👨‍🍳 The MF Kitchen #60 - your diet is lying to you


Hey Reader!

In the 60th issue of The MF Kitchen, you'll slice into the details of:

  • Recipes for my 12” Buffalo Chicken Pizza and Nutter Butter Protein Dessert Snack Cups!
  • You can eat the fruit stickers? But probably shouldn't...
  • My take on Keto (and why your scale is lying to you)...
  • What is the best peanut butter cup? Here's my opinion after buying them all...

Preheat your ovens


Weekly Recipe Roundup 🍽️

12” Buffalo Chicken Pizza

This Buffalo Chicken Pizza is only 863 calories with 112g protein!

For context, if you got this from Dominos, it’d be 2833 calories…

Click below to download the recipe and make it easy yourself:
12” Buffalo Chicken Pizza.pdf

Nutter Butter Protein Dessert Snack Cups

A delicious low-calorie, high-protein snack that only takes 5 minutes to make!

Amazing for sweet treat meal prep!

Click below to download the recipe and make it easy yourself:
Nutter Butter Protein Dessert Cups.pdf


Recipe Recreations Of The Week 🤌

Biscoff Protein Ice Cream

Macros for the WHOLE Pint w/mix-ins:
400 Cals, 35g Carbs, 12g Fat, 38g Protein

Here's the recipe and video:
👉 https://www.instagram.com/p/C0R2881uYEi/


Zach's Beats 🎧


Weird Food Fact 🤓

You ever grab an apple, take a bite, and realize... crap... you forgot to peel off the little sticker?

Instant mini panic.

Do you spit it out? Or just commit and pretend it never happened?

Well here’s the wild part… it doesn’t even matter.

Because they’re actually edible.

Yep. FDA-approved and everything (since the early 90s).

So technically, you could chew one up and swallow it without any issues (not that I’m saying you should (it's basically a tiny paper label with glue)).

Now, does this mean you should start sprinkling fruit stickers on your oatmeal like sprinkles? Probably not.

But if one sneaks past your quality control, you’re not doomed.

Just one more weird fact for your food knowledge bank. You're welcome.

And if you have never done this with the sticker on a banana, idk if we can ever be friends 🤣


One FAQ ❓

Question of the Week:
“Have u ever done keto? I'm asking bc I'm deciding whether to go back to eating carbs. I've been hesitant bc I put on weight suuuuper fast. Just wondering what ur take on that is.”

Answer: I personally have never done Keto. Not something I’ve ever had the desire to do nor have I seen anything conclusive to say it’s superior to any other calorie-controlled diet.

But let’s say Keto was a superior diet. I still wouldn’t do it just because it wouldn’t be sustainable for me.

I love carbs.

I love a balanced macronutrient approach.

And my results are just fine with my current approach.

Plus, here’s a very very important point.

I have a feeling you and I share a common love for food (I don’t think you’d be here if you didn’t).

Keto is a diet for people who don’t love food.

It’s INCREDIBLY restricting.

Thus creating this weird relationship with food and then putting you in a “missing food” mindset that leads to a lack of control around those 'bad' foods.

Aka you are much more likely to binge eat on those foods when you do have them.

And let’s cover the “put on weight suuuuuuper fast” part.

Keto seems like magic for most when they first start because of two reasons:

1.) They were eating like shit prior aka consuming a ton of calories.

They then move to a restrictive diet like keto with limited food choices so as a by-product, they eat less.

And they are motivated or they wouldn’t have started the diet. This means they actually follow the rules (until they don’t but let’s not go there lol).

2.) Water weight.

When you first start keto, you're not only eating fewer calories but you're also eating virtually zero carbs.

So what happens is you’ll lose a ton of water weight to start thus making the scale weight go down.

“Holy shit this is magic!”

But the scale is lying.

Not about your body weight.

But about your body fat.

Here’s how:
Carbs hold more water weight than fats.

For every gram of carbs you consume, it can hold approximately 3 to 4 grams of water.

For every gram of fats you consume, it can hold approximately 1 gram of water.

So you could lose 3-4 lbs right away but it’s just water.

Moral of the story is…

The best diet is the one that you can adhere to.

All macronutrients (protein, carbs, fats) play very important roles.

A balanced macronutrient intake I believe is best and most sustainable for long-term fat loss.

And most importantly, keeping that fat off.

Here’s a graphic I made to illustrate another way keto makes you lose weight. It’s not “Ketosis” that’s for sure.


Serving Surprise 😮

What is the best Peanut Butter Cup?

This is a question I asked myself recently when I started recipe R&D on how to make a macro-friendly version of them.

So of course, I went and bought every single version I could find lol.

I wanted to weigh the pros and cons of all these options for taste, volume, and macros.

And then see if I could get the best of all three in a homemade version.

I thought I was going to review each one individually but that would mean this section is extremely long.

And to be honest, there is no need.

I’ll save you the time with a list of the key takeaways:

  1. Idk if it’s because I am getting old but I liked the darker chocolate variations better than the milk chocolate 👴🏻
  2. The lower calorie options were simply lower calorie because they were smaller. Each was around 80 calories per cup BUT each cup was only 14g-15g which is about 7g smaller than their higher calorie counterparts.
  3. I am 99% positive all the lower-calorie ones came from the same manufacturer because every cup looked the same.
  4. Net Carbs is such a scam so don’t believe the claims made on the labels. Treat carbs as a carb and a calorie as a calorie.
  5. I expected there to be a huge difference between how much I enjoyed each one. Nope. I swear I remembered a Reese’s tasting better than that.

So last but not least, here's what mine looked like:

It weighed in at 32g per cup (a Reese’s is 21g per).

Still ironing out the recipe but it’s around 100 calories (less than the Reese’s) but with more protein.

Will share it with you here soon once I finalize it!

Making these at home is so easy btw. Takes like 5 minutes to prep 12 of these cups.


“Convenience is always more high calorie.”

This is a phrase that’s a prime example of the peanut butter cups above.

Homemade will always yield the highest volume of calories with the best macronutrient breakdown.

I know it’s annoying to have to cook sometimes.

But if you truly want to put dieting in EASY mode by eating delicious foods with insane macros, it’s the answer.

And here’s the punchline.

This skill lasts a lifetime.

Thus so will your results.

Rooting for you!

Your friend,
Zach

113 Cherry St #92768, Seattle, WA 98104-2205
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