Ep. 111 - Meal planning for your fasting goals | Keto, Paleo, Whole30, Vegan...which is best for me? | What's in our fridge? | Simple rules for healthy eating | Free Intermittent Fasting Plan for OMAD

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In this episode, Dr. Scott and Tommy discuss being proactive in the meal planning process to support your fasting goals. This includes planning for breaking your fast, practical matters to optimize food prep, and eating a variety of healthy foods to complement your fasting.

Need some ideas? Check out the cookbook Tommy and his wife use! Paleo Cooking with your Instant Pot

Show Transcript: www.thefastingforlife.com/blog

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Fasting For Life Ep. 111

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:00:01] Hello. I'm Dr. Scott Watier

Tommy Welling: [00:00:03] And I'm Tommy Welling, and you're listening to the Fasting for Life podcast.

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:00:08] This podcast is about using fasting as a tool to regain your health, achieve ultimate wellness and live the life you truly deserve. Each episode is a short conversation on

Tommy Welling: [00:00:17] A single topic with immediate, actionable steps. We cover everything from fat loss and health and wellness to the science

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:00:23] Of lifestyle design. We started fasting for life because of how fasting has transformed our lives, and we hope to share the tools that we have learned

[00:00:30] Along the way.

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:00:40] Everyone wanted to hop on real quick before we get into today's episode where we unpack meal planning and the second part of the equation of fasting is what to do when you break a fast. So no, don't worry, we won't be talking about buying the 15 packs of little food prep containers and spending your whole weekend prepping for your week. But what do we want to tell you about was the upcoming challenge coming up on February 23rd? We have packed the start of this calendar year with back to back challenges due to the request and the demand, so we are super excited. And today's episode is really a great conversation or a peek into what it is that we really spend a considerable amount of time on during the challenge, which is the two part equation of fasting, which is how to fast what's allowed and then what do I do when I break my fast?

Tommy Welling: [00:01:28] Yeah, you really do need to focus on both sides of the equation to get them both right, so you can see success with long term fasting and implementing a fasting lifestyle. So we open up the conversation here and we're going to get into that in some more detail during the challenge and within the the week to week structure of our continuity group as well. So this is a really cool thing, and I think it's going to be a good episode.

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:01:49] I agree. So if you've been on the fence about getting into one of the challenges you've done one in the past, it's time to re-engage and go to WW v fasting for dot com forward slash live. Click the link for all the details, dates and more information. And now to today's episode. Hey everyone, welcome to the Fasting for Life podcast. My name is Dr. Scott Watier and I'm here. As always, I'm a good friend and colleague. Tommy Welling. Good afternoon to you, sir. Hey, Scott, how are you doing? Fantastic, my friend. Just excited about today's conversation. If you are new to the podcast, go ahead and check out our free resources on the website. You can download the Fast Start Guide PDF. Six simple steps to put one meal a day fasting into your day to day life. Or you can download the insulin assessment and get some subjective data or some insight into whether or not you may have some insulin issues that need to be addressed. One of the things that we talk a lot about on this podcast is regulating blood sugar, balancing hormones, adopting the fasting lifestyle. So a couple of tools to go check out if you've already downloaded the fast start guide didn't know we had another resource, go ahead and go ahead and head on over and grab it. Let's see here. So today's conversation, Tommy.

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:03:00] We're going to talk about meal planning, and this is a very popular. Method in the I need to get healthy and lose weight world. Right, so you can't get to your ideal place in terms of what you want to look like, what you want to feel like, what you want, the number on the scale to be without counting calories, tracking macros working out five to six days a week. And. Knowing. Exactly what you're going to eat for the entire week and putting it in nice little containers for cooking seventy three chicken breasts and 14 dozen eggs and overnight oats and putting all that stuff and planning it and prepping it. So a couple of layers here. But let's start with this question that came in, and I think it's going to lead to a good conversation is like I struggle with the meal planning after I've been fasting and getting into my schedule each week, you know, cooking for just yourself and ended up eating the same thing all week because you just end up having a bunch of leftovers right from the one or two recipes you pick. Yeah. And then making sure what approach to the second thing will be, what approach do we take to make sure that we're getting the right food? So the second biggest question we get? Always is, what do I eat?

