3 Secrets to a Better Diet

Hey JJ Here. Every year around this time, I get the urge to make my home feel a little extra special. A space that feels just like the holidays. And Wayfair is my go to for that. Think cozy textures, twinkly decor, warm lighting, and all those little touches that make you want to curl up with a good book and a blanket. You'll usually find my books stacked on a great little end table I got from Wayfair, proof that function and style give can coexist. Now, whether you're adding last minute hosting essentials, picking out gifts for loved ones, or refreshing your decor for the season, Wayfair makes it easy with beautiful finds, great prices and fast delivery. And when the holidays wind down, Wayfair has everything you need to tuck it all neatly away. Smart storage solutions for every room from the kitchen to the closet. Plus, with free shipping for any order over $35, don't that's fast delivery and a total peace of mind. It's the perfect mix of joy and order, bringing the holiday spirit in, then storing it all with ease. If you're ready to make your home feel as good as it looks, get organized, refreshed and ready for the holidays. For way less head to Wayfair.com right now to shop all things home. Wayfair Every style Every home that's W A Y F A I R.com hey, it's JJ here. You know, I've been talking about environmental toxins forever, and laundry detergent is a sneaky one. A lot of them contain harsh chemicals like dyes, preservatives, and even UV brighteners. Those brighteners don't actually clean anything, they just coat fabric so your eyes think things look whiter or brighter. That's more chemicals I don't want on my family sheets or skin. And if you've got sensitive skin or allergies around the house, this can be a big problem. That's what got my attention about Earth Breeze. It looks like a dryer sheet, but it's actually laundry detergent. You toss one in the washer and that's it. No pouring, no mess, and no heavy plastic jug. Their packaging is lightweight cardboard, which helps reduce plastic waste. And if you choose the fragrance free option, it's gentle, hypoallergenic, non irritating and non sensitizing. I really like how simple it is and how fresh and clean everything comes out without those unnecessary chemicals. Right now you can try Earth Breeze for up to 40% off with free gifts@earthbreeze.com virgin that's earthbreeze.com virgin for up to 40% off plus free gifts on your first order.

This episode is brought to you by Buffalo Trace Distillery. Powerful yet smooth. Contained but never tame. Proudly going their own way but never going alone. This is the spirit inside Buffalo Trace Bourbon made at Buffalo Trace Distillery. The world's most award winning distillery. Buffalo Trace is always perfectly untamed. Distilled, aged and bottled by Buffalo Trace distillery, Franklin County, Kentucky 90 proof 45% alcohol by volume. Learn more at buffalotrace distillery.com Please drink responsibly.

Hey this is JJ Virginia. Thanks so much for joining me. This is Ask the Health Expert. In each episode I put the power of health in your hands and share ways to get healthy, lose weight, heal your gut, detox, and lots more so you can look and feel better fast. If you'd rather watch the video, hey, I did put on my makeup and do my hair, so check it out on my YouTube channel.

Hey jj Virgin here. Okay, real talk. So often the holidays sneak up on me, travel, gifts, hosting, you know, all the things and suddenly it's like, wait, who spent what and where?

And I know I'm not the only.

One who's looked at a bill in January and thought, wow, that escalated quickly. If you want to keep your finances under control this holiday season, you need to be using Monarch. If you it's rated the Wall Street Journal's best budgeting app of 2025. Monarch is the all in one personal finance tool that brings your entire financial life together in one clean interface. On your laptop or on your phone. Monarch lets you link everything and gives you real time visibility so you're not shocked later. Right now, I've been checking the holiday spending category so I don't accidentally start the new year with that dreaded debt hangover. And honestly, just seeing everything laid out is already helping me stay more aware. This season, Monarch does the heavy lifting. It links your accounts in minutes, gives you smart categorization and super clear visuals. Yes, that end of your reset could be a real goal this time. Don't let financial opportunity slip through the cracks. Use the code virgin@monarch.com in your browser for half off your first year. That's 50% off your first year@monarch.com with the code Virgin.

Some people think nature is like this, but actually it's like this. Mother Nature is not all sunshine and rainbows. Nature can be hotter than a sauna and colder than an arctic skinny dip. That's why Columbia engineers everything we make for anything nature can throw at you. Columbia engineered for Whatever.

