Eating Clean

Since I get a lot of "huh?" at work when I try and describe the way I eat and what I do for basic nutrition, here's and excerpt from Eating Clean Works:

In a nutshell, eating clean is the practice of eating whole, natural foods such as fruits, vegetables, lean proteins, and complex carbohydrates. It also means staying away from the junk that typically makes up the Standard American Diet (S.A.D) These types of food include man-made sugar, bad fats (hydrogenated, trans-fat), preservatives, white bread, and any other ingredients that are unnecessary. An easy way to remember if a food is clean is: “if man made it, don’t eat it.”
A person that eats clean generally practices the following:

• Eliminates refined sugar and flour
• Cooks healthy meals
• Packs healthy meals
• Makes healthy choices when dining out
• Drinks a lot of water
• Eats 5-6 small meals per day
• Eliminates alcoholic beverages (or significantly limits it)
• Always eats breakfast

Seems pretty simple, eh? Just add "doesn't eat processed foods" onto that list and you're primed in what I do.

I combine this with principals from Tosca Reno's Eat-Clean Diet as well. Eating protein and complex carbohydrates with every meal. Protein is a very general term and it's pretty flexible. It can be anything lean. Which could mean beef tenderloin or it could mean quinoa or Ezekial Bread. It's pretty straightforward.

Your body struggles to digest all the protein, and uses the complex carbohydrates to fuel the body, thus using your metabolism to help you burn fat. And all the protein you're eating helps build lean muscle tissue.