Health
Habits
Food
Weight 
Better Than Butternut: Roasted Delicata Squash Recipe
10 Simple Ways To Eat Less Without Noticing
Juicing: Stupid and Pretentious or Nourishing and Enlightening?
10 Tasty Carbs That Won’t Make You Fat
How To Start Working Out When You Don’t Like To Exercise
Focus More on Your Brain and Less on Your Diet if You’re Serious About Losing Weight
Home Court Habits: The Secret to Effortless Weight Control
10 Reasons You Aren’t Losing Weight When You Think You’re Doing Everything Right
How To Burn More Calories Without Breaking A Sweat
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Foodists
Summer Tomato Live – Episode #1 – The Four Hour Body [video]
Last night was the first episode of Summer Tomato Live where we discussed the new best-selling book, The Four Hour Body by Tim Ferriss. Thanks everyone for watching and submitting your questions, the show was a huge success and we had a great conversation.
[note to self: get haircut]
The entire show is available above. Normally the videos will be available a week after the live broadcast, but for this first episode I want to give everyone a chance to see what the show is about in case you’re interested in subscribing.
I’ve partnered with Foodzie and Zürsun Heirloom Beans to provide free samples of Zürsun cranberry beans (great for Slow Carb Dieters) as well as a free Foodzie Tasting Box ($20 value) to the first 150 subscribers. Spaces are filling up quickly, so sign up soon if you want the bonuses (for more info about the show and newsletter read this). US shipments only.
Subscribe to Summer Tomato Live ($3.99/mo)
The next live show is scheduled for Wednesday, March 2, at 6:30pm PST. The reason I’m choosing a different day of the week is so that Tuesday night karate class or any other regularly scheduled activity won’t be a barrier to subscribing. If this system doesn’t work for you, please let me know. If a fixed day is better for most people, we can try to make that happen.
Wondering what the next show is about? Me too! Please vote for the next Summer Tomato Live topic (if you’re reading this in an email, please click over to the blog post to vote in the poll):
[poll id=”8″]
Poll closes Friday at midnight PST.
Show notes from episode #1:
The book: The Four Hour Body by Tim Ferriss, a #1 New York Times best-seller.
Slow Carb Diet: How to Lose 20 lbs. of Fat in 30 Days… Without Doing Any Exercise (note: In the book there is one extra rule than is listed in this original post, “Don’t eat fruit.”)
Recommended pressure cooker: Fagor Splendid 6-Quart Pressure Cooker
Useful links:
- How (and why) To Cook and Freeze Large Batches of Lentils
- How To Cook Dried Beans Using a Pressure Cooker
- Intact Grains vs Whole Grains
- Does Fruit Make You Old and Fat?
- How To Cook And Freeze Brown Rice
Please add any tips or suggestions you have about the show in the comments. Thanks!
Ok, if you can’t eat fruit, isn’t that basically the same as the Atkins diet? I thought I was doing fine with it but I didn’t see the no fruit part =(
The Atkins diet doesn’t allow for binge days and I’m not sure about the beans, but I doubt it. But yes, Tim is very clear about no fruit. But if you’re eating fruit and still losing weight, I don’t see any problem with it unless you stall.
Glad you chose to talk about “The Four-Hour Body.” When I first heard about it a few weeks ago, the first thing I thought was, “What would Darya say about this?” Also glad you’re doing a show on Wednesday. Tuesdays at 6:30 p.m. will not work for me until at least mid-June, unfortunately. I’m still a Tomato Slice subscriber, though. Excited about it! 🙂
Awesome. I’m going to run the show on different days to see if there is one day that there is a clear winner in terms of viewers, but my guess is it will vary a lot. We’ll see how it goes 🙂
Ugh, Weds. don’t work for me right now. But as long as I can get a re-play, it’s ok.
Cool video – thank you.
With regard to “eating for optimum fertility” I feel that Tim’s focus is far more on being in the best shape / health possible which produces the best conditions for fertility rather than because he’s particularly obsessed with it 🙂
I agree with varying the food in the diet while keeping within the rules. Again I think Tim suggests this in the book to help people stick to the process by keeping it as simple as possible. I certainly enjoy mixing the meals with a huge range of vegetables both raw and cooked.
As far as cheat days – currently I’m enjoying eating a lot of crap on the cheat days but already I’m finding after 5 weeks that I’m eating less and less sugar and refined flour filled items.
Over time I can see that cheat day for me will adjust to eating high calorie foods that are high in energy content to help activate the required hormones but with a lot less sugar and other crap ingredients.
