Ep 177 – WFPB vs IIFYM

Ben:

Hello, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of Vegan Proteins, Muscles by Brussels Radio.

Ben:, Dani:

I’m Ben and I’m Dani this is episode 177.

Dani:

so just recorded with Giacomo. How was that?

Ben:, Dani:

That’s always a treat good as it happens.

Ben:

When I make the trip here, we have to make the most of it. So that means multiple podcasts, which I really don’t mind when I was coming here. I was thinking about that and I’m like, yeah, I’m technically coming here to do work, but I really enjoy having conversations with people, especially when it’s about a topic that I’m interested in and that I like, I don’t enjoy conversations when it’s small

talk about shit that I couldn’t honestly care less about. But I do enjoy it when it’s something that feels aligned I suppose and feels something that I genuinely care about.

Dani:

Yeah. You know, I was talking to Athena with the last podcast we recorded, which I think is coming out actually tomorrow. And she was like, oh, how’s everything going with like Ben? And she was like, you guys all kind of have the same personality and I thought that was really funny that, you know, she was, like, she said, like, me, definitely me, you and Alice, like, all have very similar personalities.

I don’t, I don’t never met anybody that has Jacko’s personality before, but I was like, what do you mean by that? And she was like, well, you’re all like, kind of serious about talking about this stuff.

Ben:, Dani:

And I was like, well, I mean, pretty good qualities to have in a coach.

Dani:

But yeah, she’s, she’s funny. I love having her around because her energy is so different.

Ben:

Actually, I need that honestly, I need people in my life to pull me out of like what my thing, whatever that is when I’m very like, this is how it is like hyper, I don’t know if it’s hyper fixated, hyper focused. but I need people who are a little bit more spontaneous, a little bit more, a little bit less silent, I should say.

Ben:, Dani:

So I get very whatever I’m into, I’m very into it and I feel like I’m the same way.

Dani:

I know Alice is the same way and Jack, I was actually the same way in that regard too, but Athena, she’s Athena’s Athena, she’s very much her own person.

Ben:, Dani:

And yeah, I think it’s really awesome and she keeps things in perspective, you know.

Ben:

Oh yeah, grounded totally.

Dani:

And I also, I was thinking about this as well, like even though like our, our vegan proteins coaching team, like we’re all different ages as well. But I feel like I don’t, I don’t feel that way, I guess, even though, you know, if I mentioned a TV show to Athena, she has no idea what I’m talking about. And that makes me feel ancient. But I feel like I always hear about these rifts between generations and like, I don’t know, people just not getting along or not getting each other.

And I don’t know, I don’t really feel that way very much. And I was thinking about some of our clients that we like, hang out with that are older than Jacque and, and myself, I don’t feel that way with them either. There’s something about this particular topic of, of fitness and changing your lifestyle and living a compassionate lifestyle that I think seems to like kind of bridge the gap of a lot of, generational stuff that other people deal with.

Ben:

That reminds me of something that Giacomo just said. He was mentioning how you guys went to a concert over the weekend and how he was there dancing with like, no, there’s some like 14 year old girl dancing next to him and there you were all in a good time. And I’m like music is another one of those things where it’s kind of timeless.

You can appreciate music that came way before your time, whatever that means. and you can also appreciate newer music. Music is music. People have different tastes, it doesn’t really matter what your age is. Some people are gonna like older music, newer music, different genres.

Dani:

Yeah. I was super surprised actually to see this, like, very younger. I, I guess she was like 14 and she, like, I’ll give her props, she knew the music. I was very impressed because I became so it was the goo dolls. I’m sure Jack will mention that. But I’ve been obsessed with them, like, since I was like 10 years old. But my mom also loved them and now that I am, you know, in my mid thirties now seeing like an entire another generation getting to find them too.

It’s, it’s always kind of surreal to realize that like they, now they’re playing to like kind of three and a halfish generations. It’s like shit. We’re all getting so much older. It’s so weird. But you, you’ll get there, you’ll, you’ll reach a point where you’re like, wait, what, when did this happen? Like, how did this happen? No, not me.

Ben:, Dani:

I’m, I’m not getting old, but I already feel old.

Ben:

So I’m, I’m waiting for that day. People are like, ok, then you go to bed at like 839 o’clock and your hobbies include reading and talking about the weather. So you’re already an old man. I’m like, yeah, pretty much.

Dani:

Yeah, I felt that way too actually at your age, like an old soul. But now I don’t actually, now I feel like I reached that old soul and just stayed that way. Like didn’t actually progress past that. So, yeah, I don’t, now, I’m seeing my peers and they, now I’m like, oh dude, like, what happened to you? You used to be like, so, so tough, so vibrant and now, like, you come home from work and just sit on the couch and don’t do anything.

Ben:

I already saw that on my five year reunion a year or two la last year, not three years, I guess, till the 10 year one. But yeah, I already saw that some people change in ways that you don’t expect and I have no quarrel or no issues with the fact that I’m up at the sunrise doing my thing in the morning and other people are lying in bed, hung over from the previous night, like feeling like trash.

Like, I’m glad, hey, if you’re having a good time, I got nothing wrong with that. People can do whatever they want to do, but I don’t have a problem with people teasing me and saying that, an old old man because I, I, what I do makes me feel good and that’s what’s important to me when I was your age.

Dani:

People did make fun of me for very similar things. I’ve never been an early bird, but like, you know, I was eating a very specific way and working out and I wasn’t interested in drinking and people would kind of give me shit for it at the time. But now that I’m 38 those same people are like, man, I should have listened to you because like, look, you’re still up and doing all of these

things and like my body hurts if I sneeze wrong. So it’s a good choice. I think more people wish they could go back and start kind of living that lifestyle much, much younger.

Ben:

And I felt like I had my year or two of doing the college thing and I, I got that out of my system very quickly. And then also it was kind of strange timing with COVID, like, my junior year. So it was kind of a natural transition where people weren’t really doing social events like that anyway.

