A Journey into Nutrition & Food Relationships – With Michael Fisher
Summary
In this entertaining episode Vanessa Leone and her partner, Michael, discuss fitness, nutrition, and personal transformation. Michael shares his journey from being overweight to bodybuilding, emphasizing the importance of protein and fiber. He explains macro counting, volume eating, and how he balances health with enjoyment of food. They discuss the psychological aspects of dieting, the importance of planning meals, and the role of gut health in overall well-being. Michael highlights the benefits of home cooking and mindful eating, advocating for a balanced approach rather than strict dieting. The conversation is candid, practical, and focused on sustainable, healthy habits.
Transcript
Vanessa Leone (00:01)
Hello! I have with me today someone very special. Someone who is going to be on here a few times. You’re going to see them a few times. He’s my excellent and wonderful life partner, for lack of a better term. Life partner, human partner, Michael. Hello, welcome. Now everybody, this is his first podcast and I’ve roped him on. And the reason why I’ve roped him on is because I think that he is
Michael (00:20)
Hello.
Vanessa Leone (00:31)
got a really worthy story, also really worthy tips about nutrition, about fitness, about how they align and his segment henceforth will be called Stir the Pot. As you get to know him, I think you will understand that. But what I want to do just to let him take over for a little bit, I want you to tell me, babe, how did you get into fitness? How did you get into
really liking food and nutrition as well.
Michael (01:06)
So first one got into fitness because when I was 21, I finally got over 100 kilos Basically, I was fat from when I was seven years old when I moved to the US as a kid Started eating a lot more for various reasons, but we’re not going into to that right now But yeah, basically I was like a lot of excess weight And I’d kind of like go up and down a little bit but for quite a few years I kind of sat between that like 95 to
99 kilo mark and I just remember one day I felt just particularly gross to be honest Like for lack of a better term I felt fat and like full and just not nice I stepped on the scales and I was a hundred point eight kilos and I was just like right I’m losing this right now because I’ve done a few bits before where I’d like diet and Kind of I’d lose a few kilos and you just go back to shitty habits basically
And then I just decided on the spot that I was going to fix it right then and there. So I just did a stupid amount of internet research. Some of it was useful, some of it wasn’t. Obviously, like the internet’s a dangerous place for specifically, think, for health information. But yeah, just, I don’t think I lost the weight very quickly. Like I dropped to 78 kilos in about five months. I got too skinny. And then I still remember one day I was just down at Cronulla.
and I walked into a bookshop and I saw Arnold’s Bodybuilding Encyclopedia. I walked in, had a flick through it and I was like, I might buy that. I walked out and I walked straight back in. It’s the best 50 bucks I’ve ever spent in my life. That is, I think it’s behind you somewhere still. It’s somewhere there. And basically that’s one of the best things I’ve ever bought in my life. That was like genuinely a life changing experience. I basically
on the spot again decided I was going to change my life and get into bodybuilding, which I did for a very long time until I couldn’t basically because of injuries and that sort of stuff. From about 30, so I’m 37. So for the like last seven and a bit years, I haven’t really been doing bodybuilding because of injuries. No other reason. But yeah, now I just kind of concentrate on trying to stay healthy generally. Ideally I would like to body build again. And what was the second part of the question? I forget.
Vanessa Leone (03:25)
Your food. This is, this is the big one.
Michael (03:28)
Oh god, yeah. Yeah, okay, so that started basically
like I was a very fussy eater as a kid, but I always really liked carb heavy salty sweet stuff, right? So as a kid, we went out to Chinese restaurants and stuff. I would just eat rice smothered in soy sauce. I’m like, fucking delicious. Don’t get me wrong.
But like you wouldn’t know now considering like, you know, I’ll eat the hell out of a sea urchin or something, like when I’m on holiday, I’m like, my God, I’ve never heard of that. Like I’m a food wanker now, I suppose. But yeah, and like from there, just like, and I used to really love like vegemite sandwiches and stuff like that. know, like sugary yogurts, but I was super fussy. And then I used to have this pasta, like one of the master food ones or something, like a cheesy master foods pasta. Again, delicious. Like, you know, the powdered stuff.
So it comes with dry pasta and powdered stuff and you basically chuck it in one pot with a certain amount of water and it turns into this like thick cheesy pasta. And I used to get it made for me now and again, but it wasn’t often enough to have it now and again. So I taught myself to cook by cooking that and I taught myself from there and now like, it’s kind of hard to get me out of the kitchen. Like I love cooking as you know.
And yeah, it’s just that’s where it really started, I suppose. And like when I was 21, I got a lot more adventurous with my food, 21, 22, I’d say. Girlfriend time, to be honest, like her ex-boyfriend was a chef or something. So she was a bit more adventurous, which helped kind of open me up a bit. And then once I started, I just kind of never stopped. As you know, like all I think about is food or like, I want to eat this. I want to eat like when we’re on holiday to the point where it annoys you sometimes.
I’m like, want to go here to eat and you’re like, it’s an hour away. What else is there? And I’m like, the food’s there. I don’t care. So yeah, that’s, I’m sorry. It’s a bit roundabout, but yeah, I love, yeah, I love eating. I love cooking for people. I love eating with people. I love sharing it with people. Yeah, it’s something that I truly, truly like. I’m very passionate about and eating healthy generally.
