Even though most Birdy’s Health Dose readers want to lose weight, we have many requests from people looking for a fast and preferably healthy bulking diet.
Therefore, in this article, we offer you the necessary information to create a bulking diet yourself that will bring you the desired results quickly and in a healthy way!
Fattening, as a reverse process to lose weight, is a real challenge for the person, knowing that it is much more difficult to gain weight than to lose weight.
The term “bulk up” is often used in a bodybuilding context to describe the process of eating more food than usual to increase calorie intake and thus gain weight. This can be for several reasons, such as increasing muscle mass or simply gaining weight in general.
Successfully gaining weight requires a balance of macronutrients, micronutrients, and foods that deliver those in the most efficient way possible.
Macronutrients are proteins, carbohydrates, and fats. These three nutrients supply energy to your body through calories and help your body perform basic functions like moving muscles around.
You need all three of them in different amounts, which is why it’s important to maintain that balance when bulking up.
In general, a higher percentage of protein and carbohydrates will lead to more muscle development while a higher percentage of fat will lead to more weight gain.
Today I will show you how to bulk up fast and healthy, the top 20 recommended foods and vitamins + menus examples for the 3 main meals and snacks.
To gain weight, the person must first identify the cause or mechanism that produces the effects (the cause is resolved, not the effect). Specifically, the person must find out why they are unable to gain and maintain the desired weight.
Metabolic Balance
Metabolic balance is the body’s attempt to achieve an important balance between daily energy intake and daily energy consumption so that at the end of the day the two components are equal, and the practical consequence will be to maintain the same body weight (which remains constant).
Metabolic Balance is a plan that can help boost your metabolism, which will increase how many calories are burned each day. Your body burns more calories while resting than it does while exercising, so if you want to lose weight, one way of doing so is to eat right and build muscle mass.
You’ll also feel fitter and stronger as your muscles grow!
Energy intake
It is represented by the number of calories eaten in the form of food or drink from the menu of that day.
Energy consumption is mainly allocated to supporting basic survival functions (eg, respiration, circulation, thermogenesis, cell growth, and division), which are essential metabolic processes in life, in addition to other possible sources of energy consumption, such as would be a physical activity of different intensity, walking, housework, intellectual effort, pregnancy, breastfeeding, etc.
Possible causes for which we do not bulk up:
Bulking up is a slow process. It takes years of hard work and dedication to build muscle, and even then the results are not always perfect. Something that most people do not realize is that building muscle is so much more than just lifting weights.
You have to diet, eat right, sleep enough and make sure you are getting the proper amount of protein in your body. If you want to get big, it is going to take a lot of work and commitment.
In the case of skinny people who want to bulk up, the causes that determine this low weight and impossibility of growing on the scales can be related to:
1. A low or normal caloric ratio but related to too high energy consumption.
That is, they eat too few calories compared to how much their body consumes:
• small portions
• feeling full quickly
• lack of time allocated to meals (read more about The Importance of the 3 main meals a day)
• eat on the run
2. Extremely high caloric intake through a high basal metabolism
It can be genetically determined, inherited, or acquired pathologically or medicinally – for example in endocrinological disorders such as hyperthyroidism, or through extra-basal but high energy-consuming activities such as:
• sustained sports (lots of cardio)
• smoking
• increased coffee consumption
• increased alcohol consumption, which is also energy-consuming, etc.
3. There are also pathological situations.
These are related to various organic diseases such as irritable bowel syndrome, where the cause that determines the organic disease is identified and treated for an improvement in weight and nutritional status.
Due to these multiple possible situations causing the lack or difficulty of bulking, it is important to make a complete assessment of health on devices and systems, with specific analyzes, to properly address the cause and achieve the desired effect, namely the bulking.
Check Out This Professional Diet Plan Which Can Teach You How to Eat Correctly
Principles of a bulking diet:
A lot of people who start lifting weights want to put on muscle. While most people think of bulking up as a process where you just eat a lot and lift heavy things, there’s more to it. If you’re trying to bulk up, you need to take your nutrition seriously by following certain principles:
• Serve meals 5 times a day (3 main meals + 2 snacks), always at the same hours
• Include your favorite dishes in your menu
• After hearty meals, at least half an hour of siesta is recommended
• Before main meals, drink half a glass of vegetable or fruit juice – this will stimulate the appetite
Top 20 foods to include in your fast and healthy bulking diet:
If you want to bulk up fast and healthy, make sure you include all the foods below in your weekly menu, at least once! However, if you have an allergy or intolerance to one or more of these foods, avoid them!
