One of the most common questions I get asked from students is how do you lose weight as fast as possible or what’s the simplest diet to lose weight.

 

This, of course, is a difficult question, because even though weight loss is pretty simple in theory, in practice most beginners have an extremely hard time seeing any results. So I understand that they are looking for an easy solution.

 

But the problem with this approach is that people who are looking for a quick fix often tend to follow diet fads and jump from one diet trend to the next. These are diets that promise you to lose weight within a few days or sometimes even within a few hours.

 

Not only are these fad diets usually bs, they are often overly complicated and rely on specific diet schemes or some new exotic food that magically burns fat like its nothing. Of course, these foods don’t exist.

 

This is not what I will do. My approach to weight loss and dieting, in general, is always long term. But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t any simple weight loss diets out there that you can implement in the short term. So in this post, I will give you one example of an extremely simple weight loss diet that works while also being healthy and sustainable.

 

We will go over how to set up this diet step by step and at the end of this post you will have a pretty good understanding of what makes this diet so successful.  

 

The first thing you have to understand is that weight loss is not depended on individual foods or supplements. That`s also why these countless lists of fat burning foods are misleading. Individual foods don’t burn fat, it simply doesn’t work that way.

 

For weight loss it’s always your diet as a whole that counts. Your body does not evaluate the individual foods you eat and automatically burns fat if it’s a clean food or stores fat if it’s a unhealthy food. What matters is the total of all the foods you eat and the total energy and nutrients they contain.

 

This knowledge can help us set up a weight loss diet that doesn’t rely on any supposed exotic foods or overpriced supplements but on actual science. What would such a diet look like?

 

 

 

Every diet is made up of different parts. In the case of a weight loss diet these parts are:

 

1. Calorie Deficit

2. Macronutrients

3. Food sources

4. Meal timing

5. Supplements

 

This list is ordered by importance, which means the lower you get the less important a factor is. So for a weight loss diet to be successful the most important aspect is always a calorie deficit, because no matter how many healthy foods you eat, if their total calories are more than your body burns on a regular basis you won’t burn fat. Unfortunately, there are no exceptions to this rule.

 

Macronutrients are in second place. Whereas calories define how much you eat, macronutrients define the right amounts of protein, carbs, and fats. They make an important difference to your body composition especially if you want to build muscle and lose fat.

 

Food sources are in third place and basically refer to where your macronutrients come from.

 

And lastly, meal timing and supplements are the two least important aspects of your weight loss diet and will only make a minor difference.

 

So when we want to design the simplest weight loss diet possible we have to address the bigger picture first. That means focusing only on the most important aspects and either ignoring or at least paying less attention to least important aspects.

 

In practice, that means that your diet planning will revolve around only three things: the ideal calorie intake, the ideal macronutrient split and the right food sources. Meal timing and supplements can be ignored if you want to keep it as simple as possible.

 

 

 

Like I said before, a calorie deficit is crucial for any type of weight loss. It is achieved by consuming less energy than your body expands on a daily basis. Introducing a calorie deficit is fairly simple and can be summarized like this:

 

1. Calculate your total daily energy expenditure (TDEE). You can do this by using an online calculator like this one

2. Subtract 20% from your TDEE to create a moderate calorie deficit. 20% is enough to get you quick results without crash dieting.

 

If you want a more detailed explanation, check out this post. 

 

 

 

Once you have your calorie deficit calculated, the next step is setting up your macros, so finding out how much protein, fat and carbs you need. This is pretty straightforward and now I will just give you the ideal values for each macro. If you want to find out why the values are what they are, read this or check out my nutrition and meal planning courses.

 

First, protein because it’s the most important macronutrient in regards to weight loss. Basically, a high protein intake makes sure that you maintain lean muscle mass while you are in a calorie deficit. That’s important because you actually want to lose fat and not just weight.

 

The ideal range of protein intake is around 0.8 – 1 gram of protein per pound of bodyweight. If you are already very lean and/or follow a larger calorie deficit you can even go as high as 1.2 gram of protein per pound of bodyweight.

 

Next is fat, which should make up at least 15 – 20 percent of your daily calories. This value might be a little too low for some people and you can go as high as 30 – 35%. So the overall range of your daily fat should be between 15% and 35% of your daily calories.

 

And lastly, fill the rest of your daily calories with carbs.

 

For experienced dieters these steps will be fairly easy to implement but I understand that for beginners everything might be going a little too fast at this point. If you want a more detailed explanation on how to calculate your macros watch my other videos where I take you through the process step by step.

 

 

 

Ok, at this point we are almost done. The last step is deciding on your food sources. How do you do this? You simply take your calories and daily macros and fill them with foods you like. At this point you might be thinking:

 

What???

Aren’t you going to tell me that I should eat food X and not food Y?

And what about metabolism boosting foods?

 

No, I’m not going to do any of that. And there are two reasons for that.

 

The first is that most of the people who preach some sort of eat this and not that, don’t understand the principles behind weight loss. Like I said before, how much you eat (in the form of calories) is a lot more important than what you eat.

 

The second reason is that designing your meal plan with foods that you like is critical to success. As the saying goes: the best diet is the one you can stick to.

 

I could tell you to eat celery and broccoli as much as I wanted, but if you don’t like it you won’t eat them. That said, there are some general food recommendations I will make to help you get started.

 

First off, dedicate 80-90% of your diet to traditional “clean” and healthy foods. Example include:

 

Protein: lean meat, dairy, eggs, fish and seafood, chicken or if you are a vegan beans, nuts and lentils.

Fat: avocados, nuts, seeds and olive oil, fatty fish

Carbs: whole grains, rice, potatoes, vegetables and fruits

 

The remaining 10-20% can come from whatever foods you like as long as they fit your total daily calories and protein, carbs and fats.

 

This will ensure that your needs are being fully met when it comes to amino acids, fiber, micronutrients and essential fats, leaving you with 10-20% of your total daily calories to play around with however you like.

 

Again, what you have to understand is that your body does not analyze individual foods but your diet as a whole. You don’t need to worry about some chocolate here and there as long as it doesn’t completely throw your calorie balance off.

 

And that’s pretty much everything you need to set up the simplest weight loss diet that is proven to work. Yes, there are other aspects like meal timing and supplements, but like I said, they will only have a minor impact on your overall results.

 

If you want to keep things as easy as possible stick to the steps I outlined before and make sure you don’t fall for the many diet fads out there.