As a general rule, I go for proteins, fats, anything green, veggies, cruciferous vegetables. I don't eat a hell of a lot of carbohydrates. Today we're going to break down Anthony Starr's diet. What he did for the boys. Now the interesting thing is, Anthony Starr's a healthy looking guy.
He's not overly jacked. He's, you know, wearing a muscle suit. But still, bottom line is, he had to get in shape for this. So I don't want to discount that. It's interesting, right out the gate, he talks about eating proteins, fats.
and veggies and not a whole lot of carbs. Now, I see this as a pretty common theme in Hollywood. It's kind of one of the quicker things to do for people where they probably reduce some water weight and whatnot.
But he goes into his diet in some decent detail. So let's go ahead and break it down a little bit more. I'm not afraid of carbohydrates, but if I do, it tends to be vegetable carbs as opposed to pastas and breads.
I just find that the inflammation of my body is reduced by a diet that is just mainly fats and proteins and veggies. Okay, first thing that I like that he said here is he's not carb-phobic, all right? Me as even a relatively low-carb person, I'm not afraid of carbs, right?
I treat carbs as a tool. I treat carbs as something that can be put into the diet. I treat them as something that in a lot of ways just helps me relax. I don't use them for performance.
Now we'll talk about this a little bit more as the video goes on because there's some evidence to back up the fact that carbohydrates and performance aren't as closely tied together as we thought unless high volume is there, right? We'll talk about that a little bit more. But the interesting thing that he says that I just want to make a little correction on is he does mention that he finds the inflammation is reduced in his body when he cuts down the carbohydrates.
Now I understand what he's trying to say there. What he's getting at is he's talking about probably the water retention. He's probably talking about some of the puffiness.
That's not uncommon when people reduce carbohydrates for a couple of reasons. For one, you hold less water. For every one gram of carbohydrates, you usually hold about 3.7 grams of water in the muscle, right? So he's probably slimming down. He might be just holding less water in general.
A lot of times when people are consuming carbohydrates, it's not the carbohydrates themselves, it's the kind of carbs they're consuming, right? They're consuming ultra-processed refined carbohydrates, right? that also have a lot of sodium, that are also just rapidly absorbed and may cause some effects there. But it's not to be mistaken with inflammation, right?
Inflammation occurs no matter when we eat anything, okay? There's an inflammatory response. There's chronic inflammation, which is much more of a pathological thing, right?
It's like that becomes more chronic and is an issue. And it's a real issue that is sometimes, sometimes curtailed a little bit by reducing carbohydrates. But for the most part, I can tell what he's referring to, and that's not...
necessarily what he means. He means that he's reducing some of the water, but that's a very easy mistake if you're not in the industry. And a lot of avocado. Avocado is a superfood, as is broccoli.
So broccoli and avocado are my go-tos. The funny thing here, now I'm not just trying to toot my own horn, is I would consider these two of my top superfoods. I would also add berries into the mix there, usually blueberries, right? But sulforaphane in broccoli? Now a lot of vegetables do have some anti-nutrients in them, right?
So it can be problematic. when you're looking at things like oxalate buildup, but it's not usually enough to offset the positives of vegetables, right? So I'm very pro-veggies.
But when you look at broccoli, broccoli is interesting because it's a relatively low anti-nutrient count, it's a relatively low oxalate count, and it's extremely high in sulforaphane, which has tremendous free radical fighting properties. So broccoli is probably one of the most powerful veggies that you could consume from that perspective. What else is interesting is a lot of times if people are consuming higher amounts of broccoli, sometimes they will notice that water retention goes down. And that's because of something that is called indole-3-carbinol or diendolmethane, which is in broccoli or cruciferous vegetables. He mentions a couple of times in this video, cruciferous vegetables.
So aim in on the broccoli and then the avocados. People look at avocados because sure, healthy fats, but what they don't is that you also have lutein-z-xanthin, really powerful free radical fighting antioxidants, but the monounsaturated fats in avocado make it a very stable fat. So a big fan of avocado oil, big fan of avocados to begin with.
So he's already off to a great start. Let's see what else he's got. I tend to avoid... Junk food as much as possible, although there is, I'm not gonna brand name it, but there is one pizza joint set up by a nameless celebrity who makes the best gluten-free pizza I've ever had. Not that I'm a pizza aficionado.
Okay, it's not about the pizza. It's not about the eliminating junk food that I'm interested in here. I did notice that he says they make an amazing gluten-free pizza. Interesting, I don't have celiac, but I definitely noticed that when I consume gluten, I don't feel my best. And I'm not alone there, right?
