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Tag: calorie counting

Calorie Counts in Glorious One-Pot Meals

Reader question: Are the calories listed below each recipe the total calories of meal for two people? Amazed by low calorie count!  ~Mary W, Grayslake, IL

Hi Mary! You’re right that those calorie counts listed for Glorious One-Pot Meals would seem awfully low if they applied for the entire meal! Usually calories are listed per serving on product boxes and in recipes, and it is the same for Glorious One-Pot Meals recipes. Each recipe represents two servings, but the calorie counts are per serving.

But I’ll confess that I’m not a big fan of this kind of nutritional counting for many reasons and I really resisted including the counts in my cookbook (I lost that fight, obviously). Not only do I believe that a whole-foods-based diet is healthier than a low-calorie diet, but I think that the whole “calories-in-vs-calories-out” philosophy of dieting is a flawed theory of weight loss.

Heresy, I know!

But if we know that obesity can be viewed as excessive inflammation, then we can see that obesity may be less about how much we’re eating, and more about what we are eating.

Additionally, if you do any substituting in the Glorious One-Pot Meal recipe from what is written, as I encourage the reader to do on almost every page of the cookbook, then those calorie counts will change anyway.

While I have received many testimonials from readers enthusing about how eating GOPMs have led to weight loss simply because they are eating more whole foods and veggies, the best way to identify the foods that are inflammatory for each of us is to identify our sensitivities by taking the Mediator Release Test (MRT). It’s truly the gold standard in determining which foods and chemicals/additives in our foods are inflammatory for your unique body. If weight loss is your goal, the MRT and LEAP dietary therapy can help you make the least inflammatory GOPMs for yourself.

Sometimes the MRT results can be really surprising. For myself, I learned that lettuce causes inflammation in my body. Lettuce! How ridiculous is that?! But I can clearly tell that eating lettuce causes me to inflate a dress size overnight. If I eat some avocado with that lettuce, that’s two dress sizes up. Its crazy! However, once I stop eating my inflammatory foods the inflammation will recede, regardless if I am reducing calories or not.

It’s a new paradigm in weight loss.

I’m happy to offer my readers a free initial phone consultation if they’d like to know more about food sensitivity testing, the MRT and LEAP. Just fill out this form to get started losing weight – without counting calories!

Why Counting Calories is Not Everything When Dieting

Reader Question: I looked at the Nutritional information for Chicken piccata and the calories seem very high per serving.  It doesn’t seem too figure friendly to me.  – Barbara, Washington DC

Well, Barbara, I have to say that this is one reason why I fought to leave the nutritional information out of my new cookbook. You see, I believe in eating whole foods, NOT counting calories. When you eat real food, your body knows how to efficiently digest, absorb, and assimilate the nutrition available, and then eliminate anything extra.

I  believe healthy eating should be a lifestyle, not a “diet,” and I don’t know many people who can sustain a lifestyle over years and years that includes the arduous chores of counting calories, keeping a food journal, or tracking other arbitrary nutritional information. Where’s the pleasure in that?

Glorious One-Pot Meals Chicken Piccata recipe
Glorious One-Pot Meals Chicken Piccata recipe

I’ve found that a diet based on whole foods rather than processed foods allows the body to shed extra weight and find its natural equilibrium in a gentle, unconscious way. Of course, this is not the way you’re going to drop those 10 lbs before your reunion next month, but rather it’s a way of living and eating that builds overall health and vitality for the long run.

If you want to lower the calories in any Glorious One-Pot Meals recipe, including the Chicken Piccata, there is an easy solution: substitute water for the broth called for to hydrate the rice. The chicken broth is adding about half of the calories in the meal — along with some yummy flavor — but you’ll be just fine using plain water instead. Or, choose your broth wisely and look for organic brands that have less sodium and fewer preservatives. Everything else in that recipe is a whole food and will do good things for your body, regardless of your impression of the caloric count.  🙂

I believe food should be enjoyed and savored and appreciated, as well as being life-sustaining and healthy. People ask me all the time if I love cooking, since I wrote a cookbook. But the truth is that I love food and flavors and textures and eating delicious things with abandon; cooking, not so much. Glorious One-Pot Meals are such a great solution for me because everything in the recipes contributes to my goal of achieving robust health at a healthy weight.