If you feel like you're eating healthy but you aren't getting the results you want, like better energy, better focus and fat loss. Stay tuned. I'm dropping three little known strategies, really secrets to a better diet that can make all the difference. This channel is all about helping you get healthy, feel better, fast and heal your metabolism to lose the weight. So if you're interested in that, like and subscribe to stay up to date with the latest and greatest info. Now let's jump in because this topic is near and dear to my heart. I get really passionate about this because I know dialing in your best diet would be so much easier and actually work for you if you knew some of the things that I've learned. But health is just like anything else. You don't know what you don't know unless someone teaches you how to do it right. And you can really waste your time spinning your wheels, getting frustrated and wondering why you're stuck and then you give up. So there are three things I know will help you get healthy, feel better, fast and lose weight. So let's get right into them and then you can incorporate them into whatever diet you're doing. It really doesn't matter. These are agnostic and work whether you're paleo, keto, vegan, vegetarian, or really whatever. All right, the first one is timing is nearly everything. Now for a lot of people, if they're awake, they're eaten. Like if you're in the kitchen, near the kitchen, thinking about the kitchen. So you gotta stop this insanity. You need structure. Structure creates freedom. Now I'm sure you've heard of intermittent fasting and the benefits are huge for.

Your heart, your blood sugar levels, your.

Blood pressure, your gut function, your appetite and weight loss. Now when you're doing an intermittent fast, it's structured around something called an eating window. And your eating window really matters if you want all those benefits. When you limit your meals to a specific window during the day, there's a built in fast from the time that window ends until you start eating the next day. So ideally, when you're doing an intermittent fast, you push your first meal of.

The day to a little bit later.