So I'm not going to come at you with some like jumping through hoops, connect the dots reasons as to why. We shouldn't consume gluten, but I will go ahead and make somewhat of an anecdotal claim here. When I travel to Europe, I can eat gluten and not have digestive issues and not have joint pain. I don't have celiac, but when I'm in the United States, that becomes a problem.
Now, it could have something to do with the red wheat, the different wheat that's used there. There's also more regulations on the wheat. There's compounds in the U.S. wheat that aren't in the European wheat, but I don't know if that's really going to be enough to... pull that lever or not. Additionally, there's more sulfur in the soil in Europe, so maybe there's less what's called gliadin.
Anyhow, my whole point here is I caught that, and I don't know if a lot of people caught that. He's eating gluten-free pizza, so he doesn't seem to eat gluten. And from the research that I did, I don't see that he has celiac.
Now, I typically do recommend to people, hey, if you don't need to have gluten in your diet, maybe it's not a bad idea to remove it and see how you feel. Some people remove it and they're like, wait a minute, my IBS is going away, I just feel better. But again, it's up to the individual.
In the off-season, I'm much less conscious of shape and more conscious of what's going on internally and trying to stay healthy. It would look like some scrambled eggs, maybe a piece of toast, sourdough, and some avocado in the morning. Okay, I mean, I don't know the quantities there.
But we've got eggs, we've got avocado, we've got like some sourdough toast. And, you know, really, like we're not talking a gigantic breakfast there. The only critique I would make there is if you're trying to keep carbohydrates lower. Now, I don't know if he is. He did mention that he is.
One suggestion that I have for people is try stacking the carbohydrates towards the end of the day. It's not a must. You absolutely don't have to do it. But if you are someone keeping carbohydrates lower, there is some evidence.
It was a BMC genomics, I think, study that found that we have more of the genes that allow us to utilize fats and more caloric density in the morning. So it's actually possibly slightly better to skew most of your fat towards the morning and then taper carbohydrates towards the evening. which flies in the face of what a lot of people think because typically we think carbohydrates before bed are not good. I'm not talking before bed.
I'm talking with your last meal of the day, maybe a few hours before bed. So it's almost like start high fat, high protein, and keep the fat getting a little lower throughout the course of the day and slowly add carbohydrates as the day goes on. You might find your sleep improves, but also find that maybe utilization of those carbohydrates is better, but it's slitting hairs. I just mentioned this because I know he's a relatively low carb person. So it might make sense for him to restack where he puts that toast, but avocado toast with eggs is pretty awesome.
I would just make sure that you're having enough protein so that the protein is the staple there. The protein followed by the fats, followed by the carbs, sort of in that order of hierarchy. Okay, now let's see what he has for lunch. Anyway, chopped vegetables and hummus with some more protein and chicken breast or something for lunch. Okay, so he has some chopped vegetables, some hummus and some chicken for lunch.
Honestly, I mean, the one thing I do want to put out there, is if you are trying to have a healthier fat profile, and he's very, very conscious of longevity protocols. I've seen some other pieces with him before. One thing I have, concern I have with most store-bought hummus is if you look at most store-bought hummus, it's predominantly soybean oil or canola oil, or maybe the slightly better ones are sunflower oil, which I don't have tremendous issues with sunflower oil.
Where I have issues is with soybean oil and canola oil that's been sitting on a shelf. Basically oxidizing for however long, right? True hummus is made with olive oil, right?
Chickpeas, olive oil, some salt. That's really all there is to it. So whenever possible, if you have time, who has time? You know, in between my pedicures and my dog bathing appointments, you know, I make hummus, right?
Who has time to do that? But if you ever do have the time, make it yourself. Otherwise, just keep a conscious eye out for brands that are using olive oil. And at the very least, use ones that are using... olive oil, at least in the oil blend.
But be careful because a lot of times they'll say soybean oil, canola oil, and then olive oil will be down towards the bottom. But on the front of the label, they'll say made with olive oil. Now, I notice this happening with other kind of Mediterranean style foods too. I notice it with pesto a lot, made with olive oil, but it's actually like soybean oil or canola oil, which again, in small amounts, I don't think is problematic.
I don't think it's inflammatory. The problem is that they oxidize. They are polyunsaturated fats that are designed to be...
consumed in their whole food form in the food matrix quickly, not put into an oil and then sitting on a shelf for weeks or months, right? So try to get hummus that's made with olive oil. So if that's actually what he's doing here and he's having veggies and he's having hummus with olive oil and some chicken breast, that's like Mediterranean hitting the sweet spot.