Vanessa Leone (05:35)
Yeah, I think what really strikes me about how your story, I don’t even know if it’s different from others, but it’s the only version. You’re the only person I know who does this. And it’s very, very unique where you started as a bodybuilder and, and your nutrition, I suppose, came from that extreme, maybe more extreme dieting, really restrictive, bulking, and then really.
like reducing your calorie content. And the interesting thing for me is what I’ve learnt about nutrition and dieting and, and actual foods and food science from you, because I think you’re so in depth about it. You like, once you find a topic about food, you dive, you dive straight in. for anyone watching this clip behind Michael is his bookshelf full of cookbooks.
And behind me is all my books. So what I’m saying is that I think we’re both people who like to dive in deeply. And you have taught me so much about food and nutrition and macronutrients and micronutrients to the point where I like, we are both able to, you know, hear information from experts and discern how they make us feel, which I think is what’s super important.
Vanessa Leone (07:02)
So for someone listening who maybe has never looked into the world of bodybuilding before, what would you be doing? you didn’t compete, but I don’t think that that’s part of an issue. think you got to the point where you definitely could have. What’s that like, that journey of putting on weight, putting on muscle, eating certain foods and then restricting that back down?
Michael (07:28)
It’s amazing. like, I love it. Like the bulking part’s obviously a lot of fun. Like I still concentrated on getting like probably 90%, what you’d call healthy food in your diet. Like you were just saying earlier, just on that, like the food thing, like how much I love it. Like when I was like, I guess at peak, I was eating like 3,600 calories a day to stay lean with a six pack instead of having an eight pack and like what but my decision was like you can almost not see my six pack that’s when i needed to cut down i chose not to compete just because you mentioned that because i didn’t want to actually put myself back into an unhealthy relationship with food and the cutting side of it i actually kind of enjoyed because it’s a really big challenge don’t get me wrong like some days it’s shit like specifically like in the last week of it like we i’d usually just do it before it went on holiday. Ego absolutely
have an eight pack when you go on holiday, come back with an eight pack, still maybe just a six pack, but eat whatever you want for a month, do whatever you want, and you just don’t, because your body wants to stay lean or your body wants to stay fat, depending on what state you’re in. yeah, and like it’s not, by the way, like it’s not healthy getting down to 5 % body fat, I’m fully aware, but if you do it like for a very short period, and like I think it’s a great personal challenge, but like you go from eating 3,600 on a base day, like whereas they’re eating like 4,000 cals on a leg day,
and you diet down, reverse, sorry, you diet down like over 12 weeks, 12 to 15 whatever weeks, and on the last week or two, you’re on 1,800 cal and you’re still doing heavy, heavy lifting. That’s hard. To a point, I never found it that challenging because I knew what I could get out of it, i.e. the end result. And it’s kind of like a…
I think I don’t know who said it like I’m talking about the juicy juiced up bodybuilders. I think it might have been Phil Heath. I like I really like what he said was like you want to look a certain way you got to live a certain way. It’s that simple people think and I’m not talking like I never took sure like and I don’t have a problem with people taking steroids by the way but I never took steroids, never took anything to like cut fat or anything. I just did it all natural. I did it all just just just just did it by like.
well tracking things and by feel as well. So, but yeah, with bodybuilding like it is the what attracted me to it was part of like, obviously it makes you look really good in my opinion. If your body build well, you look amazing. Like you were like, if you’d be in shredded, I think there’s nothing like it’s you look in the mirror and you’re like 99 % satisfied with how you feel. She’s never gonna be a hundred. I can promise you that once you start.
But like when you have that feeling of like, wow, I look fucking amazing and I worked my ass off for this, especially as a fat kid who was bullied about it a lot at home and at school and elsewhere. Like it is is an incredible feeling to get to the other side of that to where like you literally have people stop you when you’ve got your shirt off. Like ah when we were on the Amalfi coast to try to talk to you about or you audibly hear them and go fuck. That’s impressive.
And like, yeah, that’s all ego bullshit. I’m fully aware, but it’s such a big turnaround. And like it does drive you on. like, I mean, you’re like realistically with bodybuilding too. That’s never ending. You can always be better. You can always, always, always be better. And you’re only really competing against yourself. Even if you do comps, you’re still competing against yourself because you just want to be that little bit better every single time. And that’s what I love about it. And it’s all down to you. Nobody can do it for you.
Like literally nobody in a team sport you can have 10 great players and one guy hiding sometimes Or you know how many it is, but it’s it’s all you literally no one else Like people can help you along the way sort of but like it’s you control what you put in your mouth and you control what you lift I Don’t know if that answered your question probably did it Good
Vanessa Leone (11:30)
short did, short did,
will have to do a quick, quick bypass of Michael’s reference to sport there is football, Premier League and Arsenal. That is his other love, which we will not go into into this podcast, but I knew I had to mention it.
Michael (11:47)
Yeah, we’ll be here all day. If you want to
talk about that, we can.
Vanessa Leone (11:52)
I this is where I’m really interested for people to understand when you talk about healthy and macros. I, the, the cool part, I think for both of us with this journey is for me, my side of things, I was never interested in bodybuilding. I was never interested in, cutting down or in dieting or in any of that. It was never part of,
something that I thought sane people did, no offense. I, bodybuilders are incredible, but that was my, that was my thinking. and yeah, yeah, it takes a lot of dedication and a lot of discipline, to be able to, to stick to that, I think. and I see it, I’ve seen it with you and I see it with a lot of fitness professionals who I work with. but I think I was very,
Michael (12:25)
Yeah, I’d agree with that, to be honest.
