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Hosted by Paul Evans, Registered Nutritionist (@paulthenutritionist)
Tired of the endless food fads, influencer nonsense, and TikTok nutrition “hacks”? This podcast cuts through it all.
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Hello and welcome to another episode of No Fawke Nonsense and today we are talking about away days, eating on the road, service stations, long drives. You know when you're stuck on a motorway, you've a long journey and you don't really know what to do. I'm going to show you what you can do to stop you spending loads of money and probably eat food that doesn't fulfil you at all. If you want to improve your algorithm because you are sick of all the misinformation, the nonsense, the non factual toxic bits in your feed social media podcast wise, interact with this podcast, subscribe, press follow, follow me on called nutritionist because it will teach your algorithm that this is what you're into. Let's enjoy this episode and I'll catch up with you later on.
@paulthenutritionist:So I think the bank holiday weekends are now gone for the year, am I right? I don't think that's any this side of the year, I think the last one is the end of August. But maybe you travelled a lot for work, maybe you're going to see family, maybe you're going to go see a switch town like me, maybe you've got holidays planned. Whatever it is, often you are going to end up pulling into a service station and what happens in those next four minutes are entirely decided by how hungry you are as soon as you walk through the door. We are going get on top
@paulthenutritionist:of that and I am
@paulthenutritionist:going to explain to you how we can fix this kind of issue because it is a question I have with clients a lot when they are quite worried about, they have got a four hour journey, how do they handle it unless you have got an air fryer in car, how do you manage these things. So we are going to get into it. The actual problem is that people think that with travelling, there is no good food available and that really isn't the problem because there is plenty of decent food these days in service stations, probably more than there ever has been. The problem is that you arrive hungry, you're tired, you're slightly bored and then you end up standing in front of Burger King without a plan, right? And when you haven't got a plan, hunger kind of creates poor decision and that's usually because of your sequencing.
@paulthenutritionist:So almost all of the work needs to happen before you get in the car. So here's what I want you to do, regardless of what time you leave, you need to eat a proper meal before you go, that is if I'm honest, 90% of it and it's the bit that everyone skits because they just want to get on the road. Twenty minutes of eating something decent before you leave buys you three maybe four hours of not really being attracted to the Krispy Kreme donuts in the service station. Leaving at seven with a coffee in your hand means that you are going be absolutely ravenous by the time you get to Northampton. If the timing is awkward, just try and eat it anyway or take it with you.
@paulthenutritionist:A slightly early lunch is probably gonna be more effective than getting something when you're absolutely ravenous and McDonald's is the only option. Pack a bag as well, I don't mean a cool box, I mean you don't even need a lunch box, just a fucking Sainsbury's bag is good. But pack it with things that survive in the car. If you haven't got a cool bag, pack some a couple of pieces of fruit, pack some rice cakes, some crisps, some oatcakes, some crackers, a protein bar, dried fruit, beef jerky, whatever it is, boiled eggs, a sandwich, if you're going to eat them in the first couple of hours, it's going to make a huge difference. The point isn't that we're aiming for perfection when it comes to nutrition, the point is having something so that hunger doesn't make a decision for you.
@paulthenutritionist:The other thing that gets underestimated is taking a big bottle of water and putting it somewhere that you will reach it. The thing no one admits is that loads of people deliberately under drink on long drives to avoid stopping to the toilet. And that's a really bad trade because mild dehydration not only makes you groggy and less alert, but it also makes you feel hungry when you're not. So when you're bored and you've been on the road for two hours and you go well I'm going to stop anyway, you end up thinking that you're hungry because you just haven't drank anything. So you'll stop anyway and you'll just feel like shit.
@paulthenutritionist:Think about the coffee timing. Coffee at the start of your long drive is sensible, a big one at four in the afternoon will still be in your system at bedtime and you will end up sleeping like shit and tomorrow is going be a lot harder than it needs to be. It's worth just monitoring that. At the service station, so here is how to play it. Go to the shop before the food court, this is the single most useful thing that I can say to you.
@paulthenutritionist:Every UK service station has either an M and S, a Waitrose or a WA Smith. The food shop is where the wraps, the salads, sandwiches, yoghurts, fruit and protein pots live. The food court is where all the fried stuff and the pastries live. They are arranged so that the smell of the fried stuff reaches you first, so you want to walk past that and look in the shop first. If you still want the burger afterwards, fine, have the burger, but make it a conscious decision and be proactive rather than reactive.