Like the partying thing. Yeah, a little bit here and there, small, little like circles but not really. one of my goals is to live in three different centuries because I was born in 98. So I want to live in 98 you know, the two thousands and then, like, the 21 hundreds.

Dani:

Not out of the realm of possibility.

Ben:

No, especially with, like, the investments in anti aging technologies and stuff. So that’s kind of like a fun, not serious goal that I have that I like, I like to think about sometimes with all of this.

Dani:

Yeah, that’s really cool, actually. so, so, ok, here, here’s what we’re talking about today. It’s a topic that I feel like I’ve talked my head off about and j and I have talked about a lot, but I would love to hear a different perspective because I feel like this kind of can’t be talked about enough in the vegan community.

This idea that basically the idea that if you are not eating 100% whole food plant based diet, that you are doing yourself some kind of a disservice that’s probably the best way to put it.

Ben:

It kind of relates back to literally what I was just saying about the longevity thing. Like I think people think it’s this hack for like living the longest amount that you possibly can and you have to maximize and optimize every single little thing that you put into your body. And it’s a good thing we’re having this conversation because I could go off on a bunch of different tangents in different directions.

I’m like Neo with the Matrix. I’m seeing all the different ways that I could kind of go with this conversation. But I think where I’ll start is the fact that I made a video recently on the youtube channel where I was talking about the different snack options that I like when I am dieting and that was something that I brought up was, yeah, a lot of my diet is whole food based, but it’s not to the point where I am scared to or don’t include any other things because I think that can be equally de

detrimental oftentimes, even if we were to grant, like, let’s say, in a hypothetic. First of all, we can’t ever possibly know that this would be the case so that you, if you ate 100% whole food plant based, you would be healthier than somebody who ate 80% whole food plant based and 20% of the other stuff just to kind of throw some numbers out there.

I think I’m not super familiar with this research. So I’m not gonna quote like specific studies or references. This is kind of just my general understanding is that once your fruit and vegetable intake, which is kind of the general metric, I think in general for like diet quality gets above a certain number of servings per day. It’s very asymptotic in terms of the longevity benefits of that over.

I think it’s like 10 or something like that. Like it kind of like starts to curve off. It’s, it’s a similar idea, I believe in terms of training volume, like the number of sets that you do, you get a benefit up to a point and then it’s very diminishing returns after that. So theoretically, you could argue that maybe it’s adding a couple percentage points, but then what you’re not looking at is the areas of your life that might suffer as a result of you getting really specific.

So if you go back to the training volume. Example, if you’re spending now 34 hours in the gym instead of an hour, an hour and a half, that’s clearly taking away from other aspects of your life. And with food, it could be psychological stress that, that impacts, it could be social flexibility and the social connections that you’re able to make.

If you say, oh, I can’t go out to eat here, I can’t try this, I can’t try that. Even if it’s vegan, you’re like, oh, it’s not a whole food plant based. It has oil or it has this ingredient or that ingredient. I think you’re kind of siloing yourself in a way that doesn’t need to be done. And I don’t think that people understand that it’s like, it’s not the more whole food plant based.

You are the healthier you are. It’s like up to a point. Yes, there is a, is a benefit. But then if it’s like, what if you are then limiting the, let’s say you, we’re talking about longevity here. Something that doesn’t get talked about enough, in my opinion is the fact that what is going to help you live long, but also live well is being able to survive adverse events when you’re older.

Like falls, falls are a huge thing. And if you don’t have muscle mass, you’re more likely to break a hip or to break a bone and then you’re not able to perform your active activities of daily living anymore. Your life quality starts to suffer just becomes this cascading event. You go to the hospital, you never out of the hospital, you get some kind of sickness there.

Dani:

That’s it. I mean, that’s it. Like that’s the most common thing that happens. I think the most, I might, I might be misquoting this. But I remember reading something like the most common way that people die in the hospital is actually falling and breaking their hip, like breaking their hip is one of the main causes of death.

Ben:, Dani:

Not because the hip broke, but because of exactly what you said, they go into the hospital, they get sick, they never come out like, oh it’s so scary and it’s like, yeah, resistance training is we always say like, OK, if you can eat all the protein in the world and if you don’t resist the training, it’s not gonna matter.

Ben:

But assuming you’re doing some sort of resistance training, which everybody should, regardless of what your age is, you need to make sure that you’re getting an adequate amount of protein. And there’s actually research that says that you are not as sensitive, I guess to m changes in muscle proteins. And this is as you get older and you need more protein, you need more.

Some I’m a little bit murky in this like certain specific amino acids. Maybe you need more of or again, like the leucine threshold, which sometimes is talked about, I think you need more actually to reach that. And so there’s reasons that you might actually even need more protein as you get older.

Dani:

And a lot of people think it’s the opposite, they think it’s like, you know, guys, like 25 year old guys in the gym, they need the most protein, but actually you could probably get away with less because your body is just like ready to build muscle. Whereas when you’re older, you’re not as efficient at doing things like that. So you do need more.

Ben:

And if you are exclusively focusing on eating whole food plant based, another issue that you have as you get older is your appetite is just not there. And we already know it’s hard enough to eat enough calories, which can be a benefit of like the, you know, whole food plant based eating is that, yeah, you’re eating all this fiber and all you get all these micronutrients and phytonutrients.

And so it’s very filling, but you might not be able to get enough protein in because you might not be able to get enough calories and you might be too full from all of that. And so by not including anything that is quote unquote, more processed, which you can get, you know, get into or talk about, you might be limiting the amount of protein that you’re actually able to get in.

Because protein by itself is satiated, you gotta kind of pick and choose your bottles here it’s like, ok, have enough fruits and vegetables to where you’re meeting those kind of minimums or maybe even going a little bit above. That’s, that, that should be fine, but make sure that you’re not doing overdo it to the point where you’re eating so much fiber, so many fruits and vegetables that you’re not able to get that protein in and

then you’re not able to reach your goals and not able to, not even just the aging thing like this could apply to somebody who’s younger as well and just trying to put on muscle.

