If you’ve arrived here looking for information about the Bro Diet because you’ve only just heard about it then you’ve come to the right place. Even though it originated from the bodybuilding traditions of the 70s, the Bro Diet for weight loss seems to be one of the most talked about diet trends on social media at the moment.
It follows basic fundamentals for losing weight, and followers of the diet are vouching for its effectiveness, claiming that it has helped them stay in shape and obtain the body they desire. In addition, many found it to be very easy to follow.
So, what exactly is the Bro Diet, and is it good for weight loss? Read on to find out more.
What Is the Bro Diet?
In spite of the fact that it’s been around since the 70s I have only just heard about the diet! I hadn’t even done my nutritional training then and I didn’t need to lose weight.
We didn’t have the internet until the early 80s so the only way I would have heard about it in those days would have been in magazines or maybe gyms. No one seems to have written a book about it which I find a bit odd. I certainly didn’t hear about it on my Nutrition Course.
Doing some research into it recenlty I found out that it’s a dieting practice based on experience of the bodybuilding “bros” rather than science. It adheres to the macro count, forcing you to reach a calorie deficit until you start losing weight.
Related reading: The Paleo Diet: Beyond Calorie Counting
According to Jim White, a registered dietitian and certified personal trainer from Norfolk, Virginia,
“The Bro Diet includes many healthy whole foods like chicken, rice, vegetables, oatmeal, eggs and especially egg whites, and discourages consumption of saturated fat, sugar, and alcohol.”
Instead of following a stringent diet, the bro diet focuses on eating whole sources of protein, good carbs, and healthy fats to shed off your extra pounds.
It is an extension of the IIFYM (If It Fits Your Macros), which prioritizes the consumption of a certain number of macronutrients from different food groups throughout the day, helping you to practice food portion control.
What’s great about the Bro diet is that it’s super easy to follow since you do not need to follow definite rules. It gives dieters the freedom to choose the food they eat as long as it is clean and nutritious. They should belong to the whole food category and can fill up your macro count.
What To Eat on the Bro Diet?
The Bro Diet encourages you to fulfil your macro count to achieve your weight loss goal, similar to the If It Fits Your Macros diet. But unlike IIFYM, which encourages you to eat all kinds of food as long as it’s “within your macros,” the bro diet is a bit more restrictive.
The focus is “clean-eating” and consuming single-source macronutrient foods to fulfill your weight goals.
Related reading: What is a Macro Diet? Does it Work For Weight Loss?
The Bro Diet is all about meal preparation requiring you to plan and prep your meals in advance. Sometimes, as early as a week. In fact, what makes it an ideal choice for weight loss is its two rules – meal planning and portion control.
The typical foods included in the Bro Diet meal plan are lean protein and low carb sources, such as chicken, eggs, fish, brown rice, beans, oats, and whole wheat sources.
Here’s what to aim for on the Bro Diet:
- Protein of least 1 gram per pound of bodyweight. This will be your first caloric baseline to establish.
- 20% of your total calories each day should be healthy fats.
- Carbs make up the rest of your calories.
Related reading: How To Cut Out Carbs Without Going Full Keto
Some rectrict their diet to just chicken, brown rice and a couple of green veg like broccoli and asparagus. In fact you will find references to the chicken and broccoli diet as being the Bro Diet but it’s not good for a diverse gut microbiome to restrict the variety of foods you eat. Weight, as researchers are now discovering, can also be down to the bacteria that reside in your gut.
Benefits of the Bro Diet Meal Plan
By keeping track of your macros and calorie count, the Bro Diet encourages dieters to adopt portion control by eating only a restricted quantity throughout the day, eventually resulting in weight loss. In fact, studies claim that following this diet plan for a straight thirty days is an easy hack for weight loss.
Related reading: How to Calculate Macros for Weight Loss
But, aside from helping you to lose weight, many other benefits come with the Bro diet meal plan.
1. You Can Eat a Greater Amount of Food
You can eat more food if you’re on the Bro Diet, so it’s not as restricted as other popular weight loss diets. For instance, a typical Bro Diet meal plan can consist of 6 oz chicken breast, a serving of asparagus, and one whole sweet potato.
This meal is low in fat and contains around 300 to 400 calories. It’s already enough to fill you up, unlike other food with about the same calories, such as unhealthy Pop-Tarts.
2. A Bro Diet Meal Plan is Micronutrient Dense
While the IIFYM diet offers similar weight loss results to the Bro Diet, it includes processed foods with little to no micronutrients.
In the Bro Diet Meal Plan, most foods are rich in nutrients, such as sweet potato, which is naturally high in pro-vitamin A and Vitamin C. It’s also a good source of riboflavin and niacin.
While sweet potatoes and cereals may be somewhat similar from a macronutrient standpoint, there’s no way they both have the same micronutrients.
3. Easy To Prepare
One of the reasons that many are drawn to the Bro Diet is that it’s easy to prepare. You can prepare a Bro Diet meal plan for an entire week in a single cooking session. The diet’s simplistic nature allows you to stay on track since you will know ahead of time what you will eat.
4. Offers Health Benefits
Aside from helping people to lose weight, the Bro Diet also comes with other health benefits. It only requires you to eat whole, unprocessed, and highly nutritious foods.
Eating processed foods can lead to heart diseases, high blood pressure, and heart attacks. But if you follow the Bro Diet and eat simple, whole sources of protein, good carbs, and fats, you can lower your risk of developing serious illnesses. Just make sure that 90% of your diet consists of whole foods.
Bro Diet Versus Low Carb Diet
Perhaps, you are following a low carb diet like keto, and you’re considering switching to the Bro Diet. Before you do so, it’s worth knowing the difference between the two.
The Bro Diet is not a low carb diet, as it allows you to eat carbs. However, you’re only allowed healthy carbs or whole grains. Examples are sweet potatoes, brown rice, oats, and whole wheat pasta. These foods are not suitable for the low carb diet, especially the ketogenic diet.
If done right, the Bro diet can help you achieve your ideal weight as the low carb diet does. However, they have totally different approaches.
Final Thoughts
If you are following a weight loss diet but are not getting your desired results, you can experiment with the Bro Diet, as it might be the diet that can work for you.
The diet is not as restrictive as a low carb diet, which obviously requires you to restrict your carb consumption. You only need to focus on eating whole foods and develop solid meal preparation practices. If you live a busy lifestyle and don’t mind preparing your meals ahead of time, the Bro Diet might work well for you.