Like that's exactly what I would recommend is something like that. It's like even down to what I suggested, it's like the carbohydrates are starting to creep in because chickpeas obviously have carbs, obviously have soluble fiber, but we're not going overboard on the carbs. That being said, I'm sure he's eating more than that, but this is a nice little breakdown of what he's having.
In the evening, try and keep it pretty light, so more chicken probably. My go-to is chicken. I sound like I'm working for a poultry factory, but I try and eat clean and lean through the week, but weekends, it's a little more anything goes, and I am a fan of burgers.
I have a huge problem with burgers, so Saturday night is me and me couch burgers. All right, he didn't really give us much there with dinner. He just said lean protein, so I don't know if he prepared for this at all or if he was just flying on a whim.
But again, I've done a number of these videos, and the thing that I can tell you, the thing that stands out. the most is lean protein becomes a staple for almost all these people. And say what you want, okay, in the Hollywood sphere, as extreme as things can be, as weird as things can be, sometimes as much drugs can be involved as far as performance enhancements and like body composition drugs. They're all there, but you cannot deny the fact that these people can change their bodies really quick.
And I know they have a lot of people helping them sometimes. But the common denominator almost always across the board is this lean protein thing, right? Now, I need to do some breakdowns on these people doing vegan diets and stuff so that I could really get a little bit more accurate with it.
But, you know, in this case, Anthony did get in really good shape, again, despite the fact that he's wearing a muscle suit. Then he talks about burgers and he says burgers is kind of a cheat meal on the weekends. What's interesting is if you look at a lot of like European or Mediterranean countries, like they do eat red meat. Like they make it sound like they don't eat red meat.
They make it sound kind of like red meat gets categorized as processed meat. But we have to be real here. Red meat is not processed meat.
Processed meat is truly processed. And there's a difference between processed as in like cured meats, like going through a curation sort of fermentation process, or ones that have a bunch of nitrates and nitrates and all kinds of stuff added to it and sodium benzoate. That's a whole different ballgame. Unfortunately, when you look at the data, they group red meat like good, wholesome red meat that's, in my opinion, like a multivitamin in with these processed meats, and that's not fair, right? So when you look at Mediterranean regions, a lot of them do consume red meat, albeit they consume it more sparingly than we might in the U.S., right?
Maybe it's a few times per week, and it's usually relatively lean. So the fact that he's eating burgers on the weekends kind of aligns with a more Mediterranean approach. It might actually make some sense.
I don't think he's trying to follow a Mediterranean approach, but everything he's doing so far is kind of Mediterranean. Even the avocados, which technically aren't Mediterranean, from a macronutrient perspective and a fatty acid profile, I still categorize them as like for macro micronutrients as a sort of Mediterranean food, even though they're not regionally a Mediterranean food. So the lean protein and then having the burgers on the weekends. Now, the one thing that I would say is a burger is not problematic until you're combining it with a bunch of soybean oil from mayonnaise, maybe a big voluptuous bun.
Like I often choose a burger without a bun as my option. So So clearly as he's relatively low carb, he knows that he can order it without the bun. I wonder if he realizes that he could have that cheat meal effect without having to go to town with a bunch of refined carbs during the weekend.
And he could just have that burger during the week a couple times and get his fix just without the bun. Go-to snacks. God, I'm going to sound like a typical actor. Like almonds, nuts, fresh fruit, things like that. God, I'm so dull.
Oh, I should make something up. All right. Almonds, other nuts, fresh fruit. I don't think there's a problem with that, but he says typical actor and I know this because that is kind of just the thing, like there's just a lot of nuts and I think sometimes it comes from just what's available.
When you look at like craft services and what's actually available for a lot of these people, it's not usually good when they're on set. So when they're on the set, they either have to have stuff custom kind of made for them or brought to them or they're limited to like what little things they can eat that are available via craft services. So all that aside, Like you see a lot of nuts and a lot of almonds and things like that consume.
Personally, I think combining nuts and fruit isn't really problematic. There is this thing that's called the Randall cycle, where you typically don't combine high amounts of fats and high amounts of carbs together. And I want to clear something up here. That's usually applied to like hyper palatable stuff. So if you look at a Twinkie, what makes a Twinkie a Twinkie?
Besides the fact that it's got cream filling, it's got... Refined carbs, so high glycemic carbohydrates and a high amount of saturated fat. Like the two things that especially in tandem are probably what make the standard American diet so terribly bad. Probably not the processed meat.
