Disclaimer: The content displayed in the article is directly copied from boldanddetermined.com (which was closed down) to be available for those who are lookign for it.

100 years ago there was a great explorer named Vilhjalmur Stefansson who spent 11 years in the arctic.

For 9 of those 11 years he ate nothing but meat.

When he came back, the scientific community was shocked and they didn’t believe that people could live on only meat.

So they did a study. For one year Stefansson and another man, Karsten Anderson, were allowed to eat nothing but meat and drink only water.

At the end of the study these two men were evaluated and deemed perfectly healthy.

These are the reported results (from wiki):

There were no deficiency problems; the two men remained perfectly healthy; their bowels remained normal, except that their stools were smaller and did not smell.

Stefansson’s gingivitis disappeared by the end of the experiment although there was an increase in the deposit of tartar on his teeth.

During this experiment his intake had varied between 2,000 and 3,100 calories per day and he derived, by choice, an average of almost eighty percent of his energy from animal fat and almost twenty percent from protein. 

Daily intake varied from 100-140 grams of protein, 200-300 grams of fat, and 7-12 grams of carbohydrates.

100 years later we seem to have forgotten the work of the great explorer and we still believe we need vegetables and fruits and grains to be healthy.

After reading about the one year study, and after reading Steffanson’s own book Not By Bread Alone in which he chronicles his years eating nothing but meat, I was inspired to try it myself.

Personally, I found that my time eating vegetables, fruits, and grains produced profound negative results.

What I experienced profoundly changed my life.

I Ate Nothing But Meat for 35 Days. Here’s What Happened

What I ate and when I ate it

I ate between 3 and 4 meals each day. Mostly I ate 3 meals: breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I drank only water and black tea.

My daily meals were almost identical. I ate a ribeye steak for breakfast, I ate a ribeye steak for lunch, and I ate a ribeye steak for dinner. If I wasn’t eating ribeyes I was eating new york strips.

I ate the fattiest cuts of meat I could find. I paid very close attention to eating enough fat. This diet cannot work on protein alone, the fat is vital.

Here’s what happened to the explorer Steffanson when he ate only the lean meat:

At the researchers’ request, Stefansson was asked to eat lean meat only. Stefansson noted that in the North, very lean meat sometimes produced “digestive disturbances”.

Whereas Stefansson’s prior experience was that lean meat would lead to illness after the second or third fatless week, Stefansson developed nausea and diarrhea on the third day at Bellevue.

Stefansson attributes the fast onset of illness due to the usually lean meat that he was served versus the fattier caribou meat he consumed previously. 

After eating fatty meat, he fully recovered in two days. However, the initial disturbance was followed by “a period of persistent constipation lasting 10 days”.

The only time I craved “junk food” was when I did not eat enough fat. When I ate enough fat I craved nothing else.

I never once craved anything sweet after a meal and I had no problem eating fatty steaks over and over.

Regarding the eggs, I actually ate only the egg yolks, I did not eat any egg whites.

I cooked all of my food in butter. I even started putting butter in my tea, a trick I learned from a Nepalese friend.

In short, I was never terribly hungry and I never once felt unsatisfied.

My brain fog vanished 

The most profound impact the zero-carb carnivore diet had on me is that my brain fog completely vanished. Poof. It vanished into thin air.

I’d spent so many years riddled with a heavy afternoon brain fog that I was at the end of my wits.

Within just a week or two eating zero carbs I’d had the clearest head I have ever had in my entire life.

I credit this profound realization (brain fog is caused by carbohydrates) to my renaissance. Before, I’d be able to do great work only sporadically.

On all-meat diet I was able to write article after article and record podcast after podcast. In between doing the great work of B&D; I was able to read book after book and take page after page of notes.

Nothing was off-limits or overwhelming. Eating only meat gave me back the abilities of my own mind. Again, this is the most profound effect I noticed.

Belly bloat vanished (and facial bloat vanished)

Before this diet I was eating a somewhat standard diet which included both meat and carbohydrates.

My belly was bloated and often sore. It wasn’t fat but my belly would definitely protrude (during this time I took absolutely no bodybuilding supplements or fat burners). I was completely natural like everybody else.

After kicking carbs out of my diet my belly bloat completely vanished. The pain that I had nearly all the time in my stomach vanished. The nasty bloat sensation and the feeling of always needing to use the toilet but never evacuating fully vanished.

