Foods That Make You Look Good Nekid

...and foods that make you look nasty even while wearin' a
parka!
by T Nation | 08/31/01
We're about to tell you the real secret to building a lean, muscular physique. This dark secret has
been guarded for over one hundred years by a secret society made up of magazine publishers and
supplement manufacturers. We're risking life and limb to share this secret with you. Are you
ready? Okay, here goes:
The secret is, there is no secret.
Okay, so this isn't really a secret; it's more like a piece of wisdom you only develop after at least
ten years of hard training and proper dieting. But the fact remains, there are no quick fixes and
no miracle training programs.
If there is a real "secret" out there, it's simply this: A great body results from the consistent
application of smart training and proper eating. It's a four step process: 1) train hard, 2) eat right,
3) use supplementation when necessary, and 4) repeat for many, many years.
Of these four factors, most people screw up when it comes to eating right. So, what the heck is
"proper eating?" That depends on your goals. T-mag is full of different diets designed to fit
whatever your physique goals may be. The basic differences in these diets are calorie
requirements and macronutrient ratios. The funny thing is, bodybuilders tend to eat the same
foods every day, regardless of what particular diet they're using. They just switch around the
amounts of protein, carbs and fat, and toy with their daily caloric intakes.
This seems strange to the "normal" Taco Bell eatin' Oprah fans out there, but there's a logical
reason for this. Mainly, most of the food choices available at your local supermarket are crap! In
fact, if there were such a thing as a bodybuilder's grocery store, you wouldn't need that much
shelf space. Come on, do you really need 234 different kinds of breakfast cereal? No! In fact, I
propose you don't need any breakfast cereal!
The more you learn about what constitutes a good diet, the more you realize that 90% of what's
in the supermarket is garbage, a pure distraction from building the body you want.
With all this in mind, we called up a bunch of T-mag staffers like Cy Willson, Brock Strasser,
Bill Roberts, John Berardi, John Koenig, and John Davies and asked them about their diets. With
their help, we put together a list of the best and worst bodybuilding foods, plus a few that fall
somewhere in the middle.
Pull up a chair and strap on a bib. Let's dig in!

The Good Stuff

Old Fashioned Oatmeal Make no mistake about it, oatmeal is the carb of choice for many
bodybuilders. Even if you're on a reduced carb diet, there's nothing wrong with a serving of
oatmeal (27g of carbs) to go along with your morning protein. Your body has been deprived of
food all night, so some slow-acting carbs to replenish stores, plus some protein, make for a great
bodybuilding breakfast.
Oatmeal has about three grams of natural unsaturated fats, five grams of protein, and two grams
each of soluble and insoluble fiber. The fiber not only helps keep your pooper working properly,
the soluble variety can help improve cholesterol levels, thus earning the American Heart
Association's "heart healthy" seal of approval.
Only buy oatmeal that lists "100% natural rolled oats" in the ingredients. That's it! Oats should
be the one and only ingredient. Do not purchase those individually packaged, flavored oatmeal
products! (More on that in our "Bad Stuff" section.) Also, don't screw up a good thing by adding
milk and sugar. Eat your oatmeal like a man. And by the way, old fashioned oats cook up just
fine in the microwave, no need to boil the water in a pot.
Oatmeal rocks. Make it a staple of your diet.
Fat Free Cottage Cheese We hate the taste and texture of cottage cheese. Most of us also eat
at least five pounds of those chunky curds a week. Our secret for making this stuff palatable? We
blend it with protein powders and make puddings and thick shakes out of it. Why do we go
through all that trouble? Easy, cottage cheese is a great source of casein, one of the best proteins
for bodybuilders.
Casein gets props because of its slow digestion and absorption rates. A snack involving cottage
cheese will provide a steady, slow paced release of amino acids into the bloodstream. Cottage
cheese is also low in carbs. Combine that with its slow digesting protein and it makes an ideal
bedtime snack to help prevent any possible nighttime catabolism (muscle wasting caused by an
eight hour fast.)
You'll want to stick to the fat free kind and avoid the creamed varieties because of their "bad" fat
content. Sure, the fat free kind is a little bitter, but if you use it as a base for other foods like we
do, then that doesn't matter much. Besides, if you can bang out high rep squats or inject yourself
with steroids, you can certainly eat cottage cheese, ya big wuss!
Tuna and Other Fish You just can't beat a high protein food that tastes like your girlfriend.
(Okay, maybe we've just dated some skanky chicks.) If oatmeal is a staple carb source for
bodybuilders, then tuna is a staple protein source. It's cheap, low in fat, carb-free, and packs 13
grams of protein into just two ounces.
You can get it in cans or those new waterless "no-drain" packages, which are even more
convenient (though a little more expensive.) You can also buy it packed in water or oil, the latter
being very handy for those diets that require a lot of protein plus fat meals. Albacore tuna has

