Today I’m going to answer one of the most common questions I hear regarding fat loss. That questions is “Why does diet play a big part in fat loss when training?”

I would say that question is about as akin to asking, “Why does breathing play a big role in life?” Take a look at it from a stock car or race car perspective. Your diet is fuel and you need to be feeding a machine right in order for it to operate correctly and things always work better when your body is operating correctly. That includes both gaining muscle and burning fat.

Aside from everything working properly being the most efficient way to achieve anything that you want to do with your body, you have to know what you’re taking in as far as nutrition goes, so that you know if you’re in a deficit or a surplus, because your calories are going in and if you take in more than you need for the activity level that you have, you’re going to store it as fat and that’s the end of the discussion on that.

If you take in less calories to a point without shutting everything down and going into a catabolic mode, if you take in less calories you’re going to start losing weight. Proper nutrition besides the deficit that you create will also help you maintain your mean muscle so that you don’t end up just losing weight and beginning a skinny fat person, but that you end up just ripping off a higher percentage of fat in that weight loss and not muscle tissue as well.

Why does diet play a big role in fat loss training? It just does, it is as important or more important than your training. Just find a slight deficit from your daily caloric needs, which there are a couple of free tools on the internet and I have three different methods to plan your diet and figure this stuff out with the Fat to Fit program. That’s at www.fattofitprogram.com. There’s a video, spreadsheet download and PDF all about eating three different ways that you can cover in there and it’ll also show you where you should start with your training all step by step.

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Good diet plans are like good cars. How exactly do you judge them? I’ve been wanting to write a piece about this topic for a while because most people ask me which ones are good diet plans before they ask how to properly squat. I think in the beginning, working on the diet is easier for most people to get involved in before heading to the gym is. Read the rest of this entry »

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I dig cajun blackened chicken so I thought I would dig around and see if I could find out how to make a cajun dry rub that would make me some cajun blackened chicken like you get at the restaurant. Moxies being a great example. Or blackened chicken on a caesar salad rocks too.

At any rate (drooling)… I found one and you can use this cajun rub to make all the “blackened” dishes. Everything from chicken to fish to shelfish and it works on veggies too.

You need about a tablespoon of rub for a chicken breast size piece of meat.

Here is the recipe for a Cajun Blackened Chicken Dry Rub that makes about 12 servings. Whatever you don’t use can be stored as long as you keep it dry for about 3 months.

Cajun Blackened Chicken Dry Rub Ingredients.

2 TB of cracked peppercorns
1 TB dried Thyme
2 TS paprika (I couldnt find the sweet stuff)
1 TS salt
1 TS dry mustard
1 TS garlic powder
.5 TS ground bay leaf
.5 TS cayenne

Mix it up and you’re good to go. I use it outside on the BBQ because the spices will smoke and it’ll cloud up your house. But if you don’t mind that.. go for it!

Some say to let the dry rub sit on the chicken in the fridge for a couple hours but who has time for that? I’m sure there is a difference somewhere but it works just fine if you rush home from work or the gym and slap the dry rub on the chicken and BBQ it.

Update: The cajun blackened chicken dry rub works just fine on a small indoor grill if it has a top. There is hardly any smoke or smell and it’s done in 8 minutes.

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