Dani:

And it’s, you know, I think that in the vegan community for sure, whole food plant based is kind of used as like it’s talk about like a panacea that will fix everything for everybody. And it’s not true at all. Like there, there are definitely pros and cons like you just said, if somebody is very overweight, they have a lot of weight to lose whole food plant based could be very helpful for them for all the reasons you just mentioned.

So filling high fiber, hard to get in a lot of calories. But if it’s somebody in a different situation that could be a big downfall. If somebody’s already like healthy, they don’t have weight to lose at all. And they go straight into adopting a whole food plant based diet. Usually without a lot of knowledge of the best ways to do it first, they’re gonna end up most of the time undereating calories by so much that by like month two, they’re just like, I feel like trash.

I have no energy veganism sucks. I hate this. And then they just stop being vegan entirely when it’s like, that probably wasn’t the best route for them in the first place.

Ben:

Liver virus thing that you see why you get people in different communities. You see this obviously with like people in the ketogenic diet community or carnivore as well where you hear the loudest voices or the ones with the people who have been successful with that approach. And so you don’t necessarily hear or see the, well, actually you don’t hear much about Ex Keto or ex carnivore people.

You do a little but you hear a lot for some reason everyone loves to bring up the ex vegan thing. I think just because people like to crap on vegans. definitely more so than people like to crap on ex or ex convo people. You do have those people like Lane Norton is one of those people who will crap. He’ll crap on everyone.

Dani:

So for all the things you can say about him, that’s pretty, he’s an equal opportunity crapper.

Ben:

He is. I totally lost my train of thought where I was going with that. But vegans, vegans. Yeah. Right. So like you said, the people who are the loudest voices in the whole food plant based community, obviously, they’ve seen good results with themselves, maybe with clients or patients, depending on who they are if they’re, a doctor. And I think that’s totally fine from, a medical perspective to have the view that people should be incorporating more of these foods.

But when you start to make it so extreme that it’s like, it can only be these things and these other things are bad, like, oh, you shouldn’t have protein powder because it’s, I don’t even know what the rationale is. Honestly. It’s like, it’s, it’s more, I I’ve heard it before but it’s like it’s more isolated. So you’re not getting all the other nut. It’s, I think the you typically, oh you’re stripping away other parts of like the nutrients.

It’s like does everything you eat need to be maximized for like nutrition. There are a lot more reasons to consume something than purely like, oh, it’s nutritional value is the best because I think that is kind of how you start down. I hate to say it like, start down the path to like orthorexia.

Dani:

That’s our next podcast that’s in two podcasts. We’re going to talk about orthorexia specifically because it’s rampant. I think it’s really rampant in the vegan community. But yeah, that’s, that’s exactly it when every single morsel that you put in your mouth is something you’re obsessing about. Like, is this the best choice I could possibly make right now?

Like I’ve been there, remember being in that place and it was so stressful, like every situation was so stressful. And the kicker was, I feel like when people are sort of developing anorexia or bulimia, like something in their mind is like, oh, this is bad, I’m going somewhere bad right now, but they just kind of can’t stop when you are developing orthorexia.

You think you’re doing the good, the best thing for yourself? Like, you actually believe that. Well, how could this be wrong? Like I’m just trying to be as healthy as humanly possible. That’s a good thing. But like you miss the forest for the trees a lot, I think. And to your point about doctors, we look up to a lot of doctors in the vegan community and a lot of them are very, very good at treating the types of patients that they see.

Doctor Esselstyn is a great example. He is one of the best cardiac doctors in the country. He treats cardiac patients. So when he talks about like we should not be eating any fat whatsoever. He’s talking to people that are at risk of a sudden death, heart attack. Like the risk of missing out on Omega three is, is much, much smaller than sudden death, heart attack. Like, but we think about it like he’s talking to everybody and if you’re not sick, you don’t need to be eating like a sick

person. But people would say like, yeah, but I don’t want to get sick. And I would say there’s actually not a lot of research to suggest that a predominantly whole food plant based diet with some processed foods in it is going with, especially with a healthy lifestyle and exercise is going to make you sick.

Ben:

I don’t know if there’s any research on that.

Dani:

I don’t think there’s any research on it. There’s lots of research on ways to get sick and most of these people that we hear that are getting sick. Their story is, you know, I did, I did everything wrong for 30 years, 4050 years, standard American diet. They weren’t living the kind of life that we’re talking about right now.

I don’t know. It’s, it’s, it’s a tricky thing because I understand why people want to be healthier, but they, in, in many cases might be doing themselves a disservice. For example, all that fiber that can really upset people’s stomachs.

Ben:

That’s a good one. I wasn’t even thinking about that when we started this conversation off.

Dani:

But that fiber is like, in my opinion, it’s about as close to a miracle, nutrient as I’ve ever seen. But so, you know, we say like, I’ll walk it up slowly so that you can adjust to it. Some people don’t adjust to it above a certain point ever, but they just keep trying and they’re in constant like gassy bloated discomfort. And I see this a lot in women especially they, you know, they might be in really, really great shape, but they always have like, kind of a distended belly area and of

course, they think it’s fat, they think something’s wrong with them. Like it’s straight, it’s just straight bloke that they can’t seem to get rid of. And sometimes Alice actually just did this recently with a client. She took a lot of coaxing to convince this client to like, switch from oatmeal to like cereal, like a

processed cereal. And when she did that, she almost immediately saw an improvement in her gut

from just that one change. So it’s not always as straightforward as people think.

