Nutrition is an interesting topic. For some, they treat it like religion. But it isn't like religion at all. It doesn't matter what I believe. Instead what should matter is what the research tells us to be true. We can decide to accept science or not.Only once we move beyond the idea of nutrition as a belief system can we address any of the questions we may have with the foods we eat.And there's a particular order, or hierarchy, of how to address our nutrition. This concept was proposed by Tom Venuto and works quite well.Before we get to addressing the layers of this hierarchy of this concept we need to understand the context of the situation. For this blog we are writing with the end goal being fat loss. The prescription would differ for someone with a performance goal or looking to add lean mass.The first place to start is to answer the question 'how much should we eat?' If we get this part wrong it's a lot harder to achieve our goal and can add frustration to positive efforts.In order to determine your daily caloric requirement we need to know about the individual. The sex of the individual - Men require about 12-13% more calories than women. If you eat according to portion size this is 1/8th and can be used to estimate energy when plating out meals. The age of the individual - A younger person will require more than a older person. For adults our caloric requirement will decrease by about 3.8 cal/year. The individual's occupation - Someone with a desk job will require less nutrition than a very active occupation like a bike courier. The individual's activity - Not counting work-related tasks it helps to know if the person moves a lot or not.And as we mentioned this...