It's probably not some of the other stuff. It's definitely not the fruit. It's probably the combination of these hyper palatable things that metabolically especially combined could be disastrous, right?
Definitely an issue. Despite whether you look at calories in calories out, I don't think... these things together are good. So could the same apply to say almonds, which are high in fat, and fruit, which is relatively high in carbohydrates? I don't think so because that is something where when you look at the food matrix, the amount of sheer food that you can take in from almonds and fruit is not going to be the same concentration that you would get out of say a Twinkie or a Pop-Tart, right?
So I don't think the Randall cycle applies because the mixed meal effect of digestion, how long it takes to actually digest in your gut and then absorb, I don't know. by the time it's in your bloodstream, it's so separated that it's not problematic. So the rule of thumb or the issue or potential concern is that our mitochondria can only use one fuel source at a time.
So when we load up fats and carbs together, it's a problem. In this case, nuts and fruit, you see that in the Mediterranean a lot. You see nuts, fruit, cheese, like you see those kind of charcuterie even with some cured meats, right?
If I was in his position, I would probably If I was trying to cut fat, I would probably say, okay, nuts are probably not the best choice for me. Even though they're satiating, they're still calorie bombs. I'd rather just munch on the low glycemic fruit, like some strawberries, maybe some raspberries, maybe some blueberries, or I just have a simple protein shake or something in between. Now, in a second, he goes into his pre and post workout meals, which is really important for us to know, because for years, we've talked about the timing.
We've talked about how you add carbohydrates pre or add carbohydrates post to get the desired effect. So the fact that he's- double clicking on this for this interview was kind of cool. So I want to break that down. One thing I do want to note is during a workout, I prefer training in a fasted state. I prefer training on an empty stomach.
I'll just sip on some electrolytes. Maybe I'll have some black coffee before. Maybe I'll have an espresso or maybe I'll even sip on green tea, but I'll almost always have green tea during my workout and electrolytes during my workout. And obviously because I'm sweating, but usually on an empty stomach, I find the electrolytes kind of keep me satiated. So when you're reducing calories in general, try sipping on some electrolytes.
And I don't mean like a Gatorade. I mean like some good quality, like zero calorie or low calorie electrolytes. I put the ones that I use consistently down below. They're called Element.
So they're 1,000 milligrams sodium, 200 milligrams potassium, and 60 milligrams magnesium. They are really, really awesome. And they curb the appetite quite well. Plus the ratio is really good.
They're sodium centric, which is a lot better when you're sweating because you're losing so much sodium. But there's also some evidence to suggest that maybe the sodium curbs the appetite a little bit more based on these neurons in the brain called, in the hind brain called NST neurons. So I put that link down below. That gets you a free sample variety pack. So a free variety stick pack of all the different flavors with any purchase.
So you can buy their sparkling versions and then you get a free sample pack. You can buy anything and you get a free sample pack, but you got to use that special link, drinklmnt.com slash Thomas, which is down below. So it's just beneath this video in the top line of description.
for that free sample variety pack. If I'm going to do weight training, then I'll probably have some healthy fats or carbs beforehand, a bit of protein afterwards. I don't over exaggerate the intake of food because I'm not trying to gain any massive size at this point.
Okay, so he has some fats and some carbs pre-workout. One thing that I would suggest is, depending on what time of day you eat, if you can try to have two hours before your workout, That would be ideal. Like, so if you eat at 8 a.m., try to work out at 10 a.m. If you eat at 6 a.m., work out at 8 a.m. Like that two-hour digestion is pretty important, especially with fats, because the fats aren't really doing much for you during your workout, okay?
The fats are, I mean, they're gonna go into the bloodstream as free fatty acids. They're gonna probably go into storage. Don't freak out.
And then what's gonna happen is the moment you're kind of in a deficit, AMPK, phosphorylation occurs, those fats are going to come back into the bloodstream. Okay. So they do temporarily house in storage and then come back out.
And I was just talking to Dr. Tommy Wood about this. Like you eat fats, the fats kind of go into storage and then, and then are liberated. Right? So I don't think they're doing much for your workout.
So I wouldn't add fats for the sake of adding fats. Now he says he doesn't really put a lot of stock in it and he's not too worried about it, but there's also recent evidence suggesting that carbohydrates pre-workout don't do anything in the short term. So do not go out of your way to add carbs pre-workout, unless you're like. an athlete that's really pushing the volume or the time. So if you're a recreational lifter or worker-outer and you're just going into Gold's Gym for 45 minutes or 60 minutes, carbohydrates pre-workout may give you a little psychological effect, but having those extra carbs in the bloodstream isn't really doing much because you're pulling from the glycogen stores to begin with.