Ben:

And it’s so hard if you get somebody who’s coming to you and they’re like, I only want to get my protein from like beans and lentils and you’re like, oh God, this is not gonna go well, especially if they’re trying like they, it’s one thing if you’ve been doing that kind of thing for a little while and you know, you can tolerate it. But if you’re trying to make all these changes at once, kind of like the podcast that Jo and Moja and I just recorded and you’re trying to go from whatever diet

you’re currently following to completely whole Foods plant based like that. And you’re also trying to up your protein intake at the same time. Like both of those things could actually lead to, like you were saying, some kind of G I discomfort increasing your protein intake especially if you’ve been undereating with that and the fiber, it’s not a good, not a good situation, I think, when I vegan I was first actually interested for a lot of, like, I saw some of these whole food plant

based, like, documentaries, like what the health and so I started looking more into it. Now. I didn’t actually make that transition until I connected more with kind of the ethical reasoning and argument behind it, but I definitely struggled with the, the gas blowing thing for a good, I think it was probably the first year and a half of being vegan and then I kind of adjusted and part of that was realizing, ok, if you just go so ham on the, that’s not a very vegan friendly or whatever,

not intended. If you go overboard on, you can’t go overboard on protein and on fiber. And I was trying to eat all these like diet friendly foods as well, like the sugar free, this, the diet that your stomach is gonna be a mess. And yeah, you might be a little bit hungrier at times if you’re not, you know, going overboard on all these things.

But I’ve kind of come to the realization that I would rather be a little bit hungrier at times than just constantly feeling trash with my stomach. I also feel like feeling like that during your workouts is no fun when you’re trying to fall asleep. There’s just a lot more kind of extending effects that, that will have.

Ben:, Dani:

And yeah, I, I just, I, yeah, it’s super common too.

Dani:

And you said you dealt with it for a year and a half. Most people aren’t gonna tolerate that for a year and a half.

Ben:

I, yeah, I don’t even, I just remember there was a time where I realized like, oh, you know, my stomach has actually been ok recently. I looked at what I was doing. I’m like, OK, I think you’re just being a little bit more reasonable with like, if I, if I’m gonna have some of this stuff, let me just have a little bit of it. Like not everything I eat has to be like maxi, I was also doing the whole like volume eating thing where you have to feel like you have a food baby every single time that you

eat and you become reliant on that. I know this is kind of divulge, you know, diverging away from the, the whole food plant based thing. But it, it, it kind of relates in that. If you insist upon eating a very particular way all the time, there could be drawbacks and you might, yeah, you might not adapt to it. Like I there’s still some foods that I’ve realized that I just can’t have in large quantities or I can have them. But if I have them, I’m gonna have to accept that I’m gonna deal with

some gas and some blood. And the hardest thing for me as a coach is when I get somebody who comes to me and they’re insistent upon like, oh, I need to, I have these requirements. I want to be 100% whole food plant based. I’m not wavering and I want to get to this fitness goal and whatever other thing. And it’s like, ok, if you want to lose this amount of weight and this amount of time that’s going to require you to eat this many calories with this grams of protein.

Ben:, Dani:

And I’m telling you right now, that’s just not going to happen, being whole food plant based.

Dani:

And, you know, it, it almost becomes, I feel like this sort of bartering situation, like, ok, I’ll give you this for these meals, but are you willing to at least have maybe a hemp based protein powder in this shake? Like it’s, you know, people, I don’t actually know what people on the other side of this thing, but it’s like as a coach, I know I’m just trying to help them achieve the thing they want to achieve on their own terms because it’s like, it’s not up to me to determine what terms it

is, they’re going to try to reach this goal on. But there are some things that are just either not gonna be possible or certainly not gonna be possible on the timeline people want it to be possible on like there’s gonna have to be certain concessions in some places, depending on what it is, people are trying to achieve. And yeah, I never, I never enjoy that feeling of having to come back and be like, ok, I’m gonna do my best here, but we might have to like, or like, I can start you here.

But if we’re gonna keep going, like, of course, we’re gonna hit various little plateaus and stuff, we’re gonna have to change it. We might have to tweak certain things. And then that even brings up the idea of what is whole food plant based because everybody seems to have a different idea of what that even is. So when somebody says that, like you have to clarify like, OK, what does that mean for you? And you’re just like hoping and praying that it doesn’t mean no tofu or tipping.

Ben:

Like if somebody tells me they don’t eat mock meats, I’m like, OK, are you familiar with what Satan is? Like, it’s, it’s wheat gluten but it’s not a lot of it goes into a lot of acne but you can make it yourself or it can just be, you know, gluten flour and you can add whatever else you want to. You can add nothing to it if you want to eat it plain, I don’t care.

It’s up, it’s up to you. like, do you consider that to be processed? And like you said, it is this kind of the bargaining where you’re like, ok, we can try things your way, but it’s, it’s informed consent, right? It’s like, ok, we can try things your way. But if they don’t happen the way that you want, you know, kind of, I told you so sort of thing, it’s like, then we’re gonna have to come back to the drawing board and say what’s more important you sticking to this notion that you have that

this is the best way to do things or actually getting to the results that you want. And it’s like God, if like the whole food plant based thing is stopping you from achieving whatever goal you have, that is arguably worse for your health. Because if you’re not able to lose the weight or to put on the muscle that you need to, to improve your life quality or even just like objectively, your blood metrics like your lipids and your metabolic panel like that is going to look better.

Like weight loss is probably the number one thing I would say that probably improves your blood work. And if you’re not able to adhere to whatever you’re doing, because you’re so gung ho on doing the whole food plant based thing that you’re not able to lose the weight that you want to lose.

Obviously, we’ve been talking about it is generally a pretty good dietary pattern to fall for weight loss. But for some reason, you know, whether it be adherence or something else. You’re not getting to your goals because of it.

Ben:, Dani:

It’s actually now a detriment and there’s a lot of, you know, why do people even fall into this trap?