1. Wholemeal pasta
2. Healthy vegetable fats and oils (monounsaturated) – rapeseed oil, grape seed oil, walnut oil, olive oil
3. Avocado
4. Walnuts and seeds – walnuts, brazil nuts, flax seeds, pecans, pistachios, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds
5. Muesli – whole grains combined with pieces of dried fruits.
6. Fresh fruits, natural juices
7. Protein bars
8. Dried fruits
9. Bitter chocolate
10. Drinks for athletes, with added vitamins
11. Homemade shakes in different combinations (for example, milk + bananas + berries)
12. Fatty fish – salmon, tuna, mackerel
13. Greek yogurt – to vary, you can mix it with pieces of fresh fruit
14. Eggs
15. Whole milk
16. Bananas
17. Butter – of animal or vegetable origin (such as coconut or peanut butter)
18. Beef
19. Wholemeal bread, with seeds
20. Grapes
Recommended vitamins for fast and healthy bulking
Do you eat a lot and not gain a gram? While many certainly envy you, you would feel much more confident in your image if you had 2-3, maybe even more extra pounds. Here are the vitamins you need to gain weight faster!
• B vitamins: they are essential for muscle development, but also for stimulating appetite. Foods rich in B vitamins are beef, eggs, fish, whole grains, and dried fruits.
• Vitamin C: strong antioxidant, which supports muscle recovery and development, as well as collagen formation. Foods rich in vitamin C are citrus fruits, parsley, broccoli, bell peppers, and strawberries.
• Vitamin D is difficult to find in the diet, and the best way to have the necessary vitamin D in the body is to expose it to the sun for at least 20 minutes every day. Vitamin D is found in moderation in foods such as salmon, mackerel, sardines, and tuna.
• Vitamin E is a powerful antioxidant that protects cell membranes and muscles. Foods rich in vitamin E are sunflower seeds, almonds, and hazelnuts.
My recommended supplements for bulking up:
Triple Omega 3-6-9, Heart and Circulatory Health, 200 Softgels
100% Whey Protein Powder, Double Rich Chocolate, 5 Pound
Examples of menus:
The following is an example of menus for the bulking phase. Bulking means that you have a caloric surplus and you are trying to gain weight. These example menus are designed to give you enough calories to gain weight without giving you too much fat.
They will also provide enough carbohydrates, proteins, and fats to keep your body in an anabolic state where it can build muscle while burning fat at the same time.
Breakfast:
• Omelete with mushrooms and bell peppers
• Tofu omelet and lettuce
• Protein smoothie
• Avocado toast
• Bell peppers with hummus
• Rye bread with peanut butter
• Yogurt with hemp seeds
• Bruschetta with ham and arugula
• 2 boiled eggs with wholemeal bread
• Cow cheese with honey.
Lunch:
• Baked sweet potato stuffed with quinoa and green onions
• Pan-fried vegetables
• Grilled turkey breast with rice or quinoa
• Wholemeal pasta with tuna
• Salad with feta cheese, nuts, and avocado.
Dinner:
• Salmon with broccoli garnish
• Green bean pods with vegetarian meatballs
• Falafel with taboo salad
• Risotto with vegetables
• Mushroom cream soup
• Pleurotus soup
• Broccoli cream soup
• Turkey soup with vegetables.
Snacks:
• Nuts
• Pistachio
• Almonds
• Caju
• Pumpkin seeds
• Beet chips
• Banana
• Protein smoothie
• Oats and peanut butter bars
• Mango
• Almond yogurt with muesli
• Grapes
• Oatmeal and banana muffin.
In general, you need to increase your caloric intake by at least 500 calories compared to when you started the bulking diet.
To make it easier to reach this number healthily, without overdoing it, you can drink a smoothie or protein shake after each meal, or instead of a snack.
Unhealthy bulking with high sugar products, or chocolate derivatives, creams, cakes, candies is not preferable because the risk of diabetes is high due to the aggressive effects on pancreatic function.
Honey and fructose derivatives can be used in addition to the regular diet, including a larger amount of fruit in the daily intake (3-4 servings/day), consumed in their natural form, not thermally processed.
Last Thoughts:
Many people want to bulk up and gain weight, but the process can be difficult to understand. General bulking diets often fall short of their weight gain goals, partly because they don’t take the body’s physiology into account.
To maintain a healthy body, you must consider the broader picture of your diet, including how it will benefit your mood, energy levels, and exercise.
The bulking diet is not an eating plan that you can follow for your whole bodybuilding career. It’s a strictly defined period when you’re trying to gain as much muscle mass as possible.
To build muscle, your body needs a surplus of calories to recover after each workout and build new tissue on top of that. The more calories your body has available, the more muscle you can build.
The goal of the bulking diet is to provide you with sufficient nutrients so that your body can increase its lean muscle tissue as quickly as possible without getting fat.
This means that we need to eat a lot of macronutrients and micronutrients (large amounts of protein, carbohydrates, and fat). In addition, we need to make sure our eating habits are optimal for building muscle mass.
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