The Groundhog Day Diet: Why I Consume the Exact Same Thing Every Day

For the past five years, I’ve eaten pretty much the same thing every single day.

Every morning for the last 1,825 some odd days, I’ve eaten an egg scramble (1 whole egg + 8 ounces of egg whites) + 1 oz of cheddar cheese + 2 Xtreme Wellness High Fiber Low Carb Tortilla Wraps.

I’ve had almost 2,000 midmorning “meals” consisting of a whey protein shake (two scoops of whey protein + two tablespoons of olive oil), along with a cup of oatmeal topped with some fruit (usually blueberries, blackberries, or cherries).

My lunch has invariably consisted of one of three iterations of premade Ice Age meals: chicken and sweet potatoes, chicken and rice, or barbacoa and rice. In recent days, I’ve started to add some greens to the meal, like some spinach or broccoli. You know, to mix it up.

For my post-workout afternoon meal, I’ve chugged another 1,800+ whey protein shakes, accompanied, again, by a cup of oatmeal and some fruit.

Dinners are my wild card for the day. I have whatever the family is having (in a portion that fits my macros). 

On special occasions and holidays, I’ll sometimes deviate from this routine. 

But other than those occasional indulgences, my diet pretty much never varies. I eat the same things for breakfast, lunch, and “snacks” day in and day out, nearly 365 days a year.

Over the last five years, I’ve been able to easily maintain a healthy weight, without feeling hungry or hangry, and I attribute this to two factors: The first has been a commitment to tracking my macros (you can find our complete guide to following this way of eating here). The second is my “Groundhog Day” diet. 

Let’s talk today about why it works and how to tailor and implement it in your own life.

Man Was Meant to Live on a Handful of Foods Alone

Much has been said in the past decade about returning to a diet similar to that of our primitive ancestors. But while the types of foods paleo man consumed has gotten a lot of attention, it may be even more important to consider the variety of foods he ate. Mainly, the distinct lack thereof.

While we don’t know precisely what and how our hunter-gatherer ancestors ate, studying the lives of current nonindustrial cultures can give us some insights about their eating habits.

Take a look, for example, at modern hunter-gatherer tribes like the !Kung San of the Kalahari Desert and the Yanomami of the Amazon rainforest and something distinctly jumps out: their diets are pretty damn boring. 

The !Kung San get about 40% of their calories from meat that they hunt. The other 60% comes from various edible plants. But here’s where things get interesting: While the !Kung San recognize over 100 plants as edible, most of their intake of plant food comes from just 14% of those 100+ possibilities. In fact, the lion’s share of the calories they get from plant food derives from just a single source: the nuts from the mongongo tree. Mongongo tree nuts provide half of the yearly total caloric intake of the !Kung San. If you lived among these people, you’d eat some meat and a bunch of mongongo nuts every day of your life. Basically two foods, day in and day out. That’s it. 

Occasionally, the !Kung San get access to some tasty high calorie treats like