Vanessa Leone (12:47)
I’m I’m not gonna say loose with my diet, I thought I was being healthy, but then you pointed out so many factors in my diet that really changed my perception of, and I’m going to call it healthy inverted commas because I think that word is so vague. It’s so broad. It’s so conflicting. It’s so ambiguous. It’s really hard to describe. So we’re gonna like, we’re gonna go down point by point.
into certain things that I think that you do particularly well. And the first thing that I think that has come from your bodybuilding side of things, and a lot of people are quick to dismiss counting calories and counting macros specifically because they tell you that it’s not an exact science or that it doesn’t work or that it’s too time consuming. But you do it and you’ve done it for, I can’t even count the years you can tell me. Yeah.
Michael (13:39)
16 years mostly
for most of that time and I like doing it but yeah go on.
Vanessa Leone (13:44)
Yeah. So first of all, what is counting macros, counting calories? What does it do? and what are macros?
Michael (13:53)
Cool. So counting calories by itself, I don’t think is a useful tool. think if you’re going to do it, if you want to do that, do it with the macronutrient content. your basic macros are protein, carb and fat, right? Which I think everyone kind of is aware of what all those are. And there’s different types of carbohydrates, different types of fats. And then there’s like complete and incomplete proteins. For me,
I’m not overly fussed about my carb and fat intake as long as I’m not eating stupid amounts of carbohydrates on like when I say stupid amounts like if I’m not doing anything for a day and I’m eating more than 200 grams and a lot of people be like, oh, that’s a lot anyway, but you know, we can get into that or we can not. But basically like for me, protein and fibre are the ones that I absolutely am massive on.
So protein like all research will tell you, or all credible research, that 1.6 gram per kilo of body weight, lean mass as well, by the way. So if you’re 100 kilos and overweight, you don’t need 160 grams. Say you’re 30 kilos overweight, you work out of 70, which would be, I’m not gonna be able to figure that out. About 110, 120 a day, Grams of protein, ballpark.
That’s more important to get that and that’s optimal for muscle development. Now, if you’re an elite level athlete or training like one, more protein will be better, but it’s gonna be minuscule things. But if you’re at that level, minuscule things help. Like for example, protein probably too much, but when I was like getting stacked, I was in like 250 or 300 grams of protein a day. I can tell you, it made a difference along with the training and that, but like it’s still, it’s a lot, right? Like.
Now I eat about 130 to 135 a day. And if I was doing heavy bodybuilding still, I’d be doing like 170 to 200, I think now with like more knowledge. And fibre particularly, well fibre there’s a lot of reasons. Like one, if you don’t shit, you feel like shit. Let’s be honest. It’s terrible. Like you feel horrible. And also like it feeds all your gut bacteria. So your overall general health is gonna be better. Your mood is gonna be better. And
Just like as a male, particularly, it’s super important with like prostate cancer and stuff like that. That also is in the family. particularly, say in the last five, six years, I’ve gotten a lot more strict on that. Like I basically refuse not to hit my fibre for the day. On holiday that can be tricky, but there are strategies around that. But for example, like I have the RDI for men recommended daily intake, I think is like 35 or 38. So like I usually get minimum 40 a day if not.
upwards closer to 50. And for women just for context, it’s about 25 a day, 25 gram. And yeah, it’s something like in Australia, it’s like, I think it’s like only like five or 10 % of the population hit their daily fibre goal or get even and then when they set and the rest of them like don’t get near it kind of thing either. So yeah, this fibre super important fibre will keep you full too. I mean, this is an old one I used to use, which was it’s not very tasty.
A psyllium husk, which is like 80 % fibre by weight and it like if you mix it with water and let it sit it turns into this like thick gel. So you basically mix it with water and neck it. I used to have about between like five or 10 grams of that with a big bag of spinach when I was hungry and cutting because it’s basically nil energy intake and you’re still getting some nutrients and stuff, right? Like big bag of spinach is not going to be bad for you. But if I was hungry between meals, that would be my go-to. mean, I don’t necessarily think it’s a great healthy habit.
in general but like what I’m saying is like I but even like when you’re on 1800 calories a day it’s a lot harder to get your fibre but I was still very big on that and I just think it’s super important and like protein as well most people probably don’t need to track their protein to be honest most not all because you’re probably getting a shitload more than you need anyway because you’re probably having meat at every single meal not riding on me I eat lots of meat blah blah blah
you’re probably having more than enough protein in a day and especially most people aren’t that active so they don’t even need the 1.6 a day and that’s all like based on actual science too right like I’m not just making this up like I like i i used to read like scientific articles and stuff like I don’t anymore because like I’ve got i don’t know better things I’d rather be i’d rather be cooking
Vanessa Leone (18:28)
Yes, I can confirm several things in this story. Have seen him many times eat a bag of spinach and neck a glass of psyllium husk. I also have recently increased my fibre uptake. So since I had endometriosis surgery have increased it even further and can say that I don’t get hungry during the day like at all anymore. And you just feel so much better.
Vanessa Leone (18:58)
feeding your gut bacteria, everything feels a bit more regular. And I think those are factors. You know, when you look at people who count macros, a lot of it can be bro science, a lot of it can be very bodybuilder heavy. And there’s not a lot of people talking about it for health. the first two things that you pointed out were protein and fibre and fibre is an even classified a macronutrient. So a lot of people wouldn’t track it anyway. And that’s where I think that you do things so differently. And it’s super important.
because for me, I would never have thought about fibre and so many other people are not thinking about fibre. and that’s, it’s such an important one to include and it has the potential to make a huge difference in someone’s, diet, not as in your dieting, as in your overall diet, what you’re eating. but there are some interesting side effects with fibre if you increase it too soon, isn’t this correct?
