The Carnivore Diet - Explained - Newbie Fitness Academy

I’ve mentioned in a few of my recent videos that I’ve been mostly on a carnivore-ish type of diet since I moved to Mexico. I’ve been here for 3 months now.

I’m big on bio hacking and self experimentation. I would never recommend anything that I’ve never tried. And I can honestly say that I feel like my health and fitness has reached a new level since I made the switch to a carnivore-ish type of diet.

This is actually not my first time doing this. I did it as a personal experiment back in 2018 when I was first exposed to it when I went to Keto Con and I did it for 30 days.

Back then, I had amazing results. Especially when it came to my sleep, digestion, energy, my skin, and more importantly, weight loss. I was losing basically a pound a day for the first 10 days and I’m not a big guy.

Also, people with autoimmune disorders have had amazing results with this diet. People have also reversed their type 2 diabetes and have achieved amazing weight loss transformations by going Carnivore. And I’m gonna explain why in a second here.

I’ve always wanted to give the carnivore diet another go. When I moved to Mexico, my airbnb didn’t have a full kitchen. It’s also so much cheaper and convenient to just buy cooked meat here.

So I immediately thought, this is the perfect time to go carnivore again. And because I had amazing results from it the first time, it was a no brainer to switch back to it.

What is the Carnivore Diet?

It’s an ancestral way of eating where you’re only eating animals preferably nose-to-tail. As well as animal products. No plants.

But I’m gonna show you some variations of it where you can consume plants based on their level of toxicity and how you personally respond to it.

In its very essence, it’s basically the complete opposite of the vegan diet. If you’ve been following my YouTube channel, you should already know how I feel about it.

At first glance, especially if it’s your first time hearing about it, sounds kind of extreme. Right?

But the more you understand it, the more sense its gonna make.

If we go back to Paleolithic times, animals have always been the preferred food of our ancestors. In fact, a lot of anthropologists will tell you that eating animals is what made us humans.

They inherently knew how nutrient and calorically dense meat, especially fat was, versus plants.

If they were able to hunt down a megafauna for example, they would have food for days if not weeks.

And this is still practiced today. The inuits in Canada and a lot of tribes around the world who still live a hunter gatherer lifestyle are perfect examples of this. But let’s use the Inuits because I’m from Canada.

Let’s just say there’s not a whole lot of plants in Northern Canada. So they mostly hunt seal and polar bear. After a successful hunt, they actually prefer to eat the fatty cuts of meat as well as the organs. Because again they’re nutrient and calorically dense, and they would give the lean cuts of meat to their dogs.

Also, little biology lesson for you. The human stomach is actually more acidic than pure carnivores like hyenas and vultures. It’s as if our stomachs evolved to process meat.

You know what’s actually extreme? A vegan diet. There has never been a society in the history of humanity that’s vegan. It’s really nothing more than a modern day human experiment.

On the other hand, there are still tribes today that still eat a mostly carnivore diet.

Funny enough the Inuits, even though they eat a high fat and hit protein diet, actually have very low rates of heart disease and diabetes.

Why does the Carnivore Diet work?

Here are five compelling reasons.

1. It triggers satiety like no other

Here’s the truth about losing weight.

Weight loss in its very essence is not about counting calories, it’s about controlling hunger.

If you can control hunger by eating the proper diet, weight loss becomes inevitable.

The carnivore diet just happens to trigger two of our key satiety hormones. It’s a high protein and high fat diet. Protein activates peptide YY and fat activates cholecystokinin.

Basically, it keeps you full for a really long time. Sometimes I can’t even finish my plate because I’m already full.

If you’ve ever been to an all you can eat Brazilian bbq restaurant which is a carnivore’s dream, you get to a point where you literally can’t eat any more meat even if you tried. You get the meat sweats.

That type of satiety you feel is not the same as you would experience when you eat a high carb meal. Especially if it’s processed carbs.

It’s really hard to stop when you get going. This is why you can’t just have on Dorito chip. Processed foods are designed to short circuit your brain because they’re engineered to be highly palatable. Your brain lights up like a Christmas tree when you get a taste of it. Next thing you know, you’re staring at the bottom of the bag.

And because you just jacked up your blood sugar levels from eating highly processed carbs, you’re also gonna experience a subsequent blood sugar crash.

Afterwards, you feel bloated, you’re tired and sluggish, and you feel like you need a nap.

When you’re on the carnivore diet, it’s the complete opposite. You have stable energy. In fact, it makes you feel energized.

Feeling bloated after a meal is not normal by the way. There is absolutely nothing normal about bloating from food. It’s actually a sign that you might have some underlying gut issues.

2. It’s the purest form of the ketogenic diet

Think of the carnivore diet as the keto diet on steroids.

You get the same benefits like weight loss, lowered triglycerides, increased HDL cholesterol which is the “good” cholesterol, improved PCOS symptoms, it’s unbelievably effective against metabolic syndrome, and so much more.

