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Health & Fitness

Optimize Your Health, Fitness & Vitality with Brien Shamp: Transform your dinner in 5 easy steps

Are the dinners that you cook healthy? Think so, but not sure? If your weight loss has slowed, or even stopped, then there are improvements to be made in your dinner routine. I've made 5 guidelines so that you'll know if your meals are healthy and fitness friendly. And as a result you'll experience healthy weight loss.  

Check out these 5 Easy Steps to Transform Your Dinner...

Step #1: Choose Quality Ingredients: These are the building blocks to a healthy meal. While you certainly don't need to dine in gourmet restaurants in order to ensure quality ingredients, you should pay attention to the quality of the foods you eat. Choose foods that are:

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•    Fresh and organic

•    Pronounceable ingredients

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•    Whole foods 

Step #2: Use Healthy Cooking Methods: The way a meal is cooked determines how many calories, how much added fat, and the number of nutrients that survive. This simple factor will make or break your weight loss goal. Avoid foods prepared like this:

•    Fried and battered

•    Processed and packaged

•    Doused with cream sauce

•    Sautéed

Choose foods that are prepared like this:

•    Grilled

•    Baked

•    Broiled

•    Steamed 

Step #3: Eat Mostly Protein: The bulk of your calories should be coming from a quality source of protein. With the first 2 guidelines in mind, these will be high quality, healthfully prepared. Good choices of protein include:

•    Fish

•    Chicken

•    Turkey

•    Egg

•    Lean red meat

•    Beans

Step #4: Include Lots of Fiber: Fiber is a huge part of eating healthy and being lean. Fibrous foods will fill you up while delivering vitamins and nutrient in low-calorie packages. Fill at least two thirds of your plate with fibrous vegetables. Try these forms of fiber:

•    Salad

•    Seasonal vegetables

•    Fruit

•    Legumes 

Step #5: Reduce Starches: Here's where many well-meaning dieters lose it. The facts are simple; in order to maintain the low-carb, high protein diet required for healthy weight loss, there is no room for starchy foods.

Starches to Avoid:

•    Potatoes

•    Pasta

•    Rice and cereal

•    Bread and crackers 

For the most effective results, pair your clean eating with a challenging exercise routine. That's where I come into the equation! Call or email today and I'll get you started on an exercise program that will transform your body once and for all.

Stay On Track While Eating Out

  • Forget the Extras: Ask for the breadbasket or chip basket to be removed from your table and stick to eating only what you ordered.
  • Don't Drink Calories: Stick with water or unsweetened ice tea in order to avoid a few hundred extra calories.
  • Get Dressing On the Side: Ask for sauces and dressings on the side to cut down calories.
  • Order Healthier Sides: Just because the grilled fish comes with a side of potatoes doesn't mean you have to get it that way. Ask for a side of steamed veggies instead. 

Brien Shamp brings you 22 years of experience as a Body Transformation Expert, Personal Trainer, Nutrition & Lifestyle Coach, Massage Therapist, Strength Coach for College & Pro Athletes and Reiki Practitioner. In 2011 he was nominated one of the top ten trainers in the country. Brien has a degree in Biomechanics from UC Davis and extensive graduate studies in Exercise Physiology from SF State. Brien won first place in the Met-Rx World’s Best Personal Trainer Contest in 1999 and was nominated Best in the Bay by KRON 4 for Weight Loss in 2009. He is an active author in Parenting on the Peninsula, Ms. Fitness Magazine and his FREE Blog with thousands of subscribers at www.BrienShamp.com.


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