Michael (19:56)
Yeah, basically you might clog up. if you don’t track your, like when it comes to tracking, like I think you need to start at your baseline. If you’re ever gonna start tracking macros and stuff, just eat like you normally do. Okay, cool. All right. So, but basically too much fibre too quickly will clog you up. So you need to increase it gradually and you just have to accept you’re gonna fart more. It’s that simple. There’s no two ways about it. There are some herbs actually, sorry, spices that actually do assist with that.
Vanessa Leone (20:06)
We’re gonna get there. We’re gonna get, we’re coming to that.
Michael (20:25)
asafoetida, hing, devil’s dung is all three names of it. It isn’t the most pleasant smelling it’s delicious. and fennel seed, I think, actually help with bloating slash wind, as people call it. Sorry, if you increase fibre a lot too, can bloat. Bloating after a meal isn’t a bad thing all the time. People think that they’re bloated, so there’s something wrong with the digestion. That’s another massive…
Fake truth. Yeah, myth thing. That’s much better description. Yeah, so yeah, increase fibre to slowly is the short version
Vanessa Leone (20:55)
like a myth.
Okay. So you alluded to it. The challenging thing I think for most people is if they actually, let me start that again. I’m going to say I hadn’t tracked my macros ever until I met you and I didn’t track my macros for a little while. I helped you track yours. So we’d weigh food before we cook it. I just write it down for you or you put, put it down into your tracker, we use my fitness pal.
we’re not affiliated by the way, even though I think you should be considering you’ve used it for the last 16 years. now I’ve only tracked my macros. would say on and off maybe two to three months at a time, a couple of times, maybe, I think maybe two or three times. And every single time I learned something super fascinating either about food or myself or my, my own intake. I highly recommend doing it.
Michael (21:33)
Yes, sponsor me guys.
Vanessa Leone (21:57)
at least once in your life. think it is a super interesting experiment, particularly if you have a lot of challenges around food and, and, getting enough food in or getting too much food in. Uh, so number one, how do I know how many calories that I need to eat a day? Like where am I going to look? What do I do? And how do I start tracking?
Michael (22:21)
So, all right, there’s loads of those like basal metabolic rates. So like what your base metabolism rate is per day if you were just laying on the couch, how many cals your body would burn. They’re always like generous, as in like, if I put in my BMR, basal metabolic rate, it’ll tell me that I need like 2,700 cals a day or something, which I don’t at this stage. At the moment, depending on the day, I’ll eat between 2200 and 2700. 27 on my…
Like I currently have an injury, so I’m not doing anywhere near as much as I’d like to be doing. like if I, the days that I’m in the gym at the moment doing what I’m like, again, limited things on one day on the sat on Saturdays when I do the most and I do that on purpose because we tend to eat more on the weekend. I’ll aim for about 2700 cal. But yeah, so basically what I’m sorry, what I was getting at with that is most people aren’t active enough to eat that much. It honestly is a trial and error thing, I think.
Like use one of those basal metabolic rate calculators and probably slash 10 to 20 % off it maybe start with 10 and then kind of then like look you wait wait the weird thing because it changes so much like one day like I don’t weigh myself because I think it’s stupid now
Michael (23:41)
But like if you one day you might be a kilo heavier than the day before and you’re like, I ate a high carb meal. That’s just because you still, you haven’t been eating carbohydrates, your glycogen stores go up, which is stored energy in the muscles, which for every gram of glycogen that you have, you hold four grams of water. So if you’re someone who’s like low carb and then you suddenly have a big high carb meal, of course you’re to wake up that are not fat, obviously the next day or heavier because your body’s just going, shit, I need that because like this is what I use for energy.
So I would say like with that stuff, it’s just, it’s basically short version, it’s very hard, but just start with like track what you eat for a week or two. Don’t worry about like any other one’s numbers and then go, okay, well I try, I eat, let’s say you eat 3000 calories a day. You’re not bodybuilding, don’t do that.
Vanessa Leone (24:35)
It’s very high. What I would say is we’re going to get into the specifics of macro counting. have found one website and I’ll pop it in the link in the show notes that has been pretty good estimate of not only your overall calories, but helps you understand your macro breakdown, which we’ll also get into in a second. Precision nutrition. I think they’re incredible. I’ve done some work with them, like their courses in the past. I think that
They’re very reasonable and they’re really smart about the way they go things. And I like moderation and reason. I don’t think that you need to be extremes of everything, but you’re right, Michael and saying that you have to figure it out because you know, I think when I was tracking four or five years ago, my baseline was about 2,200, but I’m not doing as much as I was doing then. So it’d be less now. but I still, you know, lift quite a lot. I, you know, I, I can, I, I
run around like crazy person. I have a lot of energy to burn. So everyone’s genetics is going to have an implication as well on how much you kind of need day to day. And that can only really be done by trial and error, right?
Michael (25:48)
Yeah, and on top of that, what you were just saying about like, I think like people on it is related going about like, I have a slow metabolism. You like honestly, I can’t say it’s any other way than you don’t. It’s just that you’ve misused your metabolism and you’ve mistreated it. And when you start treating it well, it will fire up for lack of a better term. And like if you’re like me and you love eating.
just put muscle on because you can, the more muscle you have, the more you just need to eat to just exist. It’s wonderful. You look good and you get to eat a shit load and people go, how do you eat so much? It’s like, well, because I’m like, I’m huge like at the time, like I’m huge. That’s why, like look at the size of me. That’s why I get to eat a lot and I train hard and like, know, like still discipline around it. So yeah, look on that, like I think, yeah, like you said, it’s trial and error, but just start with what you’ve been eating.