450 milligrams of omega-3 fatty acids per two ounce serving, even more if you're lucky enough
to get some of that yummy dolphin meat as a bonus!
We've heard rumors that there are other kinds of fish besides tuna, but they probably require
cooking and only gay guys cook. (We're kidding. Please stop typing those hate letters now.)
Salmon is another good source and you can buy it in cans like tuna. Most of us think canned
salmon is just plain nasty, but T-mag contributors John and Steve Berardi live off the stuff. That
and breath mints.
However, there is a guy who runs a small company in California that makes one helluva' canned
fish. His name is Dave and his product is simply called Dave's Albacore (or Dave's Salmon, as
the case may be). This guy sells unbleached albacore that's hand caught, bled right at the boat,
and never frozen. The stuff is packed in its own oils and damn if ain't tasty! Trouble is, it's pretty
expensive. Six 6-ounce cans of albacore sell for about 18 bucks, and six 7 3/4 ounce cans of deelicious salmon sell for almost 34 dollars. If fish is a staple of your healthy diet, though, it's worth
it.
You can check out his stuff at Davesalbacore.com.
Beef and Poultry Let's hear it for dead animal flesh, nature's protein with feet! (Vegans love
us, can't ya tell?) This category includes beef, chicken, and turkey, although anything you can
catch counts too. T-mag contributor Coach Davies even recommends large quantities of buffalo
and ostrich to his athletes.
First, let's hunker down on some juicy steak. Red meat got a bad rap back in the "ass-backwards
80's" but things have started to swing in the other direction. The beef proponents were usually
fat-free fanatics and animal rights activists who thought that eating bagels and soybeans all day
was the enlightened path to health and thinness. They were wrong.
Beef is chocked full of protein and nutrients; it's even been dubbed "nature's multi-vitamin" by
some. Sure, it has some fat, but fat ain't bad in the right amounts. In fact, a very low fat diet can
lead to low Testosterone levels. A proper amount of fat in your diet, even some saturated fat, is
necessary and healthy.
Always go for steaks that have the words "round" or "loin" in the name. These are the leanest
cuts. Avoid the fatty meats with the word "rib" in the name. For us, that simply means ordering
sirloin instead of prime rib. At the grocery store, choose cuts that are over 90% lean and trim any
excess fat. Beef jerky is good when you're on the run, but avoid those processed and chemicalladen deli meats, along with bologna and franks.
White meat chicken and turkey are great too. Since they're high in protein and carb-free, chicken
breasts are one of bodybuilding's most versatile foods. Eat 'em up!
Eggs Before the popularity of protein powders, bodybuilders relied largely on eggs to bump up
their protein intake. A large egg has seven grams of protein, 80 calories, and a great BV
(biological value).