While Tim says the diet isn’t meant to be fun… I personally feel this is really a marketing angle to ease people into the diet. If you tell people it’s going to be horrible up front and instead they find it’s actually not so bad (or even quite tasty) as they adjust to the new diet then it’s helping people stick to the diet.
After 4.5 weeks I’m really enjoying the meals. With sugar out of my diet my taste buds are waking up and I’m enjoying the simple meals so much more.
Tim also mentions in a video he did at Google that eating fruit is fine if you want to maintain weight. If you want to lose weight then don’t eat fruit as it has a very, very efficient process to be converted to fat.
For maintenance it’s going to be fine to reintroduce some of the non “5 rule” foods – as long as people monitor their progress they can always jump back onto the no carbs for a week or so to lose any gains.
As you said – the whole book is designed to help people get on the diet, achieve results super fast and stick to it. Cooking regularly, eating more fresh vegetables and meal variations are great extras when people get the base diet done.
Awesome Phill, thanks for your thoughts and I totally agree with you. And I think for most people this 6day/wk sugar purge is one of the best things they’ll get from the diet. So many people describe this phenomenon of “taste buds waking up” and it really takes going cold turkey for awhile to experience this.
Thanks for the info about maintenance as well 🙂
Insightful as always. I think you’re absolutely right that Tim’s omission of maintenance tips leaves something to be desired. Also, I’d have loved to hear your thoughts on Tim’s warnings about soy intake.
As someone who does not have much fat to lose, but never developed a healthy diet, the most beneficial part of the slow carb diet has been Tim’s straightforward rules. They provide a simple, easy to follow foundation for a more diverse diet in the future. In another week or two, I’ll begin my own version of maintenance. I plan to build off of his recommendations by adding individual items I know to be healthy (e.g. berries, quinoa, yogurt, etc.).
I’m also one of those lacto-ovo vegetarians (actually pescatarian) whose adjustment in diet was focused on what would no longer be eaten. After reading Tim’s book, I consider myself more of an herbivore, that is, more concerned with the sources of my nutrients than defining myself by what I abstain from.
Additionally, like Phill, my body can no longer tolerate a free-for-all on binge day. It’s fascinating how cutting out sugary, processed foods for six days a week has made me cognizant of the psychological origins of our cravings for those kinds of foods.
Yes, I ultimately agree with you that the 4HB is hardly the final word on developing a healthy, sustainable healthstyle. But the greatest benefit of Tim’s work may be its ability to act as a gateway to a more holistic approach to diet and health. I, for one, would not be one of your daily readers had I not read Tim’s book.
Well that is just downright awesome. Thanks for sharing, and I hope more people are as thoughtful and conscientious about their food choices as you are.
I voted for menus! I’m sort of a menu buff. hehe 🙂
Thanks for the video … All I can say is … Once I changed over to a healthy lifestyle, I enjoy cooking and all the amazing foods that provide incredible taste and flavor.
While health and body are very important, it’s equally important to enjoy food and friends. Cooking for friends and family and hangin’ in the kitchen is a wonderful and incredible experience.
And … once you identify incredibly tasty foods, there’s no need to binge once a week on junk foods…the need and desire goes away.
I listened to the abridged audio book, and this video was a great review!
Regarding supplements, I don’t see them as necessarily a bad thing. I think there’s Vitamins that you just can’t get in any appreciable amount from diet only.. Vitamin D3 as you state, but also Vitamin K2, B12, etc. Then there’s nutrients that aren’t essential, but are linked to health.. reveratrol, turmeric cucumin, Cinnulin, fisetin, glutathione, r-ala, ubiquinol, etc, etc
Regarding the insane fertility, pro-create message of the book, I was definitely disappointed. As a treehugger, I might be a bit biased concerning how the planet cannot continue to support and feed an infinite number of people, but I think this video (albeit a bit crude) does a good job:
Finally, the only minor suggestion about the video presentation, would be to get a hat or a clip. Seeing you struggle with, and/or hold the bangs so they don’t fall was a bit distracting and uncomfortable to watch. Other than that, great video!
Haha, yes, getting my bangs trimmed is high on my to-do list. I normally don’t have a problem with them, but since I was reading from a paper that was just below my camera it was a huge problem. Will fix!
Also, I agree with you about certain supplements. I agree with Tim that people should get tested before bothering with them though.
I wish your talk was more centered around the science of nutrition than the touchy-feely aspects of food. I doubt if you have diabetes, for if you did, you would not be making a huge distinction between “junk food” and “artisanal food”. You would be shocked at your glucose levels after consuming the so called healthy food.
