Tag: Meal Replacement

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Weight Loss Exercise

Quest Natural Protein Bar Review


Quest nutrition sent me a box of their protein bars a little while ago to try out and I have to say that I really enjoyed them.

I have eaten protein bars on and off for years and they certainly are a great way to keep your nutrition up and to recover from workouts so over the years I have tried dozens of different bars and am proud of it. A good protein bar will fill me up and aid me in recovery from exercise and depending on the size they tend to be low in calories

If you want to know more about the Quest protein bars in particular I can tell you that they are very good. When shopping for bars in the past I have found that the protein bars that you buy at your local grocery store are usually made from pretty poor quality ingredients. Usually you will find bars with crappy quality protein and sweetened with sugar, not much better than a candy bar.

Is the Quest Natural Protein Bar Good for You?

Quest Natural Protein Bar ReviewHonestly, no one in my house likes protein bars so I got to eat them all (except two) and firstly the flavor was very good. Usually protein bars come in chocolate or some kind of chocolate variation but these bars came in flavors like apple pie, cinnamon roll, coconut cashew, and Strawberry Cheesecake. I have been nervous to try the Strawberry Cheesecake protein bar since I don’t like cheesecake. All of the bars that I tried tasted really great.

Next is the fillingness of the bars. One of the reasons that you are eating a bar like these is to try and use it as a meal replacement and the reason that a chocolate bar or other snack is not a good meal replacement is two-fold, first the nutrition is not usually there and secondly it does not fill you up. The Quest Natural Protein bar is very chewy so it takes time to eat and has 17 grams of fiber so it is filling for a longer time.

I am not saying here that you should live on protein bars, we all need fruits and veggies and the micro nutrients that come from the fresh food that we eat but these bars are great for post workout muscle repair and I find that instead of looking for crappy food to eat these bars come in handy.

So going back to my earlier point about the crap nutrition that most protein bars have I can tell you that the Quest Protein bars are quite a bit better, unbelievablly they have things like almonds, strawberries, and whey protein in them so they are definitely more healthy then some gunk made in a lab instead of food based products.

Do I recommend these Protein bars?

The bar I have in my hand right now is the Strawberry Cheesecake and it is 60 grams (a normal candy bar is about 45 grams), and it has 20 grams of protein which is a meal worth, and is a total of 160 calories. Plus this bar has 17 grams of fiber which is the amount an average American gets a day total even though we should be getting more like 35-40 grams. So nutritionally this is pretty packed with nutrients.

I was not really sure if I was looking at the Quest Nutrition Protein bars as a normal person would, and by normal I mean someone that has not eaten a lot of protein bars in the past so I started looking at reviews and it seems I am not alone in my love for these bars. They taste great, they are filling as a meal replacement, and they are good for you as well.

I have to say that I am very thankful that these guys turned me on to their bars, the Quest Natural Protein bar is great and great for you

Burn the Fat Feed the Muscle
burn the fat feed the muscle is an exercise and diet program. My review of Burn the Fat shows that it is designed and written by an ex-pro natural bodybuilder but is a system that was written for regular guys and gals. Teaching you how to workout and eat to lose weight.

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Weight Loss Exercise

Visalus – Body by Vi




Visalus has become a very popular meal replacement program that is also marketed as a lifestyle choice. Very popular is an understatement with people becoming passionate about the product and the sellers of the product bringing in lots of celebrity sponsors to help promote.

So what is Visalus exactly?

Visalus Body by ViVisalus at it’s core is a powder that is used as a meal replacement that is used to replace your breakfast and lunch or on maintenance just one meal. There are several different plans depending on your goals including a Visalus Balance Kit, Visalus Shape Kit, Visalus Core Kit, Visalus Transformation Kit, and Visalus Fit Kit.

All of these kits have the core 2 lbs bags of the shake mix and flavorings but as you go up in price and program you get more bags of the mix plus more vitamins, minerals, and even energy drinks.

I want to just focus on the Visalus Shape Kit as this was the one that my wife has tried out.

Visalus Shape Kit info

Visalus Body by Vi

Visalus Shape Kit

Here is where the real info starts. My wife heard about the Visalus program a few times and finally took the plunge buying the Shape kit which is basically two 2 pound bags of the shake mix along with some flavoring packets. This package costs $99 for about a months supply of breakfast and lunch replacement (actually it last longer than a month which is kinda nice) so the cost per serving is about $1.50 each.


The drink itself tasted pretty good, I tried sips of my wifes drinks a couple of times and yes it does taste good depending on what you add to it. The flavoring at the core of the shakes is just vanilla and you mix it with milk or almond milk as well as whatever you would want (everything you add is a calorie though, remember). There is a great support system that gives lots of people lots of ideas as well.

The Protein to Carbohydrate to Fat mix is high on the protein side which I personally like at a ratio of 12-9-2.5 grams per serving and since you will be likely adding fruit to it you will have a higher amount of carbs as fruit is mostly water and carbs.