Again, you may be wondering about the fat and cholesterol, and again I can tell you that the
media has over-hyped the issues. Fact: cholesterol is the basic structure for all anabolic
hormones. Without it, your body can't produce Testosterone. If you're following a good diet and
working out, a few whole eggs aren't going to hurt you. Even the very conservative American
Heart Association says it's okay to have four whole eggs per week.
Still, most bodybuilders use egg whites in their meals with only one or two yolks thrown in. You
can even buy pasteurized egg products with the yolks removed. Add a whole egg to a carton of
egg substitute and you have a great bodybuilder omelet.
Just remember that despite how buff Rocky was, raw eggs suck, and we're not talking about
salmonella poisoning (although that risk does still exist to some extent despite improvements
made by egg distributors over the last few years). According to a study found by John Berardi,
the body can only utilize about half of the protein found in raw egg products. So not only are you
risking getting sick, you're wasting your money. Lesson: Cook your eggs!
Fruits and Veggies There are about a hundred reasons that fruit can be a healthy part of a
bodybuilder's diet. Instead of going over them all again, we'll just refer you to Cy Willson's great
article, The Forbidden Fruit. Bottom line: Fruit provides you with vitamins, minerals,
phytochemicals, certain flavones, fiber and may even have some protein-sparing effects. Eat
some fruit, but avoid most fruit juices. (More on that below.)
As for veggies, what can we say? Mom said to eat them and mom was right. There are some
things out there that only nature can provide, and many of those goodies are packed into fruits
and vegetables.
Protein Powders We can hear some of the crybabies now, "Wait a minute, protein powder
ain't food! It's a supplement!" We understand what you mean, but we consider quality protein
powders and MRPs to be food. Look at the labels and you'll see protein, fat, carbs, vitamins, and
minerals. Sounds like food to us, just in a concentrated form.
Protein powders make the list because they're nutrient rich, fast and convenient. They've truly
revolutionized the bodybuilding industry and have allowed regular people with jobs and families
to get the nutrition they need to add muscle. Try to work at least eight hours a day, train, spend
time with friends and family and still fit in five or six nutritious, protein-packed meals a day.
Hard to do, especially if you're shooting for at least 1.5 grams of protein per pound of
bodyweight. Protein powders fix that problem. Those low carb protein powders are especially
good because you can use them in cutting and bulking diets.
The Okay Stuff
This category includes foods that are generally considered pretty good for the bodybuilder, but
may not be perfect for everyone. Just play around with these foods and see how they work for
you. We think most of these choices below lean toward the "good" side anyway.

Nuts and Natural Peanut Butter Nuts make the "okay" list (instead of the "good" list) for one
specific reason: they're very calorically dense. For that reason, they're often recommended to
those supposed "hard gainers" out there. One ounce of peanuts (about 32 nuts to be precise) has
160 calories, eight grams of protein and five grams of carbs. Nuts are high in fat, but only a small
part of that is saturated (two out of fourteen grams for peanuts.)
Now, since nuts are so calorically dense, you have to be careful. Just snacking on a can of party
peanuts can quickly add a thousand calories to your daily intake. But overall, nuts make a good
high fat, low carb food. (Cashews have the highest amount of carbs, about eight grams per
serving, so be careful there.) They're filling, portable and can be a healthy part of any diet.
We're also a big fan of natural peanut butter, and yes, it has to be natural! Regular peanut butter
is full of nasty stuff like corn syrup solids, hydrogenated oils, and sugar. The ingredients should
read "peanuts and salt," period. And don't be fooled by those reduced fat varieties. These are still
full of unhealthy ingredients with the added benefit of soy protein! And if you're still worried
about the fat content, natural peanut butter allows you to pour off the excess oil before you stir
and refrigerate it.
A piece of advice for those with fast metabolisms: drop two servings of natural PB into your
protein shakes for a healthy and calorically dense "weight gainer." That'll add 400 calories to
your shake, with none of it coming from sugar.
Rice, Pasta, Potatoes, Yams, and Whole Grain Bread We admit it. We put all these foods into
the same category because of their carb content. These are good bodybuilding eats, but you carb
sensitive types have to be careful with them.
Judging these foods strictly by their glycemic index, choose sweet potatoes (yams) over white
Russet potatoes; whole wheat pasta over white pasta; and long grain brown rice over short grain
or white rice (the stickier the rice, the higher the GI.) As for bread, avoid the highly processed
white breads and go for multigrain dark bread. If it looks like it has wood chips baked into it, it's
good to go. Our personal favorite is called Heathnut, a grainy bread filled with nuts and seeds.
Others prefer flax bread.
These foods are cool, just watch those carbs if you're sensitive and be careful with toppings,
especially with pasta and potatoes. Adding a fatty topping to a "carby" food is a recipe for rapid
fat gain.
Milk and Yogurt Milk is a two-faced monster. To some, it's a cheap source of protein and the
ultimate "weight gainer" for bony teenagers. Some old-timers even recommend drinking a gallon
of whole milk per day! Suffice it to say, that would leave most of us quite fat. Much of the fat in
whole milk falls in the "bad" category. Saturated fat mixed with a high sugar, high-carb food
does not a healthy body make.
Also, somewhere around 10 to 20 percent of the population is lactose intolerant, meaning they
can't digest milk sugar. (There are even a few studies that show that non-whites, particularly
Asians and blacks, have a much higher rate of lactose intolerance.) This can be helped some by