Tommy Welling: [00:04:23] Yeah, how how should I fast and then what should I eat? So it's it's it's yin and yang. It's the it's the the two sides of the coin. And you know, I think that what's easy to do if I if I look back on my own history and for for everybody pretty much in my life that I can think of, there's there's a history, like you said, of trying to lose that weight, trying to gain control over it and then using a method that's usually based on, you know, what am I restricting? What am I omitting what? What sort of things am I focused on? So even even something like a restrictive diet, like whether it's low carb or its carnivore or it's it's vegan, it's vegetarian, it's pescatarian, it's, you know, insert anything into the blanks here. There's usually some level of like, OK, I'm or juice cleanses or, you know, something else. There's there's a lot of extreme things that either limit the calories or limit the food choices or both. And when you when you understand and when you're using fasting successfully, it can almost lead. Avoid leave a void there, where now I don't I don't really have this restrictive plan. So how do I fill in that gap and actually break my fast and feel good about my choices long term?

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:05:41] Now, if you're listening to this podcast, then you're probably in the fasting camp. But if you're not right and you just heard us say, or you heard Tommy, say that? Being restrictive or removing certain food groups or well, wouldn't fasting be restrictive, right? It's something sometimes we hear. Aren't you restricting yourself from food throughout the day, right? Yes. But you're also opening up the ability to not have to omit complete food groups or foods that you love from your long term plan while being in a fat loss mode while increasing your energy, increasing your sleep quality, increasing your quality of life, decreasing your brain fog, you know, reversing your blood sugar conditions, right? So sensitivity? Yeah, gaining yeah. Right? So you're getting the additional benefits and putting yourself in a deficit throughout the day. Let's say you start skipping breakfast and now you're doing more of an intermittent window. So like an 18 hour fasting window or a 16 hour fasting window, an eight hour eating window. And that's where that second part of the conversation comes in is, OK, well, what do I break my fast with or what do I eat? And we have. This is I am. I am speaking from a place of dunnit. Been there, done it. Mm hmm. We used to prep for six to eight hours on Sundays, weighing out the Baggies and doing the meal prep and putting the bags in the freezer.

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:07:05] And we'll get to the the question that we got was what's in your freezer? I'll tell you exactly what's in my freezer. There's not a lot of stuff in there, right? It's definitely not frozen leftovers. So when we're looking at the meal planning, I mean, we used to buy special containers and label them and like my wife's portion and my portion, and just hours and hours and hours and hours. And it never garnered the result that I was looking for, you know, and it takes repetition and it takes really a skill set of knowing how to track and what do I weigh my chicken raw or do I weigh it cooked? Well, the protein and calorie content changes after you cook a steak. Yeah. Do I want to calculate that? Forty three calorie difference? Not, not. Not really. So. So we understand personally, I understand where you're coming from or it's like this meal planning or meal prepping type kind of situation. So when we talk about a lot is picking your schedule at the beginning of the week, what are your goals, you know, making sure you have a goal in mind and looking at your schedule.

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:08:10] Ok, where are your non-negotiables? Where's your lunch business meeting? Where is your meeting with a family or a friend? Where is a date night? Where is I'm going to go treat myself because I've because I deserve it, right? I'm going to go do something and enjoy something that I love to do, right? Maybe you're going to go to your favorite restaurant once or whatever it is, putting those things in and then filling in the gaps around that, not having to be, I won't say, indoctrinated but ingrained in paleo or Whole30 or, yeah, like let me look at this label and pick, make sure that there's not this one thing in it, right, where you just become hypersensitive and you're overcompensating. The situation fasting brings simplicity because you still get to eat and enjoy the things you love, but you're just putting some boundaries around when you're eating them or when you're consuming them, which allows insulin to drop and cravings to decrease and your simplicity and then your confidence around food and your confidence that you're getting wins and successes and seeing the scale move and your energy increase that all comes into play. So. So back to meal planning, what is it functionally look like for a lot of the people in fasting for life?

Tommy Welling: [00:09:25] Hmm. So when when I'm looking at my own personal choices like you just alluded to, I love simplicity. I love having a relatively short short walk from the question to the answer, so I don't

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:09:43] Know what I just did. Well, at that rambling, windy path of of only. Let's see. Let's see what the response is to this episode, right? So yes, I appreciate you just sneaking that little dig in there. Thank you, sir. It really wasn't a dig.

Tommy Welling: [00:09:56] I'm more thinking about how we go about my wife and I go about putting things into our own fridge and our own pantry and how we make decisions for what is our eating lifestyle, how did we get here? Because that was that was built into this question, too. What approach do you take to make sure you're getting the right food and then what's in your freezer like these are these are good questions. And you know, I think for me, it kind of starts with Did did my food have to travel very far from a natural environment to get to my plate? You know, was there much engineering involved? Was there a team of of scientists or food optimizers involved with it? If so, I'm probably making a different choice. At least most of the time. I'm probably going to take a left turn from that choice right there. So I like things to get to my plate that didn't have to take a long, winding road, you know, like this explanation. So.

