Mikki Williden, PhD

Mikki Williden, PhD Registered nutritionist, whole food, health, nutrition, sport nutrition, primal, podcast Mikkipedia
(2)

11/08/2026

1. I love or Nordic Naturals, if plant based then you need an algae supplement as flax doesn’t cut it for those long chain omega 3s - 2-3g a day

2. Protein powder with the protein source, a flavour, a sweetener and that’s it. Plenty to choose from out there!

3. Good green vitality from - broad spectrum MV and antioxidants to plug the gaps!

4. Protein at lunch and dinner. Yep, this increases your grocery bill. You’ll likely spend less in between meals though.

5. Often overlooked when beginning a fitness journey but a well fitted pair of shoes that suit your feet and run/walk style fit for purpose will save your knees/hips and many visits to physio later!

10/08/2026

If you’re in a mode of wanting to drop body fat, make the most of the calories you have by eating them rather than drinking them.

300 Cals from a couple of lattes are better spent chewing on, like, oats, fruit and yoghurt, lean meat and vege, those kind of things. A mini meal if you will

Totally goes the same with cream in coffee. If you’re having several coffees a day, it’s not nothing. And that’s literally just adding fat calories. Why not enjoy one like that and then have another style of coffee thereafter?

09/08/2026

You can eat what you like obvs, you’re an adult.

But I do kind of get the ick when I see people champion eating what could be absurd amounts of foods just because it’s low calorie. Which I appreciate sounds off brand for someone who is a volume eater. I guess this means I also have my limits.

Clearly this isn’t cake, nbd. And she loves it, totally fine. And of course, she’s technically correct: a 255 Cal cake would absolutely keep you in a deficit and there’s nothing inherently wrong with having a large volume, high protein dessert.

But the framing is still largely around presenting something as freedom rather than still restriction, doesn’t promote good eating habits that set you up for life, and eating an entire cake is never a great move, low calorie or not.

There’s a difference between ‘you don’t need to avoid cake to lose fat’ and ‘you can eat a whole cake and lose fat’

The first teaches more flexibility in that cognitive restraint required for fat loss.

The second is about eating an inordinate amount of food in a sitting. Not overeating calories obviously, but sort of celebrating eating the max quantity possible rather than normalising eating an amount that satisfies you.

I think this to me doesn’t champion a relationship with food that includes ‘enough’ and more about eating as much as possible for a a few calories as possible. Of course protein and volume matter. But so does appetite, normal portions, normal food, nutrient density and being able to finish something without creating a giant diet version of it.

I think I would have loved this back 10-15y ago. I don’t think I do anymore.

09/08/2026

Just putting it out there.

If you’re yet to lift protein to a minimum of 1.6g/kg per day, eat a bunch of vegetables and fruit with your meals and do some sort of activity, then don’t buy supplements to support fat loss.

Those aforementioned habits are all ones proven to help regulate appetite.

This is an excellent adjacent supplement to support appetite control - and does work for a lot of people I’ve talked to (friends, clients) - but nothing will replace the banging basics when it comes to losing body fat and improving body composition.

The money you’re considering spending here could be an additional $22/week on chicken. Or vegetables. A way better use of your resources. Or a gym membership or an app!

And if money is no object? I’d still say you want to dial in those habits. Once there, if still hungry/food noise, this can help you feel more full after meals and diminish cravings.

There are no shortcuts. No quick fixes. Yes you can lose weight quickly with a bunch of methods but if you don’t have an eye on your ability to maintain, well, why?

For years, “fasted training” has been marketed as the shortcut to better fat burning. And I know on the basis of the lit...
08/08/2026

For years, “fasted training” has been marketed as the shortcut to better fat burning. And I know on the basis of the literature, whether you train fasted or fed doesn’t appear to make a difference. 

As a practitioner with decades in the field, an athlete myself and now working with hundreds of women at a time, let me tell you: it does. 

But let’s think about what you’re actually asking your body to do.

You wake after 8–10+ hours without food. You head out for a hard run, a heavy strength session, or an intense workout. You don’t eat beforehand. Then you delay breakfast afterwards.

You’ve extended the period where your body has no incoming energy while simultaneously increasing its energy demand. This is catabolic. You’re breaking down tissue. 

If your goal is simply to move your body and you enjoy training fasted, that’s your choice and totally fine. Not every session needs to be fuelled.

But if your goal is to:
• build muscle
• get stronger
• improve performance
• recover well
• train harder tomorrow
• support healthy ageing

…then nutrition becomes part of the training stimulus, not separate from it.

Training is a stress. It’s the recovery from that stress that produces adaptation.

Protein provides the amino acids needed to repair and remodel muscle. Carbohydrate helps restore glycogen so you can perform again. Together, they shift your body from breaking tissue down toward rebuilding it.