using lactose-free milk and digestive aids. On the other hand, if you have no problems with
lactose, skim milk can be a good source of protein. Still, unless you're an extremely active
teenager with the metabolism of a humming bird on ephedrine, we'd limit milk intake.
Yogurt is a better option in our opinion. It has many of the benefits of milk without most of the
drawbacks. One of the really cool things about yogurt is the live active cultures it contains. Yep,
we're talking about bacteria, nice friendly bacteria that keep your digestion system running
properly. (That's why yogurt can help with both constipation and diarrhea.)
Some substances actually feed bacteria and as such, may even help you absorb all that protein
you're taking in. One in particular, called GDL, reduces bloating and gas and increases nitrogen
retention. That means it's a perfect addition to protein powders. The only American company
that uses it, as far as we know, is Biotest in our Advanced Protein product.
Sauces and Spices Sauces and spices make the "okay" list because some are good and some
are bad. On the good side you have a plethora of calorie-free pepper sauces, Worcestershire
sauce, and just about every herb and spice on the shelf. Many of those fancy mustards fall into
this category too, but read the labels just in case. Our suggestions: Beer 'N Brat horseradish
mustard, Cajun Sunshine hot pepper sauce, Hell on the Red salsa, and McCormick herb chicken
seasoning.
On the bad side is anything made with high fructose corn syrup (BBQ sauce, ketchup etc.),
mayo, and most creamy salad dressings. Stick to something like fat free Miracle Whip if you
must use mayo and if you just have to have some barbecue sauce on your chicken breasts,
measure out one serving and spread thinly.
The Bad Stuff
We all visit the Dark Side on occasion, but if you want to be muscular and ripped, you'd better
stay on the side of the Force 95% of the time. Here's a list of foods that you'd better avoid if you
want to take your shirt off in public again.
High Fat/High Carb Foods The prototypical Western diet consists of foods that are both high
in bad fats and high in carbs. In America, that diet has lead to a climbing rate of obesity and
obesity-related diseases. It's also lead to fat girls who insist on showing off their bellybutton
rings by wearing cropped shirts, thus exposing blubbery parts of their bodies best left covered by
ample amounts of clothing. The madness must be stopped!
Now, what were we talking about again? Oh yeah, fat and carb meals. John Berardi sums it up in
his Massing Eating articles: "Meals with a high carbohydrate content in combination with highfat meals can actually promote a synergistic insulin release when
compared to the two alone. High fat with high-carb meals represent the worst possible case
scenario. ....you'll promote high blood levels of fats, carbs, and insulin."

What foods are the real bad boys here? Unfortunately, most of the really tasty ones! Except for a
rare treat, it's best to avoid fried foods, pizza, lasagna, pancakes, whole milk, ice cream, cookies,
hamburgers, most Mexican food, most Chinese food, and a bunch of other delicious stuff. But
you already knew that.
Our coveted "Most Evil Food Known to Man" award goes to the lowly glazed donut, who just
barely beats out French fries and fettuccini alfredo.
Fruit Juice and Non-Diet Sodas Repeat after us: fruit good, fruit juice bad. Cy "Mr. Big
Britches" Willson sums it up best:
"Processed fruit juice is worthless in my opinion. Before I would've said to use it as a postworkout source of carbs, but with Biotest Surge, that isn't necessary and besides, it's less
efficient. Also, with whole fruit, you get so much more: more fiber, more phytochemicals (way
more), more nutrients, etc. Plus, whole fruit is more filling.
"Fruit juice is an easy way to over-consume calories and increase body fat. Now remember, I'm
talking about fruit juice concentrate. The processing is what reduces the amount of these special
phytochemicals and other compounds. If you're going to consume juice, then you should make it
yourself."
We also have a real problem with soft drinks, which Americans consume more of than water.
Face it, Cokes are liquid candy and they're designed especially to make you more thirsty. Add a
little caffeine to get you addicted and help dehydrate you, and you have legal crack. Okay, we're
exaggerating just a bit, but we think excessive intake of soft drinks is in the same class as
cigarettes when it comes to the destruction of your health and physique. Soda is the epitome of
the empty calorie and void of anything your body needs. Okay, rant over.
What about diet sodas, you say? Well, we'd still rather see people drinking exactly what the body
needs and wants water but diet sodas are okay if you don't mind the artificial sweeteners and
sodium. (And despite some of the internet rumors and media hype, both are fine if used in human
quantities.)
Candy Oh, come on! You know you're not supposed to be eating candy, right?
Flavored Oatmeal Go to your pantry right now and get out your oatmeal. If you took out a
colorful box full of little kiddy packets of peaches 'n cream oatmeal, do yourself a favor and kick
that shit to the curb! As stated above, we think oatmeal is one the best carb sources for
bodybuilders, but the flavored, prepackaged variety sucks.
Look at the ingredients, which are listed in order of quantity. Sugar is usually the second
ingredient in these girly oatmeal packets. Then you have other crap like salt, hydrogenated
vegetable oils, maltodextrin, and partially hydrogenated soybean oil.
To top it off, the oats used in flavored oatmeal are usually more finely ground than healthy, old
fashioned oatmeal. This means the GI could be higher based on the extra processing. The list of