Dani:

Why do people even think this? Because there are so many people out there selling this as the answer. And I’m not talking about doctors that are selling it to their sick patients because I actually understand that. I totally get that. I am talking about other folks out there that are saying you can eat whatever you want as much as you want, as long as it is whole food plant based, usually fat free, like the S OS free crowd might be the hardest crowd for me to deal with on earth, believe it

or not. But there’s sugar, salt, oil, sugar. Yeah, and that’s how they’ll refer to themselves just like, oh, I’m so ss free and it’s just like just even hearing that always makes me feel like it sounds so like culty to me but whatever. But yeah, they’re being told they can eat unlimited amounts of buckwheat and sweet potatoes and, and lose weight and just not, not even just lose weight like it’s gonna fall off you while you’re asleep.

And let me tell you how disappointed those people are like six months in. And they’re also like you just said, with the volume eating, they are so accustomed to that incredibly full feeling in your stomach,

which if you’ve ever done the volume eating thing, which I definitely use some of that when I’m in prep.

Absolutely. I mean, there have been times I have eaten to feel that way on purpose because I need to not feel as empty as I feel right now. So it’s like physically, your belly feels full but like, energetically you don’t feel full.

Ben:

It’s almost never worth it. Like, even if it helps for 10 or 15 minutes, you’re still, then you’re just hungry and bloated and you just, it’s just the worst of both worlds. And so at a certain point, you kind of just accept the way that it is. But even if you’re not like a bodybuilder in prep, I think there’s downsides to that because you can’t just enjoy like a normal portion size meal.

Like, let’s say you go out to a really nice, let’s just hypothetically you’re doing like a vegan tasting menu at a restaurant and a smaller place. But really great quality food and you know, normal, whatever that means for human portion size. Now, I would say that the portion size that I tend to eat are a little bit larger than the typical person. So you take with that what you will. But if you can’t enjoy that meal, because all you’re thinking about is man, I could be eating the same

number of calories for this much food. That’s the way that I used to think it like, oh, I’m looking at this piece of bread or I’m looking at this, like, pastry and what I do. I wanna eat that. Yeah, I do. But, oh, I could have kind of a bowl of popcorn. Yeah, exactly. That’s this size. So I’m just, I’m gonna go for that because whatever is the more volumist option will allow me to eat more. And that’s always the better option.

Dani:

But, and it’s like a good teaching tool for a lot of people that have no idea of calorie density to be like, you could have this two tablespoons of peanut butter or you could have four rice cakes or something. Like, just people don’t know, or especially when it comes to like fruits and vegetables. It’s like everybody thinks they’re all exactly the same when it’s like you could have this one banana or you could have like, I don’t know, four cups of strawberries or something.

They’re not all the same. And I think for a lot of people it’s a good teaching tool. But you can, yeah, take that too far where you’re always living at the other end. And what I was trying to get at was like, people are so accustomed to their belly, always feeling full that anytime they don’t feel that way, they feel like they haven’t eaten. So they just like they just, they just keep slamming so much, you know, fruit.

For example, like I have seen people eat, I’m, I’m talking about mountainous plates of fruit, multiples of them in one sitting. And I’m just like, that is so disordered. Like, that’s the only way I can put it is, it’s like, it’s heartbreaking because it’s so disordered. but it’s whole food plant based. So they’re like, really happy with their choices and, you know, they may very well look at my plate that has a piece of pizza and a salad on it and be like, tisk tisk, you know, but to me

it’s, it’s, that seems better to me. I mean, I guess it’s all a little bit subjective, but I’ve just seen that mentality and I think that’s what it comes down to is the mentality more than anything else because it is a very healthy way to eat in a lot of ways. And I have seen people who are whole food plant based, achieve their goals, but they are incredibly meticulous about what they do and how they track and the foods that they are incorporating, you know, they’re

deliberately including the higher protein vegetables or lots of nutritional yeast and they are willing to eat tofu, Tempe vital wheat gluten. but a lot of people aren’t.

Ben:

I think you also to extent in extent, have to get kind of lucky with how resilient your G I system is like you need to be able to tolerate a lot of these foods and not get those, you know, not get that distress like you might just have to accept that you’re somebody who can’t do 100% whole food plant based. Even if it didn’t have any of these other kind of negative side effects that we were talking about from like a psychological perspective or a social perspective.

Like, even if you’re flexible in kind of the way that you think about it, it’s kind of like the flexible versus rigid cognitive restraint thing. That I know that you’ve talked about before where it’s like, yeah, you can look at tracking macros two ways. It can be this thing that is facilitative or harmful, depending on how you look at it. Same thing with Whole Foods Plant based if you look at it as, hey, this is something that generally I try to follow and stick to, but I’ll go out and

have a vegan pizza or I’ll, you know, incorporate, like you said, some tofu or some Tempe or some Satan or whatever it is, then I think it can be totally fine. But for some people, it’s just not gonna, it’s not gonna work for you and it’s, it might be hard to kind of accept that, but it just is what it is really. And I would say most people it’s, it’s going to be the case that you’re probably not gonna be able to, to do that.

Dani:

I think it also what I’ve seen a few times. I was just in a, like weird thought about how even just like the simple conversation of brown rice versus white rice. Like when we’re, when we’re nitpicking things like, oh, well, I don’t eat white rice because that’s gonna turn into sugar in your body. It’s like everything turns into sugar in your body.

Ben:

Very true. Very true. A lot of, a lot of people who cite these mechanisms of how things work. They have no idea. They, they’re just parroting it. They heard somebody who sounded intelligent who was maybe they had a doctor or they were a nutritionist or something like that. They heard them say that and now they’re just repeating it. You see that very common with the whole insulin model of obesity.

Ben:, Dani:

People don’t understand that a lot of these foods are tested in a bubble, like the foods are tested completely by themselves.

Dani:

Yes. If you had two people on an empty stomach and one ate a bowl of white rice and one ate a bowl of brown rice, the white rice would turn into sugar in their body faster. But we don’t usually eat food like that. Like we eat it in conjunction with other things that, that slow things down or change the pace.