Like instead of breakfast, have a brunch. And that really isn't as hard as it sounds. If you can close the kitchen after dinner, right? I mean stay out and then push your breakfast to brunch, that creates an easy fasting window of at least 12 hours, probably more like 14. And that time is going to help your body heal and drop weight. And honestly, you're probably asleep for at least eight hours of it anyway. Right now you can adjust eating windows too. So you might start with a 12 hour fast and three meals in that 12 hour eating window. And then you're going to want to work your way up to longer fasts with fewer meals. And you can even try omad, that's one meal a day for those in the know as a tool once in a while to really up those benefits. Alright, so let's go through an example so you can see how easy this is to do. Let's say you consolidate your calories into an eight hour window. And that window starts at 10am and ends at 6pm so during the remaining 16 hours of the day you're fasting, you can have water, you can have black coffee or tea, but you can't have any like fruit squeezed into the sparkling water. You can't have anything, any cream in the coffee. That is it. No food, black coffee, water or tea. Now when you do eat, it doesn't mean it's an all you can eat buffet either. I said timing is nearly everything, so it's really important. But portion size and what you're eating still matter too. Now when you're eating bounce meals, you won't even necessarily need three meals a day. But to start, if you're still having those three meals, here's what the timing might look like. You'll have a late breakfast or brunch. After you're out of your fasting window, you'll have two more meals every four to six hours. And, and this is really, really important, stop eating at least three hours before bed. So what's this look like? On a 14 hour fast, you get up in the morning, you have water, coffee or tea until breakfast, then maybe 9am is breakfast, 1pm is lunch, and 6pm is dinner. Now I'd love to see you get to a 16 hour fast and rotate that in a couple times a week. But as I mentioned, I really like you to do a 12 hour to start and then you ease into it. And I want you to now think of a 12 hour fast as the rule. It's really that minimum time you want between dinner and the next breakfast. So insulin can return to fasting levels and your body can easily access stored fat for fuel. Plus this fasting also helps trigger something called autophagy, which is your body's way of taking out the cellular trash. And that's super cleansing and detoxifying. Now the one thing that always come up when I mention fasting, you're probably already thinking is you're like, I'm going to be hungry, I'm going to be starving. And I can promise you starving is the last thing you'll be doing. Your body isn't a bank account, it's a chemistry lab. And long term calorie deficit is going to downshift your metabolism and make you hold on to weight because your body goes into that survival mode. Then you've got muscle loss, high blood pressure, nausea, irritation, no energy and low blood sugar. And if you're starving, you're also going to get bingy when you do eat. And that does not sound like winning to me. Now even if you're eating only one meal a day, you have to make sure that that meal is as nutrient dense as possible. And include of course, healthy fats, clean protein and fiber from non starchy veggies, and slow low plant based carbs so you don't set off your body's starving alarm bells. The other thing I want to make sure you do is not snack. Now I know you're probably already plotting your snacking strategy, but there's no snacking. Because every time you eat, your insulin levels go up. And over time this is going to increase your risk of insulin resistance and damage your metabolism, which means you're not able to burn stored fat for fuel. You got to give your body time to digest what you ate at your last meal and allow both your blood sugar and insulin to return to fasting levels. So you're encouraging your body to burn stored fat for fuel. So as you can see, snacking is a self sabotaging habit that you've got to break full stop. You need to just break up with snacking already. Sweet and salty snacks spike cravings, so you can never have just one. I mean, you know that Pringles commercial commercial where the people's hand keeps getting stuck at the bottom of the tube. It hits so close to home, doesn't it? I mean, here it is right here and look, it doesn't fit. It doesn't fit. I mean, snacking is just a vicious cycle and it makes you feel lousy. And by the time the consequences hit your waist, you've got a lot of work to do to unwind whatever you put there. So remove your triggers from the house. And when you feel the urge to snack, try water or green tea. And stop. By the way, you'll find this interesting. Snacking is agnostic about the clock and will put pounds on you no matter when you do it. But after dinner, snacking is a big no, no. For intermittent fasting, nighttime snacking actually increases your risk of obesity. A study published in the Journal of Obesity showed that mice fed a high fat diet before sleep gained about 48% body weight compared to the mice that ate that same amount at other times of the day. Holy smokes. Alright, so what about drinking? Now? You don't usually think much about it on a diet, except for the whole water, black coffee, green tea, and easy on the alcohol thing. But timing matters for liquids too. When you're fasting before your first meal and after your last meal, you're only allowed black coffee, water and tea. But when you're in your eating windows, you can have teas with fruit essence or make a frothy latte with some coconut milk or coconut creamer. And here's what you're really waiting to hear. A what about the wine? So, you know a glass of red wine from our friends over at Dry Farm? Totally. Okay. But I want you to really be careful about the amount of alcohol you're taking in. And if you're doing those drinks that have like the umbrella in them, forget it because you're going to get a lot of sugar with that and you're going to hijack the good work you're doing on your blood sugar and gut healing. That's why I stick with Dry Farm