ugly ingredients goes on and varies a little with flavoring, but the lesson is simple: don't eat this
stuff if you want to look good nekid.
White Bread, Bagels and Rice Cakes It's hard to believe, but back in the 80s and early 90s,
diet "experts" told people to eat as much of this stuff as they wanted. Since rice cakes are fat free,
you can't get fat, right? Wrong! Now the country is full of overweight diabetics. Coincidence? I
don't think so!
One representative of the Glycemic Research Institute even stated that eating a plain rice cake
stimulated fat storage like ten bowls of sugar. Bagels aren't quite as bad but are best avoided.
Don't fool yourself into thinking you're eating healthy by consuming these things.
Most Breakfast Cereals To us, cold breakfast cereals, even many of the brands touted as
"healthy," are pure physique killers. Cereal is breakfast candy, nothing more, nothing less. In
fact, corn flakes have a GI rating even worse than white bread! And how about these cereals that
give you "energy", like Grape Nuts? Yep, at 47 carbs per teeny tiny serving (and what
bodybuilder would eat one serving anyway?), most people would be in an insulin-induced coma
by lunch.
Here's a piece of trivia for you. John Harvey Kellogg, the founder of Kellogg's cereal, invented
Corn Flakes to reduce sexual desire and curb the "epidemic" of masturbation. Besides
"castrating" people with shitty, high-carb breakfast foods, Kellogg also recommended that small
boys (not infants) be circumcised without anesthetic so they would forever associate the penis
with pain. He also thought that women should have their clitorises treated with carbolic acid to
prevent what he called "abnormal excitement." As a side note, Sylvester Graham invented the
Graham Cracker believing it would also diminish male sexual desire.
Now tell me, do you really want to eat a food designed to make you a Testosterone-free eunuch?
All that said, there are a couple of good cereals out there, but not many. All Bran and Fiber One
make decent oatmeal replacements, just eat some protein with them. All Bran Extra Fiber only
has 50 calories a serving and 13 grams of fiber, almost four times as much as oatmeal!
Some "Fat Free" Snacks Food manufacturers discovered a great trick back in the 80's to fool
people into buying their junk food. Since all fat was dubbed evil, food makers started abusing the
"fat free" label. Basically, they took out the fat, added whopping amounts of sugar and called
their products "healthy." Makers of snack foods are the worst culprits, with some even trying to
sell fat free cookies, chocolate syrup, and solid sugar hard candies as health food simply because
they have little or no fat. News flash: Sugar is the real enemy, not fat!
Alcohol As connoisseurs of fine beers, we hate to see this one make the bad list. But let's face
the music, alcohol has a lot of empty calories, can inhibit fat loss, and in the fatal words of John
"party pooper" Berardi, booze is one of the best Testosterone suppressors known to man!
Hey, have a beer or two once a week, but if you really care about what you look like and your
overall progress in the gym, don't drink to excess.

Soy protein We won't even try to do a better job than TC or Cy Willson when it comes to this
topic. Read these two articles: Bad Protein and The Evils of Soy. If you can read those articles
and still take in large quantities of soy, then you deserve that dwindling sperm count of yours!
Conclusion
Weight training and proper dieting don't have to be as complicated as we sometimes make them.
Lift, eat, rest, use supps when necessary to get you there quicker, and repeat. It's that simple.
Hopeful this article helps with the eating part.
Now go get your grub on!