@paulthenutritionist:What we are aiming for in the service station is something with protein and something with a bit of fibre as well, that's it. Protein is what makes the meal actually finished, so you're not hunting again in forty minutes and fibre does the same job from the other direction. In practice, that will look like getting a sandwich, like a chicken or an egg sandwich, a wrap, a protein pot, a salad with some meat or some beans in, some sushi, I mean even like a soup of sorts if it's really grim. With regards to meal deals, meal deals are usually decent value, there's nothing wrong with them, the trap is the third item. The sandwich is often fine, we're looking for a good source of protein.
@paulthenutritionist:The drink is also fine, sugar free drinks, nothing wrong with that, water nothing wrong with that. It's the third slot which is where they get you, because usually they have these huge bags of crisps, chocolate because they know that you'll kind of take the pre feeling one. So take the yoghurt, take the high protein pouch, take the fruit, take the more healthy nutritious option if it's available. If they are not available, you are allowed to just not have the third item, that isn't a legal obligation. But just try and be smart with it, because what you don't want is loads of sugar because that's going to cause your blood sugar level to rise and it's going fall.
@paulthenutritionist:Sweets as well, like eating a big bag of sweets when you're in the car again is going to make your blood sugar levels rise, they're going to crash, you're going to feel like shit, you're going to have no energy and you're going to wish that you didn't. Now there is nothing wrong with having a hot meal on a long drive, especially if it's your actual lunch. So grilled beets fried, A chicken burger without the mayo that isn't deep fried is going be a deep fried chicken burger. Know these days you can go Leon's are really good, I'm thinking of Beckettfield services, they've got Leon there and Leon's a really good alternative healthier food option right, a lot of the stuff is nutrient dense, loads of protein, loads of fibre. There is a really important safety point I want to explore.
@paulthenutritionist:A large heavy fatty meal in the middle of a long drive is going to make you really tired That's not a diet concern, that's a driving safety concern. As well as sugar, huge meals are going to push your blood flow towards digestion and the post eat dip is very real. It's very well documented as well. If it's winter and you're in a warm car, you're on a motorway where there's not too much stimulation, you've got nothing to look at, you've basically built perfect conditions for falling asleep at the wheel. So if you ve got hours left to drive, try and eat lighter.
@paulthenutritionist:Save the big meal for when you arrive to your destination. And if you re already tired, food is not the right fix. Coffee and a twenty minute nap in a car is probably the right thing and actually that is the advice from Highways England and it s probably better than anything I can offer you. In my last business, we used to consult around the whole of The UK with schools, I'm talking the whole of The UK, we'd be in Edinburgh and we'd be in Plymouth and we would spend, we used to say that two hours is local, Eating over is bit of a ball ache but we'd still do it and we'd travel two hours there, we'd do our job and we'd come home. I remember this one time we had a big contract in Wales and I was there for the whole week and then I had to come home on the Friday.
@paulthenutritionist:I went to a gym straight after work because I wanted to see the traffic out. So I set off at I think about 08:00 at night and it was a four and a half hour journey and I remember I got two, two and a half hours in and I started to feel my eyes kind of slip and I was like woah, that's not happened before And I was like I should be okay, open the window. And then I realised it wasn't okay. So the first thing I did is I pulled over safely and I closed my eyes and I've never had such deep sleep in all my life, twenty minutes. And obviously I wish I could replicate that feeling because it was like such a deep quick nap and then I was absolutely Graham so absolutely recommend you do that if you are feeling tired.
@paulthenutritionist:So here's what to avoid, a big grazing bag, that big share bag of sweets or crisps bought for the journey is the worst thing you can buy at a service station and it's got nothing to do with what's in it. It's that there is no unit, there is no end point, there is no moment when you've finished it. You eat it because it's there and it's fucking boring and you'll go through the whole lot and it's not going to fulfil you. As I said, with regards to sweets, if you're going buy sweets, buy a single small thing with an obvious end. Don't buy a big share bag of Haribo because you'll gobble them all up and before you know you've had two fifty grams of sugar.
@paulthenutritionist:And guess what, what rises? Balds. The I'll just get a coffee. Now, there's two sides to this, coffee, as I said, it's going to make you go to the toilet, it's probably not ideal post 02:00 in the afternoon unless you're finding yourself feel really tired like I said to you, then we've just, we've got to do the right thing there. The other thing as well is that coffees are usually next to the pastries and the queue gives you three minutes to think about having a pastry.