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:10:53] So that was my explanation. You're doing a good job up until right there. That's yeah, that's that's

Tommy Welling: [00:10:58] Like, that's my my number one rule. And then after that, I like I like some variety. So when I'm picking fruits and vegetables, I go for a variety like a technicolor dreamcoat, know from Seinfeld or like, like a rainbow. I like different colors in my in my fridge and and not a whole lot of stuff in my freezer, because if it's frozen, unless it's meat, I'm probably not going to do much with it.

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:11:22] Right, so, yeah, to answer the question directly of what's in your freezer, right, because we had that question come through, it's for us, it's frozen. Frozen fruit so we can make smoothies and stuff for the kids. Mm hmm. And my wife likes making smoothies, and sometimes we'll do banana right and just put the frozen bananas and the frozen fruit in this very loud, hard to clean machine. Yeah, and you push it down and outcomes like gelato. And it's just it's natural and it's awesome. Kids love it, right? So it's actually really good, but it is the hardest machine to clean. But so we got frozen, but we've got, you know, some some ice packs. We've got a bunch of grass fed beef, organic chicken breast, chicken thighs, chicken drumsticks, the Applegate Farms, breakfast sausages. The kids love to eat those cold on the go. Simple something you can just throw in a cup and run out the door. But outside of that, there's really not much in terms of having to make big recipes or make a meal plan for the week or meal prepping for the week. And then you're eating the same thing over and over and over again. So a really good, actionable thing you can do as we've kind of meandered through this conversation is make a list. We're creatures of habit like my mom and dad. The grandparents are in town, they're here visiting, and I know that if I have a certain tea and a certain oatmeal in the house, like just basic oatmeal, plain oats that my mom is set, I don't even have to and I don't have to check on it a little organic whole milk for her tea.

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:12:54] Yeah, she's good for the week. That's right. So we are creatures of habit. I used to eat the same thing, like when I go to a restaurant. I get the same thing. We are creatures of habit. So if you're struggling with meal planning or struggling with, you know, eating the same thing or having to eat the leftovers from a certain meal, right then I would sit down and make a list, especially if you're fasting and you're using different fasting windows, you're you're having breakfast once a week. Maybe you're doing lunch here, you know, of a, you know, a lunch date or a meeting or something. Then you have a family gathering or, like I said, going out to a special restaurant once a week put breakfast, lunch or dinner. Make a list of the top five things or five recipes that you like to eat. Yeah. Look at your schedule. When are you fasting, when are your meals? Put those meals into the schedule and if you're worried about making too much, then simply cut the recipe in half.

Tommy Welling: [00:13:54] Yeah, I think there's something to be said about the repetition that goes into a short list like that, like having your five go tos, like we probably have 10 at this point, my wife and I that we pretty much cycle through every couple of weeks. Maybe, maybe there's like 12 and but we're really good at prepping and efficient at prepping those and making some tweaks to them, but they taste really good. It didn't start off that way, but if you're kind of just jumping from recipe to recipe, it's not necessarily super enjoyable because there's always a learning curve to like every single recipe that you do. You might not have the right equipment for it. You know, should I buy an Instant Pot? Should I get an air fryer? Should I invest in this?

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:14:33] We need a dried mustard the other day for some recipe that I wanted to make, and I'm like, What is dried mustard? So I love that point that you just made that sometimes we're overcomplicating it right there used to be this company out there where they would send you the kit, all the spices, all the stuff, and you'd buy the meats and the veggies and then you'd put them in these bags and the company is no longer. Was it's a shame because we really enjoyed the simplicity of taking the thinking out of it, right? Sometimes. But yeah, to your point. Um, you know, you make a recipe and then you're stuck with it. So making sure and I love this side of it to like put the and what the heck is dried mustard? I still don't know. Putting in the the intentionality behind it also can can help with that conversation of like when I break the fast, how do I not overconsume? How do I not try to fit everything in my window? Well, if you're really looking forward to something, you're much more likely going to stick with it. I was not looking forward to four hard boiled eggs and overnight oats every morning back in my powerlifting days, right? I was not looking forward to eating. Eating was a chore. Mm hmm. Right. So there's also that component of looking forward to things that you enjoy. And that's why I really like what we're unpacking here was making the list and and and knowing that you have something that you're going to be able to stick to.