And because you’re eating almost zero carbs, your blood sugar and insulin always stay stable.

And I’ve talked about the importance of moderating insulin in a lot of my other videos. Because it’s the hormone that controls our bodyweight. It’s the switch to fat burning and fat storing.

When insulin stays low, it allows you to tap into your almost unlimited fat stores and burn it for energy.

Yes, protein spikes insulin as well. But again it also activates your satiety hormones so you’re kinda protected there.

And again, because of this high level of satiety you get, it allows you to go longer in between meals. You don’t need to graze on food all day. Which gives your body more time to burn body fat for energy.

3. Nutrient density

When you go carnivore, you’re basically only eating some of the most, if not the most nutrient dense foods on the planet.

There are certain essential nutrients, meaning the body can’t make it or can’t make it in sufficient quantity, that can only be found in animal foods such as retinol, vitamin K2, D3, and B12, DHA, heme iron, creatine, just to name a few.

Needless to say, optimal health is impossible without animal foods. Now imagine if you only eat animal foods. This is why you can’t claim that a vegan diet is the healthiest diet for humans. It’s just not.

I can’t remember the expert who said this but grass fed and grass finished beef liver is actually the most nutrient dense food on the planet. It’s the superfoods or all super foods. Just look at these numbers.

Truth be told, I used to find the taste of liver absolutely revolting. It’s a bit of an acquired taste. But those are too hard to ignore. So what I did was eat a piece of pork rind with every liver bite.

Here’s a nice little chart comparing blueberries and kale to beef and liver. As you can see, they’re not even close.

You know what real superfoods are? Steak, salmon roe, egg yolks, tallow, and again the king of all superfoods, beef liver .

The nutrients in animals are also pre-formed which means they’re more bio available. For example, the bio availability of protein found in animals versus plants is night and day. It’s as if our digestive system is telling us that it prefers meat.

4. It’s the ultimate elimination diet

I kinda brushed on this earlier but there is absolutely nothing normal about feeling bloated after a meal. That means whatever you’re eating is causing inflammation and other weird things in your gut.

The carnivore diet has been shown to reverse a lot of autoimmune disorders and gut issues. Because it’s the ultimate elimination diet.

You’re basically eliminating all the foods that triggers inflammation.

Here’s the truth about plants. Antinutrients in plants triggers inflammation. The most mainstream antinutrient is gluten but that’s just the tip of the iceberg. The other big players are lectins, phytates, and oxalates.

What are antinutrients you ask? Antinutrients are chemicals found in plants that keep your body from absorbing essential nutrients from food. It’s a protective mechanism they’ve developed to protect themselves from predators. They’re not just sitting on the ground waiting to be eaten.

Through years of evolution, plants have become great alchemists and one of the ways they’re learned to defend themselves is by synthesizing antinutrients.

Eating a steady source of antinutrients can lead to inflammation and gut issues among other things.

Fibre is actually one of the big things you’re eliminating in this diet. Yes, you heard that right.

According to Dr. Paul Saladino, he’s one of the big names in the carnivore diet space, he also looks like that.

He mentioned a study in his book the Carnivore Code where they took a group of people with idiopathic constipation. They divided them into three groups.

They had a normal fibre, reduced fibre, and zero fibre group. Guess what? The zero fibre group completely resolved their gut issues. When you go carnivore, you cut out fibre completely.

Fibre at most is neutral for some, but could actually be more harmful for others.

You won’t have a hard time finding a short list of people that say their gut issues when they went on the carnivore diet. It makes sense. The less inflammation you have by eliminating all the foods that causes inflammation, the less autoimmune symptoms.

And if you’re wondering, yes I have normal bowel movement and I’ve been on this diet for 3 months.

5. It’s easy to follow

I always like to say that adherence is everything when it comes to your success with whatever diet you’re following.

Nothing could be simpler than just having one rule. Only eat animals and animal products. Don’t eat plants or at the very least, eat the least toxic kind.

Optimal Carnivore Diet Macros

When you go carnivore, you honestly don’t have to worry about things like macro ratio too much.

Your goal is to eat 0.8 grams of protein per pound of lean body mass.

Because fat is more calorically dense, it usually works out to be a 2:1 fat to protein ratio. But don’t be married to that.

If you’re eating burger patties or fatty cuts of steak, and not going out of your way to eating lean cuts of meat, your macros ratio will naturally take care of itself.

Different levels of the carnivore diet

Let’s call the first one a strict carnivore diet where you just eat animals, but no animal products like dairy.

If you have serious autoimmune issues, you should probably start with this version. And then slowly introduce animal products back in.

Next is the standard carnivore diet which I described at the beginning of this video where you’re eating animals, and animal products like dairy if you’re not lactose intolerant.

The last one that I personally follow is the carnivore-ish type of diet. Again, credit goes to Dr. Paul Saladino for that term. He’s one of the biggest reasons why I’ve transitioned to this diet. I’m a big fan of his work.

