What is the Best Ratio Of Protein Carbs and Fat?

Are you Really Going to Measure Your Ratios Every Meal?

Most weight loss diets will usually give some sort of recommendation of the preferred or optimal protein carb and fat ratio based on the effect is supposedly has on your hormone balance and the way your body digests the food, how it will make you feel yadda yadda.

But what gets left out of the recommendation is the principle of less total calories is what is causing weight loss.

We can debate the merits of a 30/40/30 calorie ratio on appetite and the way it makes you feel all day long, but it’s a rather pointless argument.

If you’ve ever tried to actually eat at a specific ratio you’ll find out that it’s almost impossible. You’d have to measure the protein fat and carb content of each meal and of each individual food. For example you may assume that pasta is a ‘carb’ in this case, but pasta also has a fair bit of protein (and different pasta’s have different protein contents).

Same goes for things like bread, and most dairy products (they all have a mix of protein and carbs, and some of them have all three nutrients)

Balancing the nutrient ratio of a meal makes sense in theory but it’s highly impractical in practice, and as a final note it was never meant to be done on a meal by meal basis but rather on a more long term (weekly basis)

If you happen to eat a bit more carbs and bit less protein today it’s not a big deal, you’ll most likely have another day when you’ll eat more protein later in the week.

The point is that most of these dietary recommendations are meant to be done on a much longer scale than a day or a single meal. Worrying about the macronutrient content of each meal will cause you far more stress than any potential health benefit.

John

Posted by johnbarban in food, Nutrition
Tags: carbs, fat, macronutrient ratios, protein |20 Comments

20 Responses to “What is the Best Ratio Of Protein Carbs and Fat?”

  1. Cooper Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 12:06 pm

    John,

    is there scientific evidence for the benifits of any specific macronutrient ratios even over the long-term. From what I’ve heard from you and Brad, as long as a certain minimum level of protein is met, the rest doesn’t matter. This blog post suggests differently though.

    Thanks,
    Richard

  2. johnbarban Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 12:40 pm

    Cooper,

    There is no way of studying this long term. So there is no long term data. What you stated is correct about hitting minimums.

    After that it’s just a matter of not eating too much.

    JB

  3. Dave Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 1:01 pm

    John,
    There was a time I obsessed over calories and macronutrients (before I read ESE and How Much Protein). Thanks to ESE, I’m leaner than I’ve ever been without worrying about macronutrients any more . However, to get extra lean, do you think there’s any benefit to going low carb, low fat, high protein, etc. for a short period of time? I would never consider one of those diets a long term approach…especially when ESE has been going so well.
    Thanks,
    Dave

  4. johnbarban Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 1:19 pm

    Dave,

    It’s probably just less calories, sure you could try doing it with high protein (probably cause you drop some water that way too)

    JB

  5. Lars Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 1:24 pm

    Would you say tactics like carb cycling actually burn a lot of fat, or would you say they just dehydrate you?

  6. johnbarban Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 2:21 pm

    Lars,

    There is no physiological mechanism for it to burn any extra fat (beyond a caloric restriction) so it would likely be just causing you to drop water.

  7. Wood Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 3:32 pm

    and what is lowest body fat level you can achive without trick your body? Because there are some natural bodybuilder with stage ready shape. Can somebody make that level only with calorie counting?

  8. Keith Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 3:51 pm

    Regarding minimums, what is th eabsolute minimum amount of protein that you reccommend people to consume daily?

  9. Bart Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 5:38 pm

    John, if the carb cycling does not make any sense and is all about calorie restriction why a guy like Tom Venutto who is a respected body builder says that calorie restriction is the most important part of loosing fat, but at the same time he recommends a lot of carb cycling to speed up the process. And he looks great, so it must work. I understand that ESE is great to loose weight to some point, but can you get super lean with it? Why your photos do not show a six pack? Is it because you believed in wrong things for a long time and now you got it and you will look great soon?
    I know that your back and lats are great but where is that 6 pack?

  10. Josh B Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 5:56 pm

    John, I’ve wondered the same as Bart about the 6-pack question. I know that your research points toward shoulder to waist ratio to be most attractive, but do you have the goal to get the 6-pack anyway? I’ve reached a 1.6 ratio but only have the top 2 ab muscles really defined and some definition in the next 2, and I will continue cutting calories until I get the full 6 pack. Are you going to pursue the 6 pack as well, or are you content and just maintaining? And if you are not going for the 6 pack, could you tell us why?

    Josh B

  11. johnbarban Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 5:57 pm

    Bart,

    I’ve never set a 6-pack as a goal nor was I striving for one when I took those pictures.

    Just to let you know, most bodybuilders only have a visible 6-pack during the final stages of their contest prep. Many of them spend most of the year without a visible 6-pack. Just because you saw someone with visible abs in a picture once, it doesn’t mean they look like that all year round (this comment has nothing to do with Tom Venuto, it’s a statement about bodybuilders in general from my experience working with them).

    I have no idea what Tom Venuto’s theories are but he definitely looks good so whatever he is doing is obviously working for him.

    JB

  12. johnbarban Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 6:37 pm

    Josh,

    A defined 6-pack isn’t a goal I’ve ever set. It was always a golden ratio. Now that I’m at 1.6 I’m going to see how much leaner I can get and stay at this ratio.

    I’m interested in getting a leaner midsection and we’ll see where i get to in the next month or so.

    JB

  13. Bart Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 7:26 pm

    cool,i hope your hard work will be rewarded with nice abs, because no matter how good your ratio is u wont look good with abs fat covered, i am surprised that you have been working out for such a long time and never got your abs, anyway i wish you good because your back looks excellent and combine with nice abs you will be like ancient Greek athlete!!!

  14. Bart Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 7:34 pm

    Lastly , the reason i pointed out Tom Venuto is because he looks great all year long and this proves that whatever he is doing works. What i am expecting to see is the proof from you, the inventors of adonis index that your workouts work too. I understand the idea of adonis index, but seeing more pictures of your customers would be great. For me the visual is the most visible result and measurements are not that important as far as you look great. Although at the same time i would not like to see fall into same trap as all other side when everything covered with adds and bs. I really love the form your site is presented !!!

  15. johnbarban Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 7:36 pm

    Ha, Thanks Bart,

    I’ll keep you all posted here as I start the cut down.

    You know all the time I was training for size it never occurred to me that at some point I would have to cut down. I got really caught up in being big for the sake of being being.

    JB

  16. Cooper Says:
    April 20th, 2010 at 4:13 am

    Bart, have you seen pictures of Brad Pilon and Martin Berkhan? They use different forms of intermittent fasting which are as far from Tom Venuto’s recommendations as you can get. As far as I can tell, the only things they have in common are creating a calorie deficit and hitting a certain minimum level of protein intake.

    Cooper

  17. Shea Says:
    April 20th, 2010 at 10:00 am

    i have heard about ‘bigorexia,’ but is there a similar word for obsession with 6-pack abs?

  18. Shea Says:
    April 20th, 2010 at 10:02 am

    (if not, there sure should be…)

  19. Josh B Says:
    April 20th, 2010 at 12:09 pm

    Thanks for the answer John, I’m looking forward to seeing how your progress goes. Be sure to post pictures!

  20. Jordan Says:
    April 20th, 2010 at 1:47 pm

    Bart, how do you know Venuto looks great all year long? I’m not saying he doesn’t, I’m just curious.

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