Ben:

So also if you’re like diabetic, that might be an issue. But if you have like a like if you have muscle, which is literally like a glucose like sink and you have a normal healthy functioning body, like it’s not even if you just ate white rice. I’ve done that before. It’s like, sometimes you just want a full of white rice, like you go and eat sushi, which is like, you know, mostly rice and maybe some vegetables and stuff.

Dani:

and a huge part of how that gets stored in your body is all going to come down to the amount of calories you’re eating, like by the end of the day, like for better or worse, Like you could eat Oreos and protein powder and get in really good shape.

Ben:, Dani:

Don’t, but you could like, it would be, it would be really hard.

Ben:

Giacomo did.

Dani:

I, I don’t know if you heard about this there. I think it was a 2014 or 2015 Giacomo ate ice cream, like real vegan ice cream, not diet ice cream every day of his prep just to prove that he could.

Ben:

That’s what I’m doing right now with the, the Ninja Creamy invention. I’m basically like, this actually relates pretty well to the conversation that we’re having, which is I’ve kind of broken up my contest prep this year into two chunks. So I had a, a prep that I was doing for the spring shows where not 100% but close to it. And then I kind of did like a little recovery diet and then now starting again, prep for the fall.

So the first, I guess, prep that I did, I pretty much ate protein cereal for my main protein source, almost every single meal and I got shredded, like you saw me in person and that’s a processed, you know, processed food and that was a large percentage of my calories and also my, pretty much all of my protein. And now I’m doing a similar thing with protein powder where I’m using protein powder and soy milk and almond milk and powdered peanut butter and sugar free fat free pudding mix.

So a lot of things that people would say like, like it’s terrible and I’m having that multiple times a day and its energy balance at the end of the day. And it’s like being in an energy deficit again, is one of the things that’s going to promote longevity more than anything else. So I think a lot of the times it’s overly nitpicky and restrictive and you can incorporate some of these foods going back again to what I said about the youtube video I recorded recently talked about, hey,

there’s vegan jerky, there’s protein bars, there’s protein cereal. A lot of these things help you control your calories while getting your protein up. And if you combine that with a lot of the other foods like the, the fruits and the vegetables, I think that’s a, it’s a, it’s a winning combination.

most of the time and you can have foods that taste a little bit more like indulgent while still meeting those, those goals, which is the benefit as well, like, yeah, you can make like an ice cream and stuff, that whole food plant based that tastes more indulgent and like these desserts with dates.

Dani:

And actually, I kind of want to talk about that actually.

Ben:

Yeah, you can do that. But is it necessarily always going to line up, like, no adding a scoop of protein powder can go a long way into changing a recipe completely. Like we have so many recipes at vegan proteins where it’s, you look at the recipe, it’s probably mostly whole food plant based.

Ben:, Dani:

It’s just you add a scoop of protein to it or like TV, P throw that in there.

Dani:

But you actually just reminded me of two things. Excuse me, I’m like constantly throat clearing, sorry

guys. two things. One, a lot of people who are whole food plant based diet or at least trying to be 100%. They say, well, I have to be because if I have chips or something processed in my house, I just tear through it. I can’t be around it. I’m gonna eat all of it.

And I feel like one that’s kind of a self fulfilling prophecy like you’re, you’re, you’re making that true, you’re giving that food way too much power and feeling like you’re talking about yourself as if you are powerless around it. When really if it was like a skill that you actively worked on rather than just cutting it out completely, you’d probably get better at having it around and be able to, you know, have it in, in quote unquote moderation without feeling like you flew off

the handle every time you had a cookie. You know. So that’s, that’s one thing. And then, you know, these people, of course we have social lives, they end up going to parties or whatever and then they come back and they’re like, I blew it. It was complete chaos because of this. That and it’s like, it’s because it was so novel because it’s so something you don’t normally have, if, if you had it more often, it probably wouldn’t have been such a blowout.

The other thing was like the desserts you were just talking about also a lot of whole food plant based folks practitioners, blogs, whatever. Put out all of these desserts that like, I would probably not have like, I look at them and I’m just like, whoa, like that is a calorie bomb if I’ve ever seen one so much fat in it, so much, so much fat.

Usually a ton of sugar in the form of dates, maple syrup, coconut sugar, agave. And they’re like, but it’s a whole food and I’m just like that is sugar like that, that’s not going to turn into sugar. That is sugar, that’s pure sugar right there.

Ben:

Back to your point about like what is even whole food plant based? Like people don’t even agree on that. Like is maple syrup. Whole food plant based. Some people say yes, some people say no.

Dani:

I mean, I don’t think, I don’t think so. To me that’s not whole food plant based. But if somebody’s willing to eat it, I’m not going to be like, no, don’t have that. It’s not whole food plant based. Like I would never say that about anything. but no, I’ve tapped maple trees. Maple syrup, ate whole food. Like, but every time I see those kind of desserts like, oh, I made this dessert from this and it’s just like I could have made a healthy, what I consider to be like a healthier version of

that particular meal without like using something they might consider processed. But I consider this to be like a calorie fat bomb, which if we’re talking about diabetes, right? It’s not necessarily just sugar, it’s, it’s sugar and fat together, which is what most of these desserts are.

Ben:, Dani:

It’s like mad peanut butter and dates blended together and yeah, and it has the fiber and stuff.

Ben:

So it’s, you know, there’s, there’s some redeeming qualities of it, but again, it’s like what is going to be more beneficial to you actually controlling your calories and losing that weight or being able to eat a dessert that you can say is healthier.

Dani:

I’m not eating dessert for fiber. Like when I’m eating a brownie, it’s not because I’m like, what could I have that has some fiber like I want goddamn brownies. That’s, and some of these are delicious. I’m not saying they don’t taste good.