Michael (26:43)
regularly and then you start to want then the reason I say start with what like don’t change something then start tracking just start tracking because Understand what you’re eating as well and look there’s a whole rabbit hole about like how accurate is everything in there and yes That’s a big thing But that’s when you’ve got to just put in a little bit of time and like check it online like with I’d say relatively Reputable organizations like the USDA website and stuff because I actually do it scientifically
And that’s when you can start to get an understanding. then when you, and like, honestly, like what, like when you eat out and have like, for example, if I go out for a degustation meal, you know, like six, 10 courses, there’s no way I’m going to track that for two reasons. Cause it’s fucking, it’s going to, you’re going to give you a heart attack looking at the, at the macros. And secondly, you’re not going to have any idea if it’s a fine dining restaurant, because of like the techniques, you have no idea what ingredients they’re using to make. So like you might know some of them, but you’re not going to know all of
Michael (27:39)
And it’s also not worth your time. Just go and enjoy it. Like just go and enjoy stuff like that when it’s once in a while.
Vanessa Leone (27:46)
Yep. Yep. Okay. Very specific. Let’s look at you over a day.
what’s a regular routine, but also when you say tracking my macros, how do you do it? You’re obviously like you’re weighing, you’re scanning, go ahead to like describe, we can just describe like one of our kind of regular days.
Michael (28:12)
Cool, so let’s just go with a Monday to Friday, because it’s probably a bit simpler to do it that way. So on the weekend, we’ll food prep a salad for Monday to Friday with a ton of different veggies, some sort of legume. I’ve actually got them soaking in a bowl behind me to cook tomorrow. Sorry, in front of me. And then we usually have chicken in it, and then there’s a dressing with some sort of vinegar in it. So it basically keeps it for the week, and then we’ll have sumac and all sorts of, anyway.
Firstly, it tastes really good and it’s super healthy. It’s got a lot of protein, it’s got a lot of fibre and it’s got a shitload of different plants in it, including nuts and stuff and fruit like so like a grated apple or something. So like you’re getting like, like, you know, 12, 13 different fruits and vegetables and nuts in one go. And we then I’ll calculate that at the start of the week, as in like, so for example, like there’s 350 grams of dried chickpeas that
I’m soaking now. So that’s 35 grams a day per serve There’s 10 serves, 5 each, but there’s two of us five each, right? So just stuff like that. And then like, for example, like I’ll have chicken breasts is pretty about a kilo. So it’s, oh no, it’d be less, but one of the like 600 grams. So it’s about 120 grams raw weight a day for you. It’ll be thigh because you prefer that again, same thing. So basically my lunch from Monday to Friday is exactly the same. Some people like that. Some people don’t, but you know,
That’s one thing I will say it is one of the easiest ways if you want to actually like maintain gain or drop weight anything to do with your weight if you start food-prepping and make sure like and if you’re supposed to eat it eat it don’t make an excuse not to eat it. But yeah like what it looks like is in the morning I’ll always not always like if I’ve got something left over I’ll have it from the night before if I want it like so I love a curry so I’ll have a curry any time of the day.
So but or I’ll just make something I’ll chuck it all together and just macro it up as I go So when I say macro it up like I’ll weigh the things as I pull them out For example, like at the moment recently, I’ve been really random I’ve gotten back onto corn thins which I hadn’t had for like probably 15 20 years So I’ll get like four of those. I like slather some avo on them I’ll make like this quick pea curry, which is basically like a few bits and pieces like some some ghee
some spices, onion, chuck the peas in there, chuck some yogurt in towards the end, mix it all up and smash them up a bit. Put that as another layer. Then maybe some like smoked salmon and whatever else I want to put on top, some nuts or seeds. I’ll just weigh everything as I go, build the meal. And then dinner, same kind of thing. I’ll usually cook, not all the time, cook enough for two nights at a time for us. And I’ll just weigh everything as I go. Sometimes I’ll plan it ahead. I’ll like put like basic numbers into what I think it’s going to be.
I’ll then edit it as in when I weigh things at the time. I’m at the point where I can look at something and I can be within 5 % accuracy for most things of their weight. So I probably don’t need to weigh them, but it’s just a bit chore for me and I quite enjoy it. I can understand why some people would think it’s pain in the ass too. So I actually wouldn’t recommend anyone do it forever like I do. actually, well not anyone, most people, I’d say do it for two to three months.
go really hard on it, like daily, like I’m describing now, and then just see where you and just, it just teaches you what’s in things if you’re doing it like honestly and accurately.. And then like, I’ll have nuts throughout the day or something. So I’ll weigh some out and basically I’ll hit my overall Cal target. like I said earlier, but it’ll be mainly to do like protein is non-negotiable. Fiber is non-negotiable.
Carbs and fats, like I said, they can be a bit kind of up and down. And if I know I’m having more like plant sort of protein, I’ll try and get a bit of extra protein in on the day, like look for 140, maybe 150 gram if possible. But if not, I’m not overly worried.
Vanessa Leone (32:19)
I think, you know, this topic is so like we could talk for hours about it and not scratch the surface of kind of the nuances between things. But there’s a couple of things that you mentioned that I kind of wanted to highlight is the fact that you can guess and I’ve seen this in action. He can guess a piece of fruit, how much it weighs. And honestly, it’s like he’s psychic. He knows within a couple of grams what it is.
Michael (32:45)
psycho.