@paulthenutritionist:Decide before you join the queue whether you are to have a pastry or not and whether it's going to be helpful for this journey, so you are being proactive and not reactive. Energy drinks as fuel, so this is also fine as a caffeine hit, if that is your thing, but it's not going be a substitute for food and the ones with a lot of sugar are going to probably leave you feeling really shit about an hour later if you're having them on an empty stomach. The classic thing, skipping the stop entirely to save you time. You push through, you arrive four hours later, absolutely starving, and then you will inevitably end up eating loads more than you were planning to and probably, or you would have at what the gap. Plus, you have driven the last hour tired, distracted and you will get to your destination feeling annoyed, irritable and up to you starving.
@paulthenutritionist:So you end up gobbling things up that you didn't plan to eat. When you arrive somewhere, so two scenarios because they are a different problem. Family. You arrive hungry, the crisps come out at four, dinner isn't till eight, and it's that gap where it all happens. So eat something proper when you arrive rather than holding it out for the meal.
@paulthenutritionist:Refusing food for four hours and then eating everything at 08:00 is just going to cause you to overeat, without question. You are allowed to eat what is put in front of you know nobody has come unstuck from one weekend but just be mindful that you don't want to starve yourself before you eat ever, let alone on a gin. If you are on some kind of away day, so I don't know it's a different shape isn't it, Early start, you go to the pub, if you go to football merch, go to the ground, get food, football or sporting event, then you ve got a long drive home that s going end it going to a chip shop at 11:00. The bit worth planning is that drive home because often on the way there, usually a little bit bob bam but on the way home it's usually late if it's the evening kick off or even if it isn't. And what happens is that you end up being starving so you just pop and grab a McDonald's or something when you didn't want to.
@paulthenutritionist:So put something in the car on your way back after leaving, so that when you get back in the car you've got something on the way home. I do this. So what I do, if I m going on a long journey, let's say Twitch, what I will do is I will always eat for him, I will pack myself a little snack or what we will do is we will find somewhere like an Aldi, which is on a walk to the game, we will pop in there because we don't want to get ripped off by a shit pie, especially if it is an away day, but I have always got something for the way home, or I know what I am having for dinner on the way home. It is really important that we do that, again being proactive not reactive, I don't know if I'm reactive, I'm going to have something that's not going to taste very good, it's not going to fill me up, I'm not going to feel great and as a result it was a failure. So here's to do, what to do on your next lung try.
@paulthenutritionist:Firstly, eat a proper meal before you leave, that's really important. Second, four minutes pack in a bag. So pack yourself some good nutritious food. I ve got a client, she goes to rugby, rugby league every, it s in Leh, she lives in the Midland and she travels up north, goes to homegays which will be a Friday night and she has what she calls her M6 snack bag. She has loads of fruit, fresh vegetables, you know she's always really prepared because she doesn't want to go to Stafford services and just buy some shit.
@paulthenutritionist:Thirdly, big bottle of water and stop drinking less to avoid the toilet, you're going to stop anyway. So drink water, it's good for you, if anything it really helps. You're having some water for your drive, it's going to help you break up your journey and walk around. About the services, go to the shop first, go to the food court second and look at both and then choose. Fifthly, protein and a bit of fibre always and that goes for every time.
@paulthenutritionist:Sickly, keep it lighter if you still got hours on your drive and if you are tired, coffee, quick nap, really going to help you out. If you do those things, you will arrive feeling human, which is more than most people manage on a bank holiday Monday on day 14 but also as well it's going to help you the next day. Wherever you're going, I'm sure you're going for something good. It's very rare that if you're having a nice trip, you're going to be going somewhere that you want to get there in the mood, you want to get there in the best state and the best way to do that is by coming up with a nice health plan. So that's it, I hope you found this useful and on your next away day, you've got a plan, you're going to take some food, know you what you're going to do when you go to service station,
@paulthenutritionist:you're not going to
@paulthenutritionist:get £7.50 for a bottle of water but if you do go into the shop grab yourself something, prune bar, some fruit, some sparkling drink, keep your sugar down, don't have a big meal, and you'll be absolutely cramped. But I hope you found this useful, and I shall speak to you next time. Ciao, dear.