Tommy Welling: [00:15:56] Yeah, I I think that it's easy to overcomplicate it, and so just focusing on on just those few things and and then you can take a look and look at the variability within within them. You know, you can also take a look at your your blood work or anything else that any other data that you might have and go, Well, I mean, are there vitamins that I should be focusing on or something else like that like you can, you don't have to necessarily just worry about everything that you're you're eating? Or am I getting the exact right proportion of of foods and vegetables and minerals? I mean, there's there's there are actual questions that you could ask yourself and consult with a professional to get the right answer to those questions. And then you can always tweak your diet from there. But I feel like if you if you go into every fast not being sure how you're going to break it and not feeling confident about your food choices, then it's really hard to to feel confident about your fasting choices, too. It feels like every decision that I'm making would be kind of just like I'm kind of just dipping my toes in. I'm not fully committed to it because I don't have a level of confidence about how I'm going to break this fast. So then how could I really have confidence about going into this fast two? And that seems like a recipe for disaster, for sure.

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:17:13] Yeah, pun intended, right? So absolutely like you're not going to have you only have half of the equation at that point. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I don't think we ever talked about it in this way, but. Needing to always figure out what you're going to do next is a daunt, it's decision fatigue. Yeah, right. So some of these, you know, if you look at some of, you know, there's stories out there about, I don't remember who it was, but they wear the same outfit every single day. Yep, they eat the same breakfast every single day. They buy the same car every time they get a new car because there's this decision fatigue that can happen. And you know, I experienced it sometimes or I just look at my wife or my wife looks at me and she's like, I don't I can't make another decision today. Right? You know, I just had 40 consults like, I don't. I just made decisions for 40 people, and now I need to decide what pajamas the kids are going to wear. So I know it's a little random, but when we're looking at it from a long term sustainability standpoint, the figuring out what to eat is start with the recipes. And then if you're like part of the question was what approach do you take to make sure you're getting the right food? We really just want to look at balance.

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:18:21] You know, you want to have some non refined, non processed natural carbohydrates. If you're in a low carb, then make sure that you're getting protein and fiber on your plate. Make sure that you're eating like you said, tell me things that don't have a long process to get to my plate. Things that are grown right? Eat the rainbow. There's all these different, you know, cliches or adages out there about what your plate should look like. Most importantly, you need to be excited about it, right? You need to look forward to it and want to eat it right. I'm not saying put pizza and ice cream in every one of your meal plans, but then find some recipes that really resonate with you and, you know, get them into the rotation. Like you said, Tommy, we've got probably 15 or 20 that we rotate through, you know, just got cold here in Texas, went below 50. And so we're going to be putting the homemade French onion soup on the menu we're going to be putting. I know this is a fasting podcast and we're talking about food, but you can't fast without the feeding portion. Ok, so for all of you people out there going, I'm on a 48 hour fast. Why are you talking about food? We're sorry. Just deal with us. Bear with us. I think the overall message here is pretty important.

Tommy Welling: [00:19:29] Yeah, I think having a plan for when you come off, you know, breaking that, that next fast is going to be important. And sometimes it's a matter of like what you have available in your kitchen. You know, you might need to level up some of your tools, like get a new recipe, book, get a, you know, like I said, get an Instant Pot or something like that. I'm going to include a link on this episode to one of our favorite recipe books that my wife and I use. So oh, great. Yeah, I think if you're if you're not sure where to begin, I think start with your fasting plan. And if you're if you're already at that level, then think about the next time you're going to break your fast and have a better plan this time for how you're going to do that. So if you are just getting started, please go to the website, be fasting for life. Download the fast start guide so that you can make make it even easier to get started today.

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:20:18] Remove those decisions and move that decision. Fatigue. Love it. Absolutely love it. All right, Tommy. Wrap up today's episodes. Thank you all for listening! Please drop us a review. We prefer the five star kind that tells Apple Podcasts, Spotify and all the places that you listen to the podcast. There's so many now that tells them that we're doing something good and that we can reach more people. Get the message out about how powerful the fasting lifestyle is in losing the weight, keeping it off, reversing diabetes and literally just improving your quality of life. It's what gave you an I our lives back, Tommy. So this is why we talk about it every single week. We appreciate you all listening. Drop us a review, Tommy. As always, thank you for the conversation. Sure. And we'll talk to you.

Tommy Welling: [00:21:01] Thank you. Bye. So you've heard today's episode, and you may be wondering, where do I start? Head on over to fasting for Lipscomb and sign up for our newsletter, where you'll receive fasting tips and strategies to maximize results and fit fasting into your day to day life.

Dr. Scott Watier: [00:21:17] Why are you there? Download your free fast start guide to get started today. Don't forget to subscribe on iTunes, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Make sure to leave us a five star review, and we'll be back next week with another episode of Fasting for Life.