pigging out? Not only that, but while they were busy exercising with no fuel, their brains figured, "Hey, we're being starved here," so the body went into fat preservation mode, NOT fat burning mode.

Even if a person is trying to lose weight or lean out, I would NOT recommend that they cut back on their training nutrition. Face it, if you are trying to be smaller, then you are going to need to get used to eating less across the board. Eventually, the calories you take in during training will need to drop as well, but initially the last thing you want to do is deprive your body of calories while training, which even MORE convinces it that you are starving it, and will slow your metabolism even further!

So if I were to state "Crackhead's Basic Nutrition Rules" they would be:

1. Eat frequently. 6 or more times a day.
2. Don't eat a lot of food, by volume, at any one sitting
3. Always be sipping Gatorade or your favorite training beverage during workouts, even if they are short. Do some math. Make sure you achieve proper fluid volume (4-6 oz. every 15-20 min., or 16-24 oz. per hour, adjust up depending on your sweat rate and heat), and that you are replacing 50% or better of your calories
4. Don't forget to include your training nutrition calories in your daily totals
5. Don't be afraid to be a little hungry when you aren't training.
6. You should NOT be hungry while you are training! If you are, pop a gel or something.
7. So that you teach your body to burn fat effectively, complete your workouts at the proper intensity. Don't be tempted to turn an easy workout into a hard one--it will do a number on your glycogen stores
8. Be sure to replenish after workouts. I use Endurox R4 on days when I train 1.5 hours or more, which is pretty much daily now. I drink it after my last workout of the day. You can also drink sports drink, but I think it's important to have some protein right away, too.
9. If you are trying to lose weight or just lean out, go a little higher on your protein calories and slightly lower on your carbs (but NOT DURING TRAINING!).
10. If you want to jump start leaning out, you probably should do some strength training. Lots of cardio has a way of making you want to eat to replace the calories you burned; whereas strength training helps you manufacture muscle and just burns more calories at rest.

Train (and NOURISH) on!