This appropriate fuelling enhances the adaptation they’re training for. If we do look to the literature, Rothschild’s research shows that protein pre exercise provides calories without suppressing fat oxidation. Literature also shows we perform better with carbs before training and you can pull up better from any session when you add back nutrients. This matters more for those pushing a calorie deficit. 

It’s almost by default people pull back around training when wanting to get leaner. However protecting your training with fuel allows you to work hard, put out more energy then recover and do it again.  

You don’t get fitter because you stayed depleted for longer.

Fuel. Workout. Recover. Repeat. Be Awesome. Feel Awesome.

PMID 33919779

If you feel wired, shaky, or on edge like clockwork most days, it’s worth looking at what’s happening to your blood suga...
06/08/2026

If you feel wired, shaky, or on edge like clockwork most days, it’s worth looking at what’s happening to your blood sugar before you assume it’s purely psychological.

When blood glucose drops too fast, your body treats it as a threat. It releases adrenaline and cortisol to push glucose back up. Those are the same hormones involved in a stress response, which is why a glucose crash and an anxiety spike can feel identical: racing heart, shaky hands, a sense of dread, trouble concentrating.

This doesn’t mean all anxiety is a blood sugar problem. Anxiety is complex, and psychological, situational, and neurological factors matter too. But if your “anxiety” shows up reliably a few hours after a carb-heavy, protein-light meal, or after skipping lunch, or after your third coffee on an empty stomach, that’s not a coincidence.

Five things that will help:

→ Anchor meals with protein, not just carbs. Aim for 30g+ at breakfast, this is where most people underdo it.

→ Don’t skip meals when you’re already stressed. Undereating raises stress hormones on its own. Add a glucose dip and you’ve stacked two triggers.

→ Never eat carbs alone. Pair them with protein, fat, or fibre to slow the release and flatten the crash.

→ Watch caffeine on an empty stomach. It raises stress hormones by itself, which is fine unless it isn’t. Combined with low blood sugar, you get a physiological anxiety response with no obvious cause.

→ Walk after you eat, not instead of eating. It helps glucose move into muscle and blunts both the spike and the crash.

04/08/2026

Dark chocolate is delicious. And definitely gets a health halo 😇 as many clients will tell me they eat chocolate / ‘but it’s dark chocolate’ …

Still chocolate and if you’re diving into 3-4 pieces, that’s a decent number of calories after dinner that you may not need. And if you’re struggling with maintaining your body weight, definitely a habit to think about.

A piece or two not a problem. I mean it could be. But 4 pieces is 2 pieces too many and if you’re hungry you might need to just eat more dinner.

03/08/2026

“Eating too much protein could shorten your life.”

The whole piece leans on mouse research from one lab: sedentary mice, matched calories, high protein, zero training. In that exact setup, insulin resistance and fat gain occurred. It’s also not a diet-free human doing three strength sessions a week.

The “30% longer life on low protein” stat comes from the same lab’s mouse work (Lamming’s lab, University of Wisconsin-Madison), and their newest paper (published this year) found that benefit only turned up in male mice. Female mice didn’t get it. An article aimed at midlife women, built on longevity data from male rodents, and that part didn’t make the headline.

Then there’s the actual advice: eat closer to 15g of protein per meal. That number sits below what the human muscle protein synthesis research says you need to trigger growth, and past 40, anabolic resistance means you need MORE per meal for the same response, not less. The real number sits at 25-40g per meal for that age group.

Two of the studies quoted, a Danish cohort of 6,381 people and a UK twin study, aren’t named or linked anywhere in the piece. I went looking. Claude and Consensus did too. Couldn’t find either one though I wonder if study is used loosely wrt the twins, as I’ve heard about it before and am pretty sure it’s been widely critiqued.

Protein isn’t the villain here. Under-eating it past 40, while you’re already fighting muscle loss, is the bigger risk by far.
Train. Eat enough protein to back that training up. That’s still what the evidence says.
Source: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2026/08/260801042811.htm
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/lifestyle/why-eating-too-much-protein-could-shorten-your-life/premium/6X2KO4U36NBNVODKZ5WYHZGA7I/?gift_token=sOm2fMgQqM

03/08/2026

Tbh sort of depends on:
1. Your gut (low carb has more fibre from wheat which may be problematic for IBS peeps)
2. Blood sugar: the standard ones have more carbs slightly but in reality if you’re eating these it is with something so that might not be a major - a continuous glucose monitor would tell you your glucose response
3. Size preference - low carb are more bang for buck in terms of size for calories, so good for volume eaters (caveat above)
4. Protein ones have most protein - obvs - from soy, rice, pea, wheat … I mean, it is protein but I’m not going to tell you to rely on protein from items like these. Put 30g extra chicken in your wrap for the same effect.

No clear winner - because mostly it’s your diet pattern that makes the most difference here. What you put in it matters. What else you eat with it matters. What suits your budget or your tastes? Also: I haven’t tried the protein ones yet - have you?

And: if only we had those Egg Life Egg Wraps in NZ 🇳🇿

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