Vanessa Leone (32:48)
I look at something and I have no clue about how much it weighs. So guessing how much things are, particularly if you’ve never counted anything before, I think is a really big mistake that a lot of people make when they are starting to count their macros initially, because that’s where a lot of these wild inaccuracies can come from. And let’s put this in perspective because you would know what this is.
If I had 50 grams of avocado versus a hundred grams of avocado, roughly how big of a macro difference is that going to be?
Michael (33:25)
Cal difference I can probably it’s I think 50 grams is gonna be about 90 cal and 100 therefore be 180 so and like 50 grams of avo is like easy to mistake for a hundred as well specifically if it’s like squashed up and stuff too and like obviously we’re not trying to demonize avos avos are rad they’re really good for you they’re delicious but are relatively calorie dense right and like I think that’s what’s lost on people but so just on calorie density just why you’ve got it
My answer is no, take it on face value. Because…
That’s where it can get really, really hairy. And you don’t know how much of that you’re absorbing anyway. And if you do some bov tests that you get online for like 20 bucks sent to you, it’s fake.
Vanessa Leone (34:35)
generally. Yeah,
but I think that’s, that’s, that was one of my biggest learnings when I did this for the first time. It was actually looking at the tracker at the data and going, holy shit, I put two tablespoons of olive oil, and that’s like a couple of hundred calories right there and coming. There you go, come. I told you, coming from an Italian background. That’s not a lot of oil. That’s
Michael (34:54)
240.
Vanessa Leone (35:02)
you know, that was a little bit of oil and, for someone who is obviously looking to be healthy, olive oil is excellently nutritious, has fantastic, all of these other polyphenols and antioxidants, but quantity is never really spoken about when we’re talking about health and quantity makes up a huge part of what we’re eating and your plate size and
your serving size makes up a huge, like a huge portion of your health. and that’s where I think that, you know, if you’re, if you’re confused about food and if you’re confused about what’s healthy and, and, and, know, all of these other factors, I love the message that you’ve got is that, you know, calorie counting isn’t, it’s gonna, it’s not gonna solve all of your problems, but it does really give you a deeper understanding about what goes into things.
particularly, I think, when we’re scanning things like sauces and things like that, like pantry staples. Like it’s wild when you look at something like a teriyaki sauce or, you know, those pre-made sauces, essentially what comes up in those.
Michael (36:14)
And also just like you look at the ingredient lists and all of them and like we like full context, we have a lot of these sauces at home. It’s just that we don’t slough and want everything every day. Again, like there’s no food in my opinion that you can’t eat. It’s just being aware. And if you the more and look, I can tell you this from personal experience. If you don’t eat something because someone told you it’s bad, like you have like a PT that says you can’t eat and it’s like pizza is bad.
Firstly, you’re gonna want pizza because who doesn’t fucking want pizza? And secondly, like it’s just, if you love something, find a way to fit it into your diet. It’s just how much you have, right? Like the poisons and the dose with anything in life. So for example, you know I love chocolate, like chocolate I fucking love, right? Like I cannot tell you how much I love chocolate, but I…
used to deprive myself of it and then like so basically like when I was like 21 or 20 or somewhere around that age every like and when I got too skinny I used to every Saturday pretty much without fail I’d buy half a kilo of beef mince some kidney beans some old el paso mix some cheese some sour cream and a whole bag of Doritos and I’d make a nacho like dish out of that I’d nail that whole thing
then I would have an entire block of Whittaker’s chocolate. And like I was still skinny as because I was just, I was under eating at that stage the other six days of the week, right? But like my point is like, that’s not healthy at all when if you just think about that, like maybe just have like not half a kilo of beef mince, maybe have like hundred grams of it with less corn chips and have it like, you can have it five times during the week and get the same net effect.
I’m not saying have corn chips five times a week, but what I’m getting at is then, and then the chocolate, if you spread that out over the week, you can have it every single night. So I allow that if I want chocolate every single day of my life now, I will find a way to make it fit. So like my favorite thing is to get like, although I don’t really want to advertise for them anymore because they’re doing dodgy things, a certain brand of chocolate 90%, which I’m going to stop buying because of their dodgy things with, say, I’ll hopefully say the peanut butter brand, Mayven’s Dark Roasted Peanut Butter.
Michael (38:35)
put that on two bits of the chocolate and then sea salt on top. Like it is, it’s heaven to me. And what I’m getting at here is I loved chocolate and I used to deprive myself of it and now I’m like, why would I do that? That’s ridiculous. And that often comes with age as well, I think. And realizing that like, as much as like, don’t get me wrong, I love being massive and shredded.
Enjoying your life’s important to like I enjoyed it that side of it too But like when you massive you can eat chocolate every day to be honest
Vanessa Leone (39:18)
No, I think this, you know, we probably won’t get to it today, but we also talk a lot about the psychological and the emotional impacts of food because we use food as a way to connect with each other, as a way to connect with our friends and family. It’s, it’s an important social construct. And the problem that we have with diet culture and fitness influences and people telling you that you can’t eat certain things is that it puts.
stress around certain foods and it creates shame around a food. And those things are really hard to break from those emotional, those emotional triggers, those comfort foods, those things that, you know, we’ll get into the psychological side of food perhaps at a later date, but all of the research.
the more psychological side of the research when it comes to food deprivation have said that trigger foods, as soon as you take them away, they become more triggering. They become more of your relapse food. They become more of the thing that you’re going to binge on that you’re going to want to crave because you’ve taken it away. Um, yeah.
