Ray's take

When most people decide what to eat, it's primarily based on taste (and convenience).

When I decide what to put in my mouth, it's based on value. Value means how it tastes + health benefits (or lack thereof).

If you can decide what to eat based on value, it will make a massive difference for reaching your health objectives.

Who I am

I'm Ray, a doctor that is obsessed with making food tastier than any restaurant, while being 10x healthier.

What value means

Food has to taste amazing. That's a given.

If you want to reach your health objectives, you also need to eat things that help you make positive progress. Remember, nutrition is the bedrock of all health objectives.

Value comes from eating foods that taste amazing, and are healthy.

Can we really have both tasty and healthy?
YES. I've never been so sure about anything.

How?
The first is to shift your thinking for choosing what you eat from purely taste, to taste and healthiness.

Healthiness comes from getting macros that we need (protein and fiber), but those typically happen easily in this system. We'll address this later.

To optimize value, you are maximizing flavor and volume (for satiety), and minimizing calories.

Food value equation:

How much you eat = (How good this tastes) / (How many calories does this have)

Based on this equation:

I don't think its ever worth eating anything that doesn't taste amazing. Thus, within this context, we just need to make food that tastes amazing, that has low or medium calories, and eat those.

Cooking

To eat amazing tasting food with low calories, cooking is a big advantage. Here's why:

• Better Ingredients: You can buy better ingredients than those used at a restaurant. This is a huge advantage.
• Control Over What Goes Into Your Food: Restaurants often add a TON of extra fat and calories. By cooking yourself, you have full control over these aspects. This is huge.
• Portion Control: You can fully define your portions. For me, this means having MORE volume of veggies, which is huge for me.

Is it possible to order out and eat out? Yes

But I'd say most restaurants make good tasting food for med/high calories (and a high price) so its almost never worth it. I only eat at restaurants that I can't reproduce their best tasting stuff, but for way less calories (there are very few of these).

Next Steps

• Learn Low-Calorie Foods: Vegetables, which have a ton of fiber.
• Learn Medium-Calorie Foods: Lean proteins, which usually also include some fat.
• Learn Cooking Techniques: I will show you how, with a moderate use of healthy fats.
• Execute and Eat: Start applying what you've learned.

From here, you will make effortless progress toward your health objectives. I guarantee it.

Examples

Steak dinner

Our version:

• NY Strip Steak with mashed cauliflower and broccoli (Photo shows 1/2 portion)
• 500 cals // 10g fat

Cheesecake Factory version:

• NY strip steak with mashed potatoes and broccoli
• 1710 cals // 97g fat

We can buy a much higher quality steak, cook it perfectly, and pair with mashed cauliflower and an asian style broccoli that is so good. Can also make in batches so its easy to have for a 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th meal.

Value: Better taste with less than 1/3 the calories and ~1/10 the fat of cheesecake factory version (or any other steakhouse)

Links:
How to choose and cook steak

Taco night

Our version:

• Spaghetti squash bowl with seasoned ground pork, guacamole, salsa, and pico de gallo. Cauliflower and zucchini optional
• 500 cals // 10g fat

Cheesecake Factory version:

• Factory burrito Grande
• 1950 cals // 105g fat

We will get all the deliciousness we can handle with spaghetti squash as a base for our taco meat (which is so good and so easy to make). We get guac and salsa which are the perfect compliments. If you mix it all together, its so good and you will be so full.

Value: Better taste with ~1/4 the calories and less than 1/10 the fat of cheesecake factory version (or any other burrito place, though cheesecake factory seems particularly bad)

Links:
How to cook spaghetti squash

Stupid Ideas

Stupid: I don't want to learn how to cook
RW response: Did you read this article? Even more reasons why you should learn how to cook.

Stupid: I don't know how to cook
RW response: You can learn. I will teach you.

Stupid: I don't have time to cook
RW response: You can cook in batches so prep time will be faster than ordering takeout and way faster than going to a restaurant.

Stupid: What I cook won't taste good
RW response: Yes. It will. I'll show you how to make foods that are really hard to mess up. I guarantee I've taught people less proficient in the kitchen than you, how to make delicious, high value foods.