This is the sweet spot and where most people are gonna find themselves. You make animal foods a big portion of your diet and only eat plants that are the least toxic.

On the more toxic side are seeds because those are literally the plant babies. Think about it. Your stomach literally can’t digest it when you eat them. And they’re filled with anti nutrients.

Seeds also include grains, nuts, and legumes. You should also avoid sweet fruit. As well as any plant from the night shade family.

Moderate toxic plants are things like tubers and berries.

While the least toxic ones are non sweet fruits like avocado. Again, credit to Dr Paul Saladino for that information. You should read his book if you really wanna dig into the science and studies why this diet works.

How do you get started properly?

Before we get into the actual steps, let me just give you the pre-requisite.

You need to be fat adapted first

This is key if you wanna have a mostly seamless transition.

If you’re currently eating the standard american diet which is a high carb diet. Oftentimes people on SAD eat a mind blowing 300 grams or more of highly processed insulinogenic carbs daily.

If you go from that to a zero carb diet which is what the carnivore diet is, it’s gonna come as a complete shock to your system.

You’re gonna have massive sugar cravings, headaches, you’re gonna be hangry, you’re gonna feel lethargic, which are all symptoms of the keto flu.

You experience those things when you go from SAD to a ketogenic diet. The symptoms could be even magnified if you go from SAD to carnivore.

You’re not a light switch. You’re more like a radio knob. There are levels to this.

I recommend switching to a low carb/ketogenic diet first for at least 3 weeks. That’s the average time to get fat adapted.

I’d even give it a full month just to give yourself more wiggle room before switching to a carnivore diet. You’re gonna have a much smoother transition that way.

You can also expedite this process a little bit faster if you do fasted workouts to drain your glycogen stores a lot faster and violently recalibrate your hormones back to it’s original healthy setting.

You need to fully commit

Don’t just do it for a week and say it didn’t work for you. You need to let your body go through that adaptation process and then you can make an honest assessment afterwards.

Give it at least 30 days. And yes, this is another 30 days on top if you’re transitioning from SAD.

If you’re already following a low carb/ketogenic diet, then it’s just the 30 days.

Now, depending on where you’re at with this, this is gonna be different for everyone. Think of it like a spectrum. If you’re trying to heal an autoimmune disease, then go with a strict carnivore diet for maybe for a week or two.

Then maybe switch to a standard carnivore diet where you include eggs and some dairy. Just add them slowly so you can pin point food intolerances.

I can almost guarantee that you’re gonna be unrecognizable in a good way if you see this through for 30 days. Heck, it might even change your life.

Try to do this with a friend or a family member so you can get someone to hold you accountable. You can also join Facebook groups.

Personally, because I’m not trying to heal an autoimmune disease. So I’m on a carnivore-ish type of diet 90% of the time. The other 10%? I eat whatever I want. I love cheesecake.

Now you might be wondering, why is it that some people tolerate antinutrients in plants just fine while others don’t? That’s where bio individuality comes into play.

Again, think of it like a spectrum. Not all plants are bad. I’m not saying you should never eat plants. A lot of people have the genetic ability to eat avocado, broccoli, or mango and be just fine.

Some people might not be able to tolerate plant foods. If they eat a tomato or cheese, they get eczema or trigger other autoimmune issues.

The only way to find out is by using a carnivore diet as your template and slowly introduce some of these foods back to your diet. Do you see what I mean here?

The quality of the meat that you eat matters

There is a big difference between the nutritional profile of grass fed and grass finished beef versus grain fed meat. So try to buy the highest quality meat you can afford.

But as always, there are levels to this.

If you go carnivore but you can only afford grain fed meat, that’s totally fine. That’s where I started. It’s still gonna be infinitely better than the standard american diet.

Also, what you can do is buy a leaner cut of meat that’s cheaper and add grass fed butter as your healthy fat.

You can also buy in bulk. And that’s what I do in Canada. You can also go to a farmer’s market and connect with local farmers in your area that raises grass fed and grass finished beef. You can even just do a quick google search.

Also, did you know that meat raised from regenerative sources is actually carbon negative?

This picture is actually pretty telling about the real cost of a vegan diet.

And again, this doesn’t have to break the bank for you. Think about it this way. Because you’re always satiated, you can seamlessly pair the carnivore diet with intermittent fasting. You eat less frequently. You automatically save money. Which you can then use to buy higher quality food.

Less, but better. I think it evens out doing it that way. But I will cut cost on everything else in my life except for the types of food I put in my body.

Because your health is absolutely worth. I mentioned this in one of my other videos but the number one cause of bankruptcy in the U.S. is health care cost. People getting sick and not being able to pay the bills.

Your health should be your number one priority. You only get one body and you have to live in it. You might as well take care of it.

This might be favourite quote to sum up the carnivore diet.

Steaks aren’t always cheap. But they’re a whole lot cheaper than a lifetime of healthcare expense and medications.

As always, if this was helpful, share it with a friend who could benefit from it as well!

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