I truly wish you would separate good tasting food from healthy food. What is good tasting food is mainly a cultural thing and what is healthy seems to be very individualistic.
Good luck with your show!
Hey PhilM,
I totally agree with you that diabetics must be very careful about what they eat, whether the food is artisan or not. The point I was trying to make is that in Tim’s recommendation of “binge days” I think there is still value in sticking to foods that are not filled with chemical preservatives and other potentially toxic ingredients. I’m not talking about glucose levels, I’m talking about carcinogens. The whole point of these binge days is to spike glucose, as far as I can tell. This is certainly not my advice for a better healthstyle 🙂
The point of the binge days is to spike your calories and eat some of the foods you may be missing. If you allow yourself these foods on binge days you are more likely to stick to diet the other 6 days. Also, Tim shows how to binge with the least amount of damage using cinnamon, grapefruit etc. Some folks are even doing binge day gluten free.
I personally see binge day in the long-term as relaxing a bit on the weekend – being stricter during the weekdays with food but enjoying yourself socially on the weekend. Having that cake with coffee or ordering a dessert and totally enjoying it without feeling the slightess bit guilty.
This was awesome, great job!
Seeing as most diets are focused on fat loss or muscle building I was just wondering if you have any tips for foods or supplements that might help optimize brain function (e.g keeping focus, improving memory)?
I’ve looked into this before, and sadly the science isn’t very compelling. Most focus on B vitamins and omega-3s (eat that meat and fish!), but I’d be surprised if there weren’t more to the story than that. The brain is a complicated place. May be time for me to review the literature again, it’s been a few years.
Read the Brain Trust Program by Larry McCleary, M.D. – improve memory, elevate mood, enhance attention etc. There is another book out recently that is similar can’t remember name at moment.
Thanks for reviewing the book, I’ve got it but it’s really quite a BRICK
…yes, it’s quite large and I haven’t been able to get through, I’m glad for your scientist input. It seem like Tim is quite smart, although a master salesman, and there are some strange claims out there. It good that you disagree with the binge-day, I also find this unhealthy, even its temporarily satisfying.
You’re summary of it’s tenets was perfect.
Cheers.
Darya,
I really enjoyed your thoughts on the four hour body. They mirrored quite a bit of my own opinions. I am almost finished reading the book…(I have the appendices to finish). I totally missed the odd dichotomy between the Tim’s two books, the deferred eating plan was a fantastic observation.
I have a tendency to fit somewhere between you and Tim on eating. I enjoy bodybuilding (not the big variety) and am regularly under 10% body fat, I eat mostly the same things day in and day out, but my meal plans are full of mostly whole foods that I love. If I have a cupcake I figure that into my meal plan.
I think my point is that I years ago out grew Tim’s eating plans. I have in the past indulged in the full on cheat day, but found it erased the benefits of a constructed and reasonable plan throughout the week.
These days I have a tendency to just stick to maintenance caloric levels and just loosen things up on Sundays (GRILLED CHEESE). I eat an ovo-lacto vegetarian diet from a variety of foods (that’s a personal choice there).
People need to simply need to move more and eat a reasonable amount at higher quality foods. Sadly that doesn’t sell books.
Any reason why antioxidant rich fruit juices are off limit? Is it just because of the calories, or is the vilified fructose responsible?
What about vegetable juices? Twice a week, I juice a beet / kale / radishes mixture and add a tablespoon of vitamin supplement (Beyond Tangy Tangerine) to make it taste good.
Also, what does cranberry beans taste like? Is it sweet?
Juices are off limits because they have so much sugar and slow weight loss. As Tim says, this diet is meant to be effective. Fruit makes it less so. I imagine he would say the same about veggie juice, but if you try it and have no problem then don’t worry about it. Cranberry beans aren’t sweet, they’re a relative of the pinto bean I believe. They’re very creamy and rich tasting. I love them 🙂
Fruit juices so much sugar but vegie juices less so. Just eat the whole fruit.
The four hour diet is to lose fat its not a maintenance diet – you can’t compare it to the way you eat Darya. You don’t need to lose any weight.
This diet meant for a short time only so for some its easier with compliance if they just eat the same things day in day out for ease of preparation. You can change the meals slightly by the different herbs you use.
Re the binge day a lot of people were nervous in doing the binge day incase all their hard work ruined. Some skipped it or binged on healthier stuff. Its a choice what you decide to binge on.
The promised weight loss seemed slower in women.