Visalus 90 Day Challenge

To be really clear this Visalus system is not just about the shake, there is a 90 Day Challenge where you take a before picture, an after picture, and chart your weight loss and body size changes and your goal is to make great changes in 90 days. I really love this as everyone may want to lose weight but they really don’t have any clear goals or timelines  90 days is a nice long enough time to change your habits and life and see results with any changes that you make.

The company tends to be a bit heavy handed with this and I can imagine that since people lose and change at different rates that it can be very discouraging if you are not losing weight as quickly as other people are, again the weight loss industry is full of the “look at me, I won” kind of mentality that a lot of people will just cringe at.

Along the same lines as this there is a few support forums where people will help each other out and share their favorite shake recipes (My wife was addicted to finding new ones all the time) and that support system really helps anyone that gets involved and interacts.

The Dark Side of Visalus

Nutritionally Visalus is always pushing the fact that the nutrition in their drinks is ridiculously high in nutrients but really the a couple of great posts seem to tell us a different story. Sheleana at Young and Raw who I really like does not like the obviously processed and not natural part of this product. On the nutritional side Graeme from Graeme Thomas Online did not at all like the nutrients in comparison even to cheap multivitamins.

Anyone that has seen or been involved with Amway or any other multilevel marketing system will recognize the business side of Visalus. I am not a bit fan of multilevel marketing but it is highly ingrained as part of the Visalus system. As a user of the product you can opt into being a promoter and the more that you sell and the more product that people you recruit sell the more money you make. The rewards can be very very high and because of this you will always find people that are really aggressive in promoting and selling the dram of the product sales.

This is just a marketing system where the money that would go into marketing the product on TV or other media is replaced by putting that money into the hands of the distributors. Trouble is this always comes across to me as greedy and opportunistic even if this is not the way the person selling the product to you is really like.

One other problem that we have found with Visalus is that if you do not make it very very clear that you want to cancel you will be charged every month and get a new months stock sent to you. We accidently didn’t cancel and after trying and trying the company finally found room on our credit card and charged and shipped another months supply, guess it is our own fault but it had been a few months since my wife had tried the product the first time. She doesn’t mind doing another month though anyway.

Should You Try Visalus?

I am not sure if this is the product for everyone but there are a few things that I really like about this product.

First the idea of serving sizes is foreign to almost everyone, we all end to eat too much per meal unless we are careful. The other great thing about this product is the fact that it seems to be filling, tastes good, and will boost your energy and cut sugar cravings, at least that is what my wife found.

On the bad side is that nutrition. I have found at least a couple of reports that show the nutrition may not be all that great but please don’t look for yourself as Google seems to be ranking only the pro-visalus side in the rankings lately and it took me pages of results before I could find not biased info.

So balance this as you would like. I think if you are looking to jump start a weight loss plan then this may be a great start but in the end I always like to make sure that people are eating as many whole foods as they can to stay in shape or get in shape and more importantly stay healthy.



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Categories
Weight Loss Exercise

Day 2 and Go to food and exercise



Well I seem to have somewhat snapped and made this blog about me as much as you…maybe even more me. But today is day 2 of my 30 day fitness challenge and I want to keep you up to speed so that you can glean some of the things I am doing and hopefully they will help you too.

What did I do?

First of all yesterday I ate quite well except for an ice cream cone. Smoothy for breakfast, left over chicken and asparagus for lunch, and chicken and a veggie stir fry for dinner. And lots of fruit and water throughout the day.

And for exercise a long bike ride to just chill and get myself ready for the week this week.

Today I am back to Oatmeal for breakfast (steel cut oats just take too long) and I had some home made pizza for lunch before a killer chest, shoulders, triceps workout. I am feeling pretty good and am really tuned in to everything to make sure I don’t slip at all. I hope you didn’t notice but I never made any goals for these 30 days even though I will ramble on and on about how important they are. I think my motivation is really strong since a few thousand people arrive here at the blog every day to keep me in check.

Go to Foods and Exercise

One thing I was thinking about today was riding and oatmeal, and yogurt. I always have my go to foods of oatmeal, protein powder, and a fridge full of fruit so I never have an excuse not to eat well. I hate yogurt but most people really like it and it is a super easy and fast meal replacement if you add some fruit, try the Greek yogurt since it is higher protein and stay away from the yogurt high in sugar or high fructose corn syrup.

For exercise I always fall back on riding or weight lifting. I know there are a lot of types of exercise out there and some people may have another goto exercise like tennis or swimming but a couple is good enough.

I know that everyone runs into eating and exercise problems and when you get lazy or tired or just busy you don’t want to have to think about it you really just want to have go to foods and exercises that you can fall back on.

If I get stressed out I tell my bike I am going for a bike ride. If I am stressed out at work I go down to the gym and have a weight workout.

Same with food. There is no thinking in the morning for me, I don’t go to a coffee place so I know that it is Oatmeal and tea that I make and I do not get strayed off to bad eating decisions.

So try to think about these things. What can you rely on and what do you always have to fall back on?


Day 2 and Go to food and exercise, 5.0 out of 5 based on 1 rating

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