The Best Foods to Build Muscle and Lose Body Fat

OK, first thing first. If you don't have any junk food around the house, then you're less likely to eat it. On the other hand, if all you have is healthy food, you're forced to eat healthy. It all starts with making smart choices when you make your trip to the supermarket.

So lets get started.

Each week, make sure that you're stocked up with a good variety of fresh vegetables. Depending on the season, it's better to get local produce, but obviously in winter and depending on where you live, you may have to purchase your produce from the supermarket. Most of the time, you should have plenty of onions, zucchini, spinach, fresh mushrooms, red peppers, broccoli, etc.

You can also dice up some lean chicken or turkey sausage and mix it with eggs, along with some swiss, jack, or goat's cheese. Remember when referring to eggs, we are not referring to egg whites. The yolk is the most nutritious and nutrient dense part of the egg, so when you only eat the egg whites, it's like throwing away the best part. And no, it's NOT bad for you because of the cholesterol. Eggs actually raise your GOOD cholesterol. Try to get free range organic eggs for the best quality.

Coconut milk should be included in your fridge. You can use it to mix in with smoothies, oatmeal, or yogurt for a rich, creamy taste. Coconut milk is great because it adds a rich, creamy taste to a lot of dishes and it's also full of healthy saturated fats. Yep, you read correctly, healthy saturated fats!

Now for the continued list of fridge items:

* Chopped walnuts, pecans, almonds - delicious and a great source of healthy fats
* Cottage cheese, ricotta cheese and yogurt - mix cottage or ricotta cheese with yogurt, chopped nuts and berries for a great mid-morning or mid-afternoon mea
* Whole flax seeds or chia seeds - you can grind these in a mini coffee grinder and add them to your yogurt or salads. Always grind them fresh because the Omega-3 polyunsaturated fats are highly unstable and prone to oxidation which create high levels of free radicals in flax that is pre-ground.
* Whole eggs - one of natures richest sources of nutrients (and remember, they increase your GOOD cholesterol so stop being so scared of them)
* Salsa - try and be creative by purchasing some of the exotic varieties available
* Avocados - a great source of healthy fats, fiber, and other nutrients. Try adding them to wraps, salads, or sandwiches
* Butter - don't believe the naysayers, butter adds great flavour to anything and can be part of any healthy diet (just keep the quantity small because it is calorie dense. And NEVER use margarine)
* Nut butters - for those of you who find peanut butter a little boring, a creative suggestion is to mix together almond butter with sesame seed butter, or cashew butter with macadamia butter. Delicious and unbeatable in nutrition!
* Leaf lettuce and spinach along with shredded carrots - for salads to have with dinner
* Home-made salad dressing - use balsamic vinegar and extra virgin olive oil. This is much better than those salad dressings you find in the supermarket which mostly use highly refined soybean oil (full of inflammation-causing free radicals)
* Whole grain wraps and whole grain bread (look for wraps and bread with at least 3-4 grams of fiber per 20 grams of total carbs)
* Rice bran and wheat germ - for some, these may sound a little too healthy, but they actually add a nice little nutty, crunchy taste to your yogurt or smoothies, or they can be added to your mixture when baking muffins or breads for their nutrients and fiber

Continuing now with the freezer...
* Frozen berries - during the local growing season, grab the fresh ones, but for the rest of the year, it's a good idea to keep a supply of frozen blueberries, raspberries, blackberries, strawberries, cherries etc. so you can add them to create a high fiber cereal, oatmeal, cottage cheese, yogurt or smoothie
* Frozen fish - make it a habbit to try a couple of different types of fish each week. There are so many varieties out there, it's hard to get bored easily
* Frozen chicken breasts - very convenient for a quick addition to wraps or chicken sandwiches for quick meals
* Grass-fed steaks, burgers and ground beef - Grass-fed meats have been shown to have as high as, or even higher levels of Omega-3 fatty acids than salmon (without the mercury). Also, grass-fed meats have much higher levels of conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) compared to typical grain-fed beef.
* Frozen buffalo, ostrich, venison and any other "exotic" lean meats - it may sound weird, but feel rest assured that these are some of the healthiest meats around, and if you're serious about a lean healthy body, these types of meats are much better for you than the mass produced, hormone-pumped beef and pork that's sold at most supermarkets
* Frozen veggies - again, when out of season and you can no longer get local fresh produce, frozen veggies are the best option. They often have higher nutrient contents compared to the fresh produce that has been shipped thousands of miles and been sitting around for weeks before making its way to your dinner table

And for the pantry/cabinet:

* Various antioxidant rich teas - green, oolong, white and rooibos are some of the best
* Whole wheat or whole grain spelt pasta - much higher fiber than normal pastas
* Oat bran and steel cut oats - higher fiber than those little packs of instant oats
* Cans of coconut milk - to be transferred to a container in the fridge after opening
* Brown rice and other high fiber rice - NEVER use white rice
* Tomato sauces - delicious and a great source of lycopene. Just keep an eye out out for the brands that are loaded up with nasty high fructose corn syrup.
* Stevia - a natural non-caloric sweetener, which is an excellent alternative to the chemical-laden artificial sweeteners like aspartame, saccharine, and sucralose
* Raw honey - better than processed honey and has higher quantities of beneficial nutrients and enzymes. Honey has even been proven in studies to improve glucose metabolism (how you process carbs)
* Organic maple syrup - none of that high fructose corn syrup stuff. Stick to real maple syrup. The only time you should really use this (because of the high sugar content) is if you want to add it to a post-workout smoothie for a bit of extra sweetness and to also bring about an insulin surge that will push nutrients into your muscles.
* Organic unsweetened cocoa powder - this is great for mixing into your smoothies for an extra jolt of antioxidants. Or you can use it to make your own low-sugar hot cocoa by mixing cocoa powder into hot milk with stevia and a couple of melted pieces of dark chocolate

Cans of black or kidney beans - good to add a couple of scoops to Mexican wraps for the fiber and high nutrition content. Also, beans are surprisingly one of the best sources of youth promoting antioxidants!!
Dark chocolate (as dark as possible) - a treat that satisfies the sweet tooth as well as providing loads of antioxidants at the same time. It's still calorie dense, so keep it to just a couple squares

Finally, one more thing that's hard to go wrong with is a good variety of fresh fruits and berries. The list should include bananas, apples, oranges, pears, peaches, mangoes, pomegranates, kumquats, papaya, star fruit and pineapples. And for the berry selection, include strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, blackberries and cherries, which are some of the most nutrient and antioxidant-dense fruits you can eat.

Hopefully this gave you some good ideas that you can use next time you're at the supermarket.

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