Michael (40:27)
been there. like I
can tell you for like I don’t like research is great. And I think sometimes research is also not great. As in, sometimes it can be skewed. But like I can tell you from very personal experience, like sorry to interrupt you, but like there is, it is so so shit to do that to yourself. And then like you inhale a whole block of chocolate and and I used to fucking inhale it like I’d be like I loved it when I ate it. But I like it’s not real enjoyment.
Like it’s not real enjoyment. Like when I sit down with my dark chocolate and peanut butter with sea salt on top now, I love it. Like to the point like where I’m like, can you talk, not talk to me while I’m having it? Cause I sit there and like, I like legit the other night, right? And the specific, if it’s something stressful or whatever too, I’m like, not now. This is like my enjoyment time. And it’s for like two, three, four, five minutes if that, but it’s just, I sit there and like, I really just try and enjoy it. And, and that takes away.
it’s control over me or a lot of it, maybe not all of it to be completely honest, but it takes away a lot of the control over you when you go, no, I’m going to decide to have this and I’m going to have this amount of portion. And this is where the macro side comes into it. Cause if I have 20 grams of said chocolate with the 16 to 20 grams of peanut butter, it’s ballpark to depending on how much peanut butter, blah, blah. It’s ballpark about 210 cal. It’s 10 % just under 10 % of what I eat on a non-active day.
Um, so not much, right? And if you can’t fit your fav food around that and the easiest way, if you want to eat more, just eat a shit load of vegetables because you’ll be able to eat more. And like, like the volume of food I eat on some days, when I’m down at 2200 calories, like if I’m not doing any sort of like muscular work, like lifting or whatever, like it’s crazy. Sometimes you see like the volume of food and people must think that I’m eating like stupid amounts of like calories, but I’m just not.
Vanessa Leone (42:22)
This is a really big one. think we’ll finish up around here. Some people might not have seen volume eating before and we’ve talked about macros and so macros is obviously counting the energy that the food will give you. Yeah, exactly. Right. So how it how it gives you energy in the body, what those macronutrients are used for and then the overall energy consumption.
Michael (42:39)
the protein, carbs and fats as well as the energy intake here.
Vanessa Leone (42:49)
But volume is really cool. What’s, what’s volume eating?
Michael (42:54)
Well, it’s just like, for example, like, um, if you want to eat, basically, cause you want it, like the trick for lack of a better term is if you’re used to eating a lot and you’re used to eating a lot of like ultra processed foods or foods that don’t really satisfy you, if you started eating vegetables and like leafy vegetable specifically, they’re going to fill you up or anything with a lot of fibre leafy vegetables, like I guess per gram don’t have a
as much fibre as maybe some other things. But like if you eat a whole sweet potato, like a decent size one, you know, like 250 gram, that’s going to leave you feeling really full. And it’s really fucking delicious too, right? You roast that, like put like a small drizzle of honey on it. You don’t even need that because like if you roast it, it brings out the sweetness, but you’re eating a lot of volume, like 250 grams of food on one of your vegetables, like one vegetable. That’s a lot. That’s, and that’s three of your serves as well, by the way.
like, but then like, if you want to add lots of volume, shred cabbage and stuff. And like, people might go, cabbage gross. But like what I’m getting at is like, doesn’t matter. Like shred something leafy, shred it. Cause then it’ll like look like it’s bigger. And by the time you eat it all, you’re just going to be like, wow, I just ate a load and you’ll find that you’re starting to eat healthier and therefore you, and it’s, and it’s filling. And it’s also like, you’re getting, you’re getting micro nutrients, which you probably previously weren’t getting in many of, and you’re just going to feel a better.
And like that satisfaction. I think there is this thing too, like where if you’re not healthy as such with your eating and then you start to become healthy, I think there is a really nice satisfaction to that. Like to know that you’re feeding your body better because like, let’s face it, life’s very stressful. Like work for most people is a horrible stress, which it shouldn’t be, but anyway, that’s what we’re talking about today. But like, yeah, like the way people are treated at work and stuff like.
So like eating is very closely linked to your mental health, your gut bacteria diversity is very linked to your mental health. Like I was listening to something the other day with Oshar Ginsburg, he was talking to like a gut health expert and he was saying that people with like anxiety, depression and stuff when they’re at their worst, particularly you look at you study their gut bacteria, the diversity is shot to shit, whether or not it’s their diet or not. But if they eat better, it helps improve their mood.
doesn’t mean it’s going to make your anxiety and depression necessarily disappear, but it’s not going to make it worse. It’s probably going to help it. So things like that, like to me, are like mind blown because like it’s like I’m somebody who has issues around that, like complex PTSD, anxiety, depression for other reasons. But as well, that’s part of healthy eating for me is like, I’m like, well, this is going to give me the best chance of not suffering from those symptoms because when those symptoms are bad, it’s fucking horrible.
And so it’s really like to me, it’s super important to feed it to like to feed myself well to try and help like help myself not go through things. And also just like, you know, as I said, I’ve had a lot of injuries and stuff for various reasons. So if I’m not feeding myself well, then like, I don’t think it’s going to be a better outcome.
Vanessa Leone (46:11)
No, it’s good. I like it. Last question. I think that food and enjoyable food experiences are a completely underrated part of movement therapy. 100%. I think food can be therapy. And we’ll talk about this in later pods. But let’s, let’s set the scene for someone. What
If you had to pick one off the top of your head, what is your most like therapeutic food for you that if you, if you’re desiring comfort and nutrition and all of the good things, what are you going to eat?
Michael (46:54)
I’m going to put that back on you and say what do you think it is? Because I reckon you might know. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. It’s a curry. Especially like just pick curry gets a bad rap like for health wise because people go out and have it and like, yeah, often it’s got a ton of oil and stuff in there. But like you don’t need tons and tons of oil. need some oil in there because it helps actually like carry the flavor of the spices and stuff.