I did not lose any weight whatsoever. However, my body re-compositioned from skinny-fat and bloated to lean and hard.

I was never hungry, I never experienced a night going to bed hungry, I always ate until I was full and I never counted calories.

I did not start this diet simply to lose weight or get lean, I did it entirely for health. But being able to maintain a lean stomach and not have to be hungry was a great bonus.

Constipation vanished

During my 35 days of meat only I had zero fiber and I never poo-pood better in my whole life. I was never constipated and I was never bloated. I also never farted.

There were no issues with waste elimination. I would wake up in the morning and use the toilet like clockwork. My belly would be nice and lean for the rest of the day.

We’ve all heard about the need for fiber over and over. In my experience fiber actively HURTS, it does not help. I never had worse shits in my life than when I was eating a high fiber diet full of vegetables, fruits, and grains.

The “Hangry” feeling vanished

I had steady energy throughout the day, never experiencing lulls in energy.

My mood completely stabilized on this diet. I was never once angry.

In the past I would get angry over the smallest thing. It was like I had no control of my emotions. If I was hungry, get out of my way because I’d turn into Mr. Hyde.

Now? I am always calm, cool, and collected.  I attribute this to the complete lack of blood sugar spikes from not eating carbohydrates.

I often found myself smiling like a child after meals.

I have tried every diet in existence including intermittent fasting, vegan, vegetarian, bodybuilding low fat/high carb, all raw etc.

The all-meat, zero carb, carnivore diet is the only diet that has ever left me feeling satisfied and happy.

What about all the vitamins we need?

Humans cannot properly digest vegetation, which is why you fart so much after eating plants, beans, and other high-fiber foods.

Ruminant animals such as cows have different stomachs than us and they can digest vegetation.

Ruminants (e.g. cows, deer, goats, antelope, bison, buffalo, moose, giraffe, elk) have a specialized stomach for fermentation, which requires that they chew, regurgitate and chew their food (cud) again. We humans don’t do this (thankfully!).

(By the way, our digestive differences start in the mouth. Most ruminants have a thick dental pad they use to chew plant-based foods and they don’t have upper incisors.)

The ruminant has a stomach that is made up of four separate compartments, each with its own digestive function. After bacteria have done the job of fermenting cellulose, ruminants digest those bacteria in the fourth stomach chamber — the only enzymatic digestive chamber in their complex four-stomach system.

Unlike humans, ruminants do not absorb glucose from dietary carbohydrates via an enzymatic process. Instead, they get their energy from Volatile Fatty Acids (VFAs) through fermentation of fibrous and non-fibrous carbohydrates in the first two chambers and obtain the majority of their protein from the digested bacteria (i.e. microbial protein) in the fourth chamber of their stomach. (source)

In a nutshell, the animals eat the vegetation that we cannot properly digest and they turn that vegetation into vitamins. Then we eat the animals and get our vitamins that way.

As it turns out we can get all of the vitamins we need from meat, especially beef. In fact there are many B vitamins in beef that are not found in any plant foods whatsoever.

The following vitamins and minerals are abundant in beef:

• Vitamin B12: Animal-derived foods, such as meat, are the only dietary sources of vitamin B12, an essential nutrient that is important for blood formation and the function of the brain and nervous system.
• Zinc: Beef is very rich in zinc, a mineral that is important for body growth and maintenance.
• Selenium: Meat is generally a rich source of selenium, an essential trace element that has a variety of functions in the body.
• Iron: Found in high amounts in beef, meat iron is mostly in the heme form, which is absorbed very efficiently.
• Niacin: One of the B-vitamins, also called vitamin B3. Niacin has various important functions in the body. Low niacin intake has been associated with increased risk of heart disease.
• Vitamin B6: A family of B-vitamins, important for blood formation.
• Phosphorus: Widely found in foods, phosphorus intake is generally high in the Western diet. It is essential for body growth and maintenance.

Meat is our most important source of vitamins, our natural multi-vitamin. According to this study:

Meat has been a staple part of the human diet since the dawn of mankind, but in recent years there has been some debate over whether too much red meat can raise the risk of health problems.