wines, because it's lab tested and it's low in sugar and free of all those metabolism damaging additives. I mean, they have these really high standards. So I'll drop a link to their website below. Okay. Now second secret. Planning is mission critical. Now, remember what I said earlier about how structure creates freedom? Here it is again. If you need to grab something as you're running out the door in the morning, or you get home late and just want something fast, odds are you're seriously stacked the deck against making a good choice. Unless you planned for it. Unless you have good food in the house and it's ready to go. You have to be smart about how you approach meal preparation if you want your diet to work for you. Prepping makes sticking to your diet so much easier. And all it takes is a little planning and knowing a few shortcuts. First, keep your pantry, fridge and freezer as well stocked as possible. So you always have what you need to make a healthy meal by the plate or to make smoothies and salads. Again, you have it all stocked up. You should see my fridge and freezer. I can just make a meal or a smoothie in a minute. Now, smoothies and salads. I Love them because they're such fast go tos. So here's what I recommend. You make a list and do at least one big grocery run a week that you know might take a few hours to build some meals for the entire week, right? So you do the grocery run and then you set yourself up with some prep, double or triple your recipes and freeze what you're not making right away or stick the extras in the fridge for lunches the next day. Bonus if you have a slow cooker because that these things can be a lifesaver on busy days and then you have to expect life to happen no matter what. If you get stuck somewhere and it's past meal time and your blood sugar is cratering, you know you're going to die for the nearest vending machine if you don't have other options. So don't risk blowing it. Just carry some emergency food with you. Now my emergency food I carry Reignite wellness bars, I carry Paleo Valley grass beef sticks or turkey sticks and an easy one is just carry some low roasted nuts. All right, third secret. The third secret to a better diet is macros matter. You want to eat by the plate, which you can see here and I'll also put in a link below. The plate is a great tool to help you get hooked on healthy swaps, crush your cravings and get the right foods in. When you're doing your eating window, you'll fill up your plate like this. First you want balanced meals of clean lean protein, healthy fats and fiber from a colorful array of non starchy veggies. And then of course a small amount of what I call slow low sugar impact carbs. So here's what this looks like. It's about 6 to 8 ounces of protein. Now this depends if your protein is higher in fat, then you're going to have a bigger serving of it to get the protein grams that you want. Then two to four servings of a healthy fat. So a healthy fat that would be something like a half of a small avocado, 10 nuts, a tablespoon of olive oil, a cup of coconut milk. So easy things that you're going to make sure again, two to four servings there, increase it if you're maintaining your weight, decrease it if you're trying to lose a little bit. But make sure that you're always getting that fat in because it is so satiating. Super important. Then two or more. And I'm going to underline more servings of non starchy vegetables because it is so critical to get those in and again with the non starchies. What you want to think of for a serving is a half a cup of cooked or a cup of raw and more is better. Like 5 servings for the day is sort of my minimal amount. I'd love you to have 10. All right. And then slow, low carbs. This is zero to two servings per meal. I actually feel better when my first meal of the day I don't really have much there. I'm more in a keto state. And then I have a little bit at night. I find that helps me sleep. So a serving, depending on what it is, is usually about a half to to three, four of a cup of something. But generally it's much more around about a half of a cup of wild rice or legumes or things like that or a cup of fruit. Now you can adjust there. You play around with those carbs if you're more active or athletic. But the big key thing here is food is information. So eating in the space balance sends the message to your body to keep that blood sugar stable and keep that insulin low, which is so critical for being able to use stored fat for fuel. And you can get a lot more info on that in my book the Sugar Impact Diet. So check that out too. Now the protein on the plate is great for filling you up and it slows down stomach emptying, which keeps the hunger hormone ghrelin suppressed. And what's cool about protein is it doesn't really impact your blood sugar or spike insulin. And it's the most thermic of all of the macronutrients. Like it is three times more thermic of all the macronutrients, which means that it requires a lot more energy to digest it. And my favorite things for protein, wild fish, shout out to my friends at Vital Choice, especially the salmon and the halibut. I love grass fed beef, grass fed lamb, pastured pork and chicken. And then if I'm doing more plant based, I'll switch over and I'll get. And again, these are always going to have some carbs or fat. So I might do some quinoa or lentils that goes on the carby side or nuts and seeds that goes over onto the more fat side. So I'm always making sure that I'm balancing that out. And the other place I always win is with my protein powders from Reignite Wellness now. Healthy fats. We need healthy fats for so many things. We can't live without protein or fat. We can live without carbs by the way just might be a little crappy. So healthy fats are so important to help lower your triglycerides, reduce inflammation and heal your gut and also will help you accelerate your fast fat loss, which all this stuff is going to help you reduce your risk for chronic disease. And of course they help you be more satiated and help you curb your cravings. But you want to make an oil change here. I said healthy fats because the wrong fats can be very pro inflammatory. So we want to focus on things like