Vanessa Leone (46:57)
It’s curry It’s curry.
Michael (47:22)
I’m not anti oil. I’m not anti any of that stuff like I think that’s crazy to be anti that but but like if I like for example if I need comfort and like a good dhal Like is incredible or a curry that has meat, but it’s got lentils in there as well There’s something supremely comforting about like a really hearty thick Lentil the curry or dhal for me personally
Part of the association with that is like for me, that’s something I very much, it sounds odd. It wasn’t really something I grew up eating and I don’t necessarily have positive associations with my childhood a lot of the time. So it’s something that I’ve given myself and learned to love and make by myself. And like, am like obsessed with Indian food and like Sri Lankan food and like
anything that has spices generally. like I love Arabic food and stuff too. But like, um, yeah, it’s gotta be a, it’s gotta be a generally like try to pick one thing and I had to, I’d say it’s actually probably Dal. Um, because it’s just, yeah, it’s just something beautiful about having like this bowl of Dal and just like, it fills you up and like, I know. I think you just can be like a wanker about how healthy you feel after it. like, I just had this really healthy thing and I feel great now, but you do.
Michael (48:49)
Right? And then
like, let’s be honest, it’s going to make you nice and regular too.
Vanessa Leone (48:53)
Exactly, exactly. Thank you, I love that. For context, everybody, this is true. I have watched the Dal consumption. He makes an excellent Dal. If you want a recipe, you’re going to have to reach out on socials to him. My comfort food for sure would have to be a pasta. But what I love about how you make pasta, number one, you make very great
pasta, very good fusion pasta, very good traditional pasta. You do. But if I want it for something that’s during the week, you actually include so much nutrition into it and still find a way to make it delicious. And I think that a lot of people think that comfort isn’t
Michael (49:25)
I make it better than Italians, saying.
Vanessa Leone (49:45)
healthy and both of the meals that we’re talking about, mine’s probably less overall healthy because we’re talking about pasta is generally a higher processed carbohydrate consumption in that. But they’re both, you can turn them into super healthy meals. know, curry can be this extremely fatty, very greasy meal as well, or you can turn it into something that’s got an incredible array of spices and you know, like you said, lentils and dals has a lot of fibre and a lot of nutrition. So there’s always a spectrum.
when it comes to food and I think that we’re really quick to label something healthy or unhealthy. I think that’s really dangerous as an endpoint.
Michael (50:25)
Yeah, I’d agree with that argument, specifically like, like, yeah, pasta, like, I think, again, it’s the dosage, right? Like if you’re having like 70 grams of dried pasta, right? It’s gonna change brand, brand or whatever. But let’s say that’s like 300 ish cals, right? Which isn’t, but once you start adding everything else, you’re probably, you know, it’s gonna be a heavier meal. But if you know you’re gonna have that, just eat a little bit lighter at the other meals of the day, like it’s not.
Michael (50:54)
Like to me, just think people just make no… People don’t plan their food. And I can understand people want some degree of spontaneity, 100 % agree. Like I used to plan like every single dinner Monday to Friday. But the point is like start planning a little bit more and you’ll just find it a lot easier. And like I…
little bit of subject, but I want to say like I’m huge on food waste and I think it’s disgusting that people throw away so much food. actually people always talk about like, oh, you know, it’s hard. No, it’s not. If you’re throwing away more than five or 10 percent of what you’re buying, then you’re doing the wrong thing. And like you’re wasting fucking money from like just from like, forget the forget the other side of it. Like look at it from like a purely personal perspective, a selfish perspective. You’re wasting money. You’re probably working the job you hate.
like a lot of people are unfortunately. And you’re wasting the money that you’re going and slaving away to make someone else rich for like, no way. Like plan it just a little bit better and you will get a lot more from it and you’ll enjoy it a lot more. like, as soon as like, cooking’s not hard, you don’t have to hours in the kitchen. I’m happy to, but you don’t have to. And like, there’s nothing wrong with shortcuts or cheats, right? As long as you’re not like loading up with crap.
as in like you’re putting in 10 different like sources with 100 ingredients each, okay, not great. But there’s worse things you can do. But also like just try cooking. It’s fun. Like try easy, like start easy. Don’t start trying to make something that you know is hard and it’s gonna take you three, four hours because you will get the shits. Like it really is just build up to it and just do basic stuff. And even if it’s once a week, start at that.
Because it’s better than if you’re doing nothing all weekend and you’re getting Uber Eats every night. Think all the money you could save. You’d spend that on a holiday. You’d go to Italy and eat for a month. Do that. That’s way better. Eat out for a month in Italy or Spain or Thailand or something. Go do cool shit.
Vanessa Leone (52:48)
I love it. Yes. So I think that we’re going to have a lot of questions from this and I think the questions are necessary. What is he talking about? Exactly. No, but in general about macro counting or fiber or any of the things that we’ve said, if we have questions, great, because that will help direct the next.
Michael (53:10)
Like what the fuck’s he talking about?
Vanessa Leone (53:28)
podcast and our topics and what we’re going to talk about. So please feel free. DM me, DM Michael, reach out on meant to move podcast. Thank you, Michael, for your very, very honest and I love your direct approach. You know, he means well everybody, but he will be to the point. That’s why it’s called stir the pot. Okay. Stir the pot. but thank you for now and we will see you again soon.
Michael (53:55)
Thank you.
Vanessa Leone Movement Therapist 