So you're kind of adding calories for calories sake, but you're also just adding glucose for glucose sake. I don't think it's going to impede fat loss. I think people that would say, hey, you're putting glucose in the sink first and it has to burn through that.
You're going to lose. incinerate that glucose so fast. If you do negate fat loss, it's to a negligible degree. It's just the matter of, is it worth the extra calories? And is it worth having something in your stomach?
Especially when you find like, hey, as long as you're somewhat fueled or fasted and very adapted to doing so, it's going to work out great for you. So I would say go ahead and give yourself some time and don't try to add specific carbs pre-workout. Protein post-workout is all that really matters. Carbohydrate backloading can be a tool if you are very low carb because it's a time that you could add more carbs and potentially suck it up more in a glycogen depleted state.
That is complex. In other words, it means like if you're very low carb and you work out... You deplete yourself so much that you send a signal that you will suck up the carbs a little faster. But unless you're depleted, the carbs post-workout probably aren't doing what we used to think they do. So the point is, just work out.
It really doesn't matter as much the carb timing as we once thought. Balance for me is a monthly thing. It's not a daily thing.
The toughest diet I've ever done for a role would have been preparing for season one for the boys, getting into that spandex, maintaining the exact same shape. Okay, two things here. One, he touches on maintaining, which is actually pretty easy once you get to it. But when you first change your body composition, maintaining becomes difficult because it takes roughly six, eight months to recalibrate to like a new set weight. So once you lose weight, take some time to recalibrate.
But he says one golden nugget here that I bet you casual consumers of this video didn't catch or didn't mean anything to them. He said, maintaining to me is, it's more about like what's happening on the monthly, not on the weekly. Thank you so much for saying that.
I've thought that for so long. Dr. Andy Galpin confirmed it when I interviewed him. It's like day over day over day, the calories matter, the food consumption matters, but it matters more over a week or over a month.
Like where are your net calories at the end of a week? Like, are you in a deficit today? Congratulations! Are you in a 200 calorie surplus? Boo hoo!
What really matters is where are you at the end of that seven day revolving period or bigger, wide scale, where are you at the end of that 30 day period? Because that is where things get really intriguing. Because that is where things really start to matter.
is when we look at that, the big picture. I would go for a really nice eye fillet steak, definitely from New Zealand. I like this guy.
First of all, he makes the subtle mention of New Zealand, where beef is typically more grass-fed. Now, what's interesting is if you get down to like the fatty acid profile on the surface, grass-fed, grass-finished meat, very similar to grain-fed. It's a small difference.
But when you get down to the nuance of like the C15, different types of saturated fats, significantly higher in grass-fed meat, and New Zealand is known for its grass-fed meat. So he says that. It has a different taste to it. It does taste different than some of the grain-fed stuff you might get elsewhere. I have no problem with grain-fed meat.
I used to kind of bag on it. I really don't think the whole you are what you eat ate thing applies as much anymore, knowing what we know now. But the fatty acid profile is definitely a little bit better in terms of grass-fed. You just have to watch out for what's called greenwashing. So when you look at a label, you should say grass-fed and grass-finished, not just grass-fed.
because that could mean that they just finished them on a little bit of grass. Bid is probably my favorite place to eat. There's nothing better.
It's to put on some kind of junkie movie, maybe a superhero movie. I love those pea snacks, wasabi ranch flavor, and some Diet Coke. That, for me and Bid, oof, heaven. So all in all, Anthony Starr's got a very well-structured, thought-out, Mediterranean approach, seems to be somewhat gluten-free or close to gluten-free, and...
really has it structured in such a way where he's able to maintain and that sustainability comes into play. One thing that I think he might get some benefit out of doing would be, hey, maybe put yourself in the occasional surplus so you can put on a little bit more muscle mass since it's clearly one of his goals to like put on muscle and also kind of lose fat for the role. I'd say if I was in his situation, I would put less focus on the carbohydrates, like peri-workout, so to speak, and a little more focused on say, hey, how can I add more resistance training in, keep my protein high, and keep myself in a little bit of surplus on some days, and then maybe use something like intermittent fasting a couple days a week to sort of offset the caloric surplus on the days that he's lifting more and wants more recovery. So as always, keep it locked in here on my channel, and I'll see you tomorrow.