Wired to Eat: Turn Off Cravings, Rewire Your Appetite for Weight Loss, and Determine the Foods That Work for You Kindle Edition

While I love the concept behind this book, I wish that it had been executed just a little bit better. The first half is explanatory about why you should be eating this way and why the concept works. That's great, but very repetitive, with lots of salesy lines telling you why it will work if you just keep reading. I get that, only say it one or two times, not fifty, because I already bought the book.But the real failing is in the back of the book, where the explanation of how to eat paleo and how to test your blood sugar is located.I wish that instead of telling us so many times why this is good, Robb Wolf had spent some time explaining the HOW. If you are picking this up as your first guide to paleo, get a different one. It's not a fabulous explanation of how to go paleo and the instructions for how to test for blood sugar resistance and how to eat when paleo are limited.The key thing that should have made this book different, is missing, lots of talk about HOW to implement the program. I would have liked to have seen a better vegetable list, onions aren't even on there—even though they are used in the recipes. And if the editors had him cut down the list, then include a link to a site where you could get a complete list. I was left wondering if some typical paleo foods, like onions, were more high sugar than I thought and that he'd left them off on purpose. I had to dig to figure out he really likes them.I think having someone read this book who wasn't paleo and didn't understand how to implement the concepts would have been very beneficial.Having said that, I'm using different books on how to go paleo for resources, and then will test blood sugar resistance to starches as this book recommends. So, until someone comes out with a better how to, it's doable.

It seems to me that in writing Wired to Eat, Robb Wolf spent a great deal of time thinking hard about how to present his ideas in a way that will get traction with readers. It’s not so much a diet book but a book that takes a few steps back from the psychological and emotional gridlock involved in the subject and uses a language that is thoughtful, calm and with occasional bits of awfully brilliant humor, all the while presenting a smart case for how to think about food based on science and common sense. Remarkably, it’s both fun to read and vitally incisive. Wolf takes us along a line of thinking on why we as a society need to earnestly let go of the morality trap that so many people who struggle being overweight get stuck in—that being overweight is a failure of human willpower and character. Wolf painstakingly shows, through the lens of evolutionary biology, how the modern food industry (with the disturbing blessings of government subsidies) takes advantage of it (e.g. by employing food scientists that are masters of dialing up the hyperpalatability of junk food). As Wolf remarks in regards to the old potato chip marketing promise about how you can’t eat just one, “I’ll take that bet every time.” Last week I read an article on Politico on the obesity and in one of the photos was a six-year-old girl, overweight, who was being taught how to use a treadmill. I hope this book gets in the hands of those who were coaching her.In regards to the how-to in the book, Wolf again has thought and worked hard to present ideas readily grasped, make sense and are relatively easy to carry out. In particular, I like his food matrix approach to learning how to cook, where you use a chart with 20 ingredients and from there can whip up more than 600 meals that you can do well by rather than be overwrought by meal plans that always to have recipes where there are ingredients you don’t have or have never heard of. As far as fresh ground, Wolf has included a concrete pathway (using blood glucose tests) toward identifying foods that are going to cause you problems and those that you can get away with.This book is not a lecture-from-the-mountain-top sort of book on what the best diet is. It’s a smart reframing of the problems surrounding food in 2017 with some well-thought ideas on how to navigate through them and how sleep, exercise and stress figure in. It seems likely that anyone following the path laid out by Wolf is going to have success in feeling better, burning off excess fat and reeling in a good set of biomarkers. He does a good job of making this path feel accessible and fun to hop on.

The book is very well researched and written. Mr. Wolf has a fun tone and feels like an ally throughout the book. That said, I think the book would be confusing to someone new to the paleo/ancestral eating way of life, and I think it really falls down on its central promise. Most of the book is spent on background telling you why eating the standard American diet is bad and how it can hurt you (I'm pretty familiar, so didn't find anything new here, but again, it's well written and I know this is new news to much of America), and then there are some good recipes at the end.If this had been the promise of the book, that would have been fine, but the book touts the 7 day carb test and 30 day eating reset. Sure, they are in the book, but they are a mere 2 chapters! The 30 day reset is really unclear. What exactly am I supposed to do? Eat paleo-ish? It sounds like some alcohol is ok? Just preferably not at night? Again, for someone new to this way of eating, I think this would be VERY confusing without some more clear guidance and rules (something more like what whole30 offers). A clearer, black and white outline would help. Then, there's only ONE chapter on the 7 day carb test, and it's pretty thin. Taking my blood sugar would be a totally new step for me, and likely most Americans, and I feel really let down here. I wanted more background, process, coaching. More of a plan than to eat 50g of net carbs (again, confusing to a lot of people. Sure, there's a table with some foods, but since he avoids gluten, no dice in getting those numbers). I had to flip back and forth to try and remember what blood glucose level you want after testing as it wasn't all clearly outlined. I've heard he's working on developing a tracker/plan, but you think something like this would have coincided with the launch of the book.While the book is well written and probably generally helpful for someone new to this way of eating to start them on the journey, I was expecting more background, coaching, plans, etc. geared at taking my blood sugar. I know personalized nutrition is new, but I think more could have been delivered here.

I'm (or I was) a big carb lover. I usually started my day with coffee and almond croissant and I struggled to lose weight for years. I developed PCOS which made it even tougher with losing those extra pounds.I wasn't expecting anything before starting reading this book and this book promises great things: lose weight, feel better, have more energy, improved cognitive function you name it.So I decided to commit to Paleo principles for a month, no cheat days, keep up strictly with the plan and OH MY GOD it works. Within one month I went from size 14 to size 12 (a bit snug but hey, it still counts as 12!).I no longer feel sluggish and often wake up before my alarm clock (never happened before in my whole life).I feel more alert and energetic which really helped me increased my daily productivity because I no longer feel so dead tired in the afternoon.Also, my acne reduced considerably!I love that this book does not preach exclusive Paleo, it's very balanced and teaches you how to find a diet (as a lifestyle) that works for you. Give it a chance, you'll be amazed by the results that go way beyond mere weight loss.

I happened to find a video in which Robb Wolf was talking about "metabolic flexibility". He talked about the idea that no diet is perfect for everyone and that with a little bit of effort you can figure out exactly what does and doesn't work for you in terms of a diet and potentially avoid being super restrictive when it isn't always necessary or even effective.The information in the book is well written and it covers essential topics that everyone should be familiar with if they truly want to be healthy and happy. I was familiar with things like insulin resistance and gut health but reading this book really ties everything together in a way that means I feel like I have a decent understanding of my own health now. The book makes it quite simple to learn more about your unique nutritional needs and isn't just a diet book designed to get you from fat to slim for a while. If you can understand what you need you soon start to feel better and weight loss is just a side effect of being significantly healthier overall.

Really made me think about what I consume and has made me reconsider some of my choices. I have such a sweet tooth that I need to look at what makes me head for sugar so much. It is a well-written book - but I got mine on Kindle and wish that I had bought the book.

Full of information and explanations as well as honest views on what is not known. Easy to follow recipes makes it a winner for me.

Nicely written, researched and put together; a great 'go to' simple reference for anyone trying to understand their eating behaviour.