avocado, avocado and olive oil. I love avocado oil as well. Raw nuts and seeds, coconut, all of these types of things that help reduce inflammation and do not raise insulin and actually may even help your blood sugar. Okay. Remember too when I talked about protein earlier, I said if you're eating a higher fat protein, you'll need more of that protein source because you've got the fat in it. So case in point would be something like grass fed beef or wild salmon. You've got to count both the protein and the fat in there. So again, if you're doing some great wild salmon, maybe you're having 8 ounces of that. You can count in two servings of fat there too. All right, cool. Let's talk carbs. Now, super important, I want you to get your carbs as close to nature as possible. So that means eating kale rather than kale chips, right? Or you've seen those veggie straws and things like that. No, no, no, just eat the veggies. So that would be things like all of the non starchy vegetables from the rainbow, Brussels sprouts and broccoli and cauliflower, etc. And then you're going to do your starchier carbs are going to be things and this is where you really want to look, as close to nature as possible. Now all of these things are going to have had some processing. If you're getting wild rice, you're not going out into the fields. Same with quinoa or legumes. But you really want to have them as close as possible so they have an additional damaged things and added in damaged fats. So legumes, wild rice, quinoa, squashes, potatoes and fruit, and especially berries. And I love these because they are loaded with fiber. And when you do fiber, it's going to help slow your blood sugar response, keeps it more stable, feeds your gut microbiome, right. And helps with good digestion. Plus slows down stomach emptying and helps you feel fuller. And if you're getting some of that resistant starch in from greener bananas or cold potatoes can help you burn fat too. So there's so many good things about fiber. I want you to get at least 50 grams a day. More is better there too. But if you haven't been eating much fiber, we're going to change this over the course of a couple weeks, not overnight, because if you do it overnight, you will feel bloated and uncomfortable. So we make this shift over time. All right, what else does it do? It also fiber can also help reduce the risk of heart disease and type 2 diabetes. So I mean, come on, like fiber is such a rock star. It's so amazing. So remember, you're going to eat zero to two servings of these non of these starchy carbs at each meal and then you're going to go crazy on the non starchy veggies. The more the better. And again, I want you to get in at least five servings a day. Super duper important. And one of the easy ways you can do that. Cauliflower rice has become one of my biggest go to's to throw in a lot of stuff. Now I just have to do one little riff on fruit because I put fruit into the starchy carb category because I want you to understand that fruit's really good for you and it's not a free food. So I have people do one to two servings of fruit a day. And I really like to emphasize berries or slightly green bananas like my favorite fruits. I like the apple for the pectin. It's very gut healing. But my most favorites are berries with all those deep colors and so much fiber. And then just a slightly, it's just turning ripe banana. Freeze them that way. Use half of it in the smoothie to get that resistant starch. But do not go crazy on the fruit because you will get too much sugar. So one to two servings a day. Stick with that in your smoothie. And by the way, like let's talk smoothie, let's say that maybe you threw in a half a cup of blueberries and a half of a barely ripe green banana, added in some extra greens in there because you won't taste them. So it's a great way to sneak them in. Maybe a chia or flaxseed for extra fiber when you do that and you're using my Reignite Wellness protein powder, that can get you like 10, 10 grams, 20 grams of fiber easily to start your day. In fact, done that way, that's about 20 grams so that's a great way to start the day. All right, I want you to stick to these three secret weapons. I want you to grab them right now and commit right now to at least starting with one of them this week, the next next week, and then the next the following week. And this is going to be something that you're going to become. It's going to become a habit for you. It's going to help you get and stay healthy, lose the weight as a bonus, and most importantly, avoid the weight regain. That's the biggest one of all. Now don't forget to hit like and subscribe and join me next time for tips on how to get metabolically healthy. See you soon. For more info on this and other health topics I cover, or to rate and review, find me on Instagram, Facebook and my website, jjvirgin.com and don't forget to subscribe to my show so you won't miss a single episode. Go to subscribetojay.com thanks again for being with me this week. Foreign.

Hello listeners, this is Anne Bogle, author, blogger and creator of the podcast what Should I Read next? Since 2016, I've been helping readers bring more joy and delight into their reading lives. Every week, I take all things books and reading with a guest and guide them in discovering their next read. They share three books they love, one book they don't, and what they've been reading lately. And I recommend three titles they may enjoy reading next. Guests have said our conversations are like therapy, troubleshooting issues that have plagued their reading lives for years, and possibly the rest of their lives as well. And, of course, recommending books that meet the moment. Whether they are looking for deep introspection to spur or encourage a life change, or a frothy page turner to help them escape the stresses of work, school, everything, you'll learn something about yourself as a reader and you'll definitely walk away confident to choose your next read, with a whole list of new books and authors to try. So join us each Tuesday for what Should I Read Next? Subscribe now wherever you're listening to this podcast and Visit our website, whatshould I read next podcast.com to find out more.