Calorie Burning Foods

The Claim: Certain foods cause you to burn more calories digesting them than others

Answer: FACT

Protein actually has a slightly higher thermic effect than carbs or fat. In other words it takes a bit more energy to digest and metabolize protein. But this effect is minimal and will never help you actually lose body fat.

The thermic effect of protein might add up to at most 10% of the food eaten. In other words, it would be eating 1000 calories in order to burn 100. This is a pointless road to travel if your goal is fat loss.

Just eat less total calories to burn fat, and don’t bother concerning yourself with the composition of those calories.

John

Posted by johnbarban in food, Nutrition

Tags: calorie burning, Calories |8 Comments

8 Responses to “Calorie Burning Foods”

Tracey Says:
February 24th, 2010 at 1:33 pm
Jon, how much protein is required/beneficial for someone my weight 132lbs??
Thanks!
Sheryl Blystone Says:
February 24th, 2010 at 5:17 pm
Are you kidding me? “don’t bother concerning yourself with the compostition of those calories?”
That is ludicrous. Fat, carbs. and protein all act tremendously different in our bodies and to not concern yourself (or educate yourself) of this is simply ignorant. If you consume mainly carbs as most people do you will end up insulin resistant and “skinny fat.” That is because all carbs turn to sugar and are mostly stored as glycogen or saturated fat in our bodies. My main point being there is no muscle maintenance and repair from them. Carbs also deplete our bodies of magnesuim (causing hardening of arteries), C, D, and Calcium.

Fat and protein help maintain muscle, teach our bodies to burn stored fat for fuel, and promote the immune system, brain function, and strengthen our joints and ligaments.

It’s really a no brainer. Foods elicit a metabolic/hormonal response and the difference btw eating carbs, protein, or fat makes ALL the difference in the world.
MikeGP Says:
February 24th, 2010 at 6:18 pm

Wow, here we go…..stop reading “Good Calories Bad Calories”. You wont become insulin resistant by eating carbs, youll become insulin resitant by eatin huge amount of calories, including carbs, and lack of excersise. If carbs by themselves made you insulin resistant, then 99% of the population would suffer from this, not just fat americans.
Shea Says:
February 24th, 2010 at 7:03 pm
When I saw Sheryl’s post I was just anticipating the deluge of responses it was likely to engender. Sheryl, there are so many implicit and explicit assumptions in your word choices that it is not clear to me that even you are aware of the sweeping claims that you are making.

MikeGP hit a big one by pointing out that if just eating “mainly” carbs was enough to cause insulin resistance then pretty much everyone in the world would be insulin resistant (BTW, what do you mean here? What is the threshold at which this adverse reaction to just the presence of carbs is supposed to occur – 20% of total intake? 40%? over 50%? 60%? 90%? Is this supposed to occur after a long period of time or is it instantaneous? What accounts for all the counter-examples that can be given, etc.? Your language is very vague here).

Another implicit assumption you make is that “all” carbs consumed turn to sugar and are stored as glycogen, which while technically true is only true when in caloric excess. If intake is at or below maintenance, then these carbs are metabolized and not being stored at all, and thus cannot have all the ill effects you impute to them, unless there is something else going on, like that carbs are inherently poisonous to humans, which doesn’t seem likely given the co-evolution of humans and carbs and whatnot.

I also can’t think of anything said in this podcast or in any of the other forums that indicates the position that macro-nutrients are not processed differently, just that these differences are not the life or death distinctions you make them out to be (i.e., that this makes “all the difference in the world”). Once again, how would you account for all the counter-examples that can be raised, such as the countless other cultures that consume a lot of carbs and are generally healthy, etc.? Is it carbs per se that are unhealthy, or is it caloric excess?

Anyway, not attacking you just trying to point out that the issue is not as clear cut as you assume (i.e., carbs = bad).
johnbarban Says:
February 24th, 2010 at 7:11 pm
Tracey,

I think the recommendations for women is fine, perhaps a bit more…so I think around 40-60 grams per day should be good.

JB
johnbarban Says:
February 24th, 2010 at 7:17 pm
Shea,

Thanks. Couldn’t have said it better myself.

JB
Jordan Says:
February 25th, 2010 at 10:55 am
“Skinny fat,” that term gets thrown around a lot, but what does it mean exactly? Someone who’s thin but doesn’t have much muscle? Or someone who’s mostly skinny but has a little extra fat around the waist, love handles, etc.? If so, I would think the answer to “skinny fat” would be to put on more muscle, or reduce body fat a little more, not increase this macro or decrease that macro.

Re: carbs and insulin resistance, I’m certainly no expert in this area, but I do know that there are vegans/ “nutrarians” like Joel Furhman who also claim that their high carb, high plant food diet also improves insulin resistance. So you have two diametrically opposite camps who make the same claim. Who’s right? Who’s wrong? Are they both right? Are they both wrong? I don’t know.

What I do know, with full certainty, is that the best thing *I* can do for *my* body is to lose weight, to relieve it of this ~70 pound burden that it has to put up with 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. And the way that I’m going to do that is to eat a variety of foods that I enjoy, but less of them.
Tracey Says:
February 25th, 2010 at 11:05 am
Thanks John:)

8 Responses to “Calorie Burning Foods”

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