Now a team of researchers has studied the issue of meat in the diet to help gauge just how important it is for a healthy mind and body – as well as the crucial nutrients that red meat in the diet brings.

The latest study found that data from dietary surveys indicates that UK diets for people of all ages can be worryingly low in nutrients normally found in meat, such as vitamin A, vitamin D, iron, magnesium, zinc, selenium and potassium.

The researchers say that integrating red meat into diets across the age spectrum, from infanthood to old age, may help to narrow the present gap between vitamin and mineral intakes and recommended levels.

In addition, there is emerging evidence that nutrients commonly found in red meat may play a role in supporting cognitive function, immune health and addressing iron deficiency.

Red meat – defined as beef, veal, pork and lamb, which is fresh, minced or frozen – is a source of high quality protein and important micronutrients.

Beef and lamb are classed as a ‘rich source’ – more than 30% of the recommended daily allowance (RDA) – of vitamin B3 (niacin), B12 (cyanocobalamin) and zinc. It is also a ‘source’ – 15% or more of the RDA – of iron, potassium and phosphorous. Pork is also a ‘rich source’ of vitamin B1 (thiamin).

Meat, particularly from grass-fed animals, can be a valuable source of long chain (LC) n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) such as omega 3 fatty acids.

Research shows that these fatty acids support normal foetal development as well as help lower the risk of inflammatory conditions, depression and dementia in later life.

Red meat is also an important source of haem iron – a type that is readily absorbed – and data shows that average iron intakes in the UK are inadequate, especially among females in general and during pregnancy.

“But my vegan friend said that meat is bad?”

The vegan diet is a form of eating disorder and your vegan friend is mentally ill.

All vegans are profoundly deficient in important vitamins and suffer from extreme malnourishment.

Meat and animal fat is a vital necessity for the brain.

When the brain does not get the nutrients it needs, mental illness appears.

Dr. Deans warns that many of the nutrients our brain needs are often found in meat and animal proteins. When our brain is lacking in these vitamins, the levels of glutamate in our bodies is lower, which causes an increase in feelings of depression, anxiety, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. When our brains don’t have enough zinc or iron, both of which we find in meat, then it’s expected that one can experience mood swings. Dr. Deans recalls that in the past she’s treated patients who believe they’ve had a panic attack but are really just experiencing iron deficiency.

These feelings can compound themselves even worse in vegetarians who are unsure what to eat and instead reach for white bread, rice, pasta, and cereal. Experts call this the “carb-itarian diet” and warn that the “resulting seesaw of blood sugar and hormone levels may lead to even more irritability, depression, and anxiety.” (source)

Carnivore Diet Results

The all-meat diet has profoundly changed my life for the better. I have never been so calm, so nourished, and so fulfilled.

I experience what people pretend to experience with meditation or religious/ritualistic fasting but I do not have to starve to achieve it. I literally eat as much as I want and I get nothing but good benefits.

I now have a deep understanding that we are meant to eat meat. When I look at grains and vegetables I don’t even see food.

Am I ever tempted to eat cheat meals? You bet I am. But I recognize that the desire for cheat meals is a mental desire caused by the addictive nature of most of our carbohydrate foods.

In fact, carbs fit the category of drugs better than the category of food. Actually, all of our medicines come from plants and high-sugar carb foods act exactly like drugs.

They get you high via a dopamine release and then a few hours later you get “hangry” and you desire more and more carbs.

You are never satisfied eating carbs the same way you are never satisfied with your intoxicating drug intake. It’s always more, more, more.

When I eat steak, I eat one steak and then I’m finished for hours with no cravings and no spikes in blood sugar or mood.

The benefits of the zero-carb diet far outweigh the cons.

Actually, the only “con” to eating this way is overcoming your own mind and using your own willpower and self-discipline to not eat these fake foods that get us addicted.

Foods like pies, cakes, breakfast cereals, breads, pastas and pizzas etc. I have absolutely no desire to ever eat vegetables so there is no struggle there.

For me, it’s steak, steak, steak, and more steak. If I want a cheat meal I eat some cheese and drink some sparkling water.

I have to repeat that I have never in my life felt worse than when I increased my consumption of so-called “healthy” foods such as fruits and vegetables.

I have never, ever felt better than when I eat all-meat and nothing else.

That’s it friend, that is my experience eating nothing but meat for 35 days in a row.