Ben:

No. II, I like them but like you said, yeah, it’s like you get these small little portion sizes because it’s a lot of dried fruit and nuts or nut butters. fat sources. Just generally they’re, they’re more dense because they have more calories per gram. It’s as simple as that and something that you did just touch on that I think is important is when I get somebody who comes to me as a new client and they’re like, they do say these things, I can’t be around this or like we’ll ask people like,

what are your like trigger, trigger foods? I think a large reason why we specifically do that is that we can get them incorporating versions of these that are also in alignment with their goals. So they can see, oh, I can have these foods. I just need to be a little bit more intelligent about how I either incorporate them. So using moderation, having like a little bit alongside whatever their main thing is or finding a more diet friendly version of that and making it.

And often times people are like, oh wow, this is like 80 90% as good as the real thing or I actually enjoy it more like something that I’ve realized is that I used to prefer the taste of things that were really high in, like, oil and fat and, and sugar. And once I started making more, like, macro friendly versions of them, at first I was like, hm, this isn’t scratching.

It’s quite the same, but at least it’s got protein and it’s like getting me closer to my goal. So, whatever. And then over time I actually found that I liked it as much, if not in certain cases more. Now I know not everyone is the same with this. Like, I, I’ve again going back to Athena, I’ve talked with her and I’m like, oh, this is like, as good as like the real thing.

She’s like, no, it’s not. Come on, like just have the, like the actual thing is so much better. So I can, I can, I appreciate that like, as somebody who’s a bodybuilder and probably has not as much discernment for how much pleasure I get from food. That OK. Yeah, maybe my, I it’s like a funny running joke that like, I can’t be trusted to give honest reviews of like foods to like friends and family.

Even when I’m not dieting, like, even when I’m like off season, I’m like, you guys got to try this and

they’re like, no, like what? That sounds gross. I’m like, this is the most delicious thing I’ve ever had. Like, have you tried cream of rice? And they’re like, that’s literally baby food and you’re eating it with protein powder.

Ben:, Dani:

And I’m like, and it’s the best thing I’ve had in weeks when the last prep I had, I was in like recipe making mode and like, I swear to God, put, put me on a diet and I would just crank out recipes left and right.

Dani:

But before I would actually publish it, I would have to have somebody who was not dieting taste test it because I couldn’t tell anymore. Is this just, is this actually good or is this just what I call diet good?

Ben:

You know, who is actually really good at that is Alice, like her recipes are actually really good. And creative as well. I’m always sitting around like, I don’t know how you come up with these ideas, but they’re super creative and they work really well. So if you haven’t go to the vegan proteins, youtube channel and check out some of the recipes that she’s put up because they’re awesome.

Depending on what person, sorry, depending on what personality you have. Like, I know some people like to do these recipes make a little bit more complex. Some people like a little bit more simple. You can find ways to do that.

Dani:

So, yeah, it’s I do, you know, like I said, Jack Mona, we’ve had this kind of conversation so many times over the years, but amongst ourselves on the podcast on the channel to individuals and then when we post stories or post like a full day of eating or what I eat in a day video. A lot of people are like, oh my God, you guys eat like a lot of produce and I’m like, yeah, like, of course we do.

Did you think we don’t eat fruits and vegetables? Like I thought you were going to say the other thing? No, I mean, people there’s always like randos that are any time I post anything food related, they’re like, you eat processed shit, junk food vegan. Yeah. And I’m just like, OK, whatever. But the people who like actually consume our content are a lot of times like, wow, you guys, I’ve heard so many people say, wow, Janny, you eat like a lot of fruit and I’m like, yeah.

Yeah. I mean, I never said I didn’t. All I’m saying is like, I’m not going to demonize everything else if something is vegan, like I’m going to try it. I don’t care. I mean, this might set me apart from other. I don’t care how processed it is. If something’s vegan, I’m trying it because I’m at the end of the day, like I started as an ethical vegan, still an ethical vegan, but I’m going to reach my

health goals and my fitness goals also. But yeah, we still eat a lot of produce and I think that for some reason surprises some people because we champion this message so much.

Ben:

However, the pendulum swings, you try to swing it back, but people don’t realize that you’re probably still taking parts that are good from whatever that other side is. So it’s like if you’re trying to say, hey, whole food plant based, nothing wrong with that.

If it works for you. But if it doesn’t, you can incorporate some more processed foods. Like people will take that and be like, oh, so they’re probably just like eating all of these things and like, they, they, they don’t, they don’t do fruits and vegetables.

Dani:

I mean, I could, in fact, this weekend while we were traveling, I mean, we did not have a good 24 hours of eating because there were lots of cool places to stop. And last night when I was going to bed, I was just like, oh, my stomach is just, like, not happy and it was 24 hours.

Ben:

So, like, that’s how I felt when I was in Dallas. So I pretty much subsisted off of protein bars and jerky and like a couple pieces of fruit the whole time I was there. My stomach was in shambles by the end of it. So, I, I, yeah.

Dani:

Yeah, it’s, I mean, if you eat well, most of the time when you don’t eat well, like you recognize it very quickly that it feels bad and you don’t want to keep eating like that. So, I don’t know, it’s a, it’s always just very interesting because when it comes to, like, social media, like, you only get a snapshot of what other people are doing anyway.

And unfortunately, like Athena and I talked about on the last one that’s coming out, a lot of those snapshots people are showing are not even accurate representations of what it is they’re really doing. Because that what they’re really doing is like, not fun, you know, which is why we try really hard to put out like, genuine what I’m eating on this day videos, which are usually kind of a little bit boring, I think.

But that’s because that’s really what most days look like and the fun days, like, that’s just eating out multiple times. Like, that’s not even worth sharing because nobody could replicate it anyway because we’re like in specific places, trying different things or like holiday or something kind of related, kind of not.

Ben:

But I was at Walgreens this morning picking up some things and I always, I’m just curious what they have kind of in like the, the protein or like, sports section there. And I saw a couple of things that were really cool that I hadn’t seen that before. So I saw the own like 32 g protein shakes. They’re just ready right there. They always kind of have like Lenny and Larry’s cookies. I’ve seen the no cow dipped bars have been there for quite some time. but I also noticed that not in that

section but in like, there’s like a separate, I guess it’s kind of like a diet foods. Like, there’s some, like, I guess, like, Adkin stuff but there’s some other stuff as well. They had the n go slim bars in another section that’s like away from the protein bars, which is bizarre. But I’m like, oh, you can get n go slim bars at Walgreens and you can get own protein shakes at Walgreens. And I’m like, I have to imagine a couple of years ago that was not the case at all.

Dani:

It’s actually why Jacko and I shut the store. Like, because we started as the only vegan supplement shop in the world actually. And we loved it. It was very, very fun. And then like, as time changed, like we just didn’t need it anymore because you could just walk into a CV S or something and get stuff that previously, like you could only find on our website and that was it. So it was like kind of bittersweet, I guess because we were like, yay veganism is so much more mainstream, but also

like, boo, I guess we’re going to shut our store, but it actually ended up being the best thing we ever did because we were able to pivot to the coaching full time, which I feel like is much more impactful than being a retail store in the long run. But yeah, it’s, it’s much more access.

Ben:

Actually. Another thing that I just thought of is like traveling as someone who’s whole food plant based. Like, what if you stop in at like a gas station or a grocery store or something? It’s like, you don’t, you can’t just cook up a lot of it requires a lot of meal preparation. Like, you have to have a kitchen, you have to have like ways to cook these things. They take longer, whether that’s greens, potatoes, grains.

So, what are you gonna do? Are you gonna like, bring a bunch of, like, frozen meals with you? If you’re traveling, like, you go to the airport, a lot of this stuff is probably not gonna keep as well. It seems like logistically it could be a lot more difficult as well. Like, you can’t just stop in the grocery station and get a vegan protein bar and a, I don’t know, a piece of fruit and a diet soda or something like that.

Dani:

Yeah. I mean, I’ve, I’ve worked with a lot of clients who are mostly whole food plant based and, you know, you can do, like, you can get like a banana at the counter and like almonds or something in an aisle. But it’s, it’s not the same, it is more complicated. You can’t just stop into most restaurants and

find something. Like, if you’re going, you’re going to get like an iceberg salad dry, which isn’t going to fill you at all.

Ben:

It just about the most miserable thing. You gonna eat that dry iceberg salad.

Dani:

Yep. some folks who are whole food plant based won’t eat beans, like, out of a can. So you can’t really, yeah. So you can’t even, like, buy, like, you can get canned beans off of a shelf at most, like convenience stores. But if you won’t eat that then, yeah, you’re just, you’re in a much trickier situation. And I would say, depending on where you’re traveling to, like, vegans are in a trickier situation anyway, then everybody else, like, pretty much everybody else could

theoretically go out and get like, you know, a chicken salad with a light dressing and it’s like, boom, they got like a halfway decent meal, vegans can’t do that and just easily find a protein meal. So you already, you’re having to plan a little bit more, but whole food plant based just adds a whole other layer of planning. But stress also. And to me, I think the psychological effects are really probably the most important thing to me. Like, if someone wants to tolerate having a

bubble guts for months and months, like, that’s whatever, that’s their prerogative. But when I see somebody like mentally suffering and not even recognizing how much they’re suffering, that’s when I get like, like I really feel like I need to do something. So that’s why we, that’s why we talk about this sort of stuff. So, II I think I’ve said everything I have to say, is there anything else you want to add?

Ben:

No, not really, I think we’ve given a good landscape of what are some of the pros and cons of eating whole food plant based and how to maybe approach it from a more balanced perspective and not as dichotomous, black or white, like, has to be all or nothing with it. I think it has a lot of good principles and things that you can take and apply to yourself. maybe even some recipes or new things that you pick up from, some people who are talking about it, but it’s definitely not like you said,

a panacea or it’s not gonna cure everything and there are some things that it potentially lacks or misses out on. So, yeah, like most things, it’s, there’s some, some gray area and it requires context. And ultimately it’s about finding what works for you, which is going to be a little bit different for everyone.

Dani:

Right. Totally. And that’s, that’s what we’re all about here at vegan proteins is not like there’s not like the vegan proteins way that everybody has to eat. I Proteins method. I mean, like all of our clients eat

totally different. I have some clients that don’t cook, they won’t cook. Like all of their stuff is basically frozen convenience foods and eating out multiple times, sometimes multiple times a day and having to find a way to do that.

And then we do have whole food plant based folks as well and everything in between. So, you know, it really is about finding what’s going to work for someone like their, like I said, they, their rules, their terms, I guess, but also their likes or dislikes their schedule, their lifestyle. but, you know, I think to just blindly follow something because you heard a bunch of people say it was the best thing to do. I just think you should probably think it through a little bit more

because it’s going to be very hard to stick to. And of course, if you don’t stick to it 100% I think this could be a whole other topic. The guilt people feel for not sticking to it 100% is not worth it. Like just don’t just don’t. There we go. That’s the whole topic, don’t.

All right, I’m going to wrap it up. All right, everybody. Thank you so much for tuning in to another episode of Vegan Proteins Muscles by Brussels radio. Feel free to follow us on Instagram, youtube. Ben’s at Ben Mitchell.

Ben:

Ben, a Michell. I got my middle initial.

Dani:

Ben’s Instagram is at Ben, a Michel. If you’re not already following him, be sure to do so. And if you are interested in any kind of one on one coaching, that is what we do full time, go to Vegan proteins.com, fill out a coaching application or shoot us an email coach at Vegan proteins.com. Ben has some spots open right now. And like, he’s no joke. So definitely check that out. All right, thanks so much for tuning in. My name is Dani and we will talk to you soon. Bye.