How To Cook Amazing Fitness Food, For Idiots - Chris Baber | Modern Wisdom Podcast 299
Chris Baber (guest), Chris Williamson (host), Narrator
In this episode of Modern Wisdom, featuring Chris Baber and Chris Williamson, How To Cook Amazing Fitness Food, For Idiots - Chris Baber | Modern Wisdom Podcast 299 explores from Clueless to Confident: Simple Fitness Cooking for Everyday Lifters Chris Baber joins Chris Williamson to teach how to cook simple, tasty food that supports training and health, especially for people who feel useless in the kitchen.
From Clueless to Confident: Simple Fitness Cooking for Everyday Lifters
Chris Baber joins Chris Williamson to teach how to cook simple, tasty food that supports training and health, especially for people who feel useless in the kitchen.
They cover fundamentals: how to stock a smart cupboard and freezer, shop and plan around your week, minimize waste, and store/reheat food safely and well.
Baber explains the minimum equipment you actually need, how to batch-cook without wrecking Sunday, and how to turn one base dish into several different meals.
Throughout, he shares practical, high‑protein recipes (curries, burgers, peri‑peri chicken, tofu, noodles, steak) while reframing cooking as a skill anyone can learn and a source of joy, not just fuel.
Key Takeaways
Stock your cupboard and freezer so a meal is always possible.
Keep core herbs (oregano, thyme, sage), spices (cumin, coriander, chili powder, turmeric, garam masala), tinned tomatoes, beans, rice/pasta, and frozen veg (peas, broccoli, spinach). ...
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Plan meals around your week, not your cravings.
Before shopping, map your schedule: which days you can cook, which need leftovers or freezer meals. ...
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Cook once, eat differently for several days.
Batch-cook versatile bases (bolognese, chili, curry, roast chicken) and transform them: bolognese becomes chili then tacos; peri‑peri roast chicken becomes salads, fried rice or wraps. ...
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Respect your ingredients—especially protein—by cooking and seasoning properly.
Don’t overcook chicken and fish; season earlier (e. ...
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Use your freezer and fridge intentionally to save money and reduce waste.
Freeze herbs in ice cubes, chill and reuse leftover rice, freeze excess chilies, label and date everything, and actually schedule freezer meals into your week. ...
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You don’t need fancy gear—just a few good tools.
A sharp chef’s knife, chopping board, large oven‑proof non‑stick frying pan, two saucepans, a couple of baking trays and some decent Tupperware or Pyrex are enough to cook almost everything discussed; gadgets are optional, not required.
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Make ‘clean’ food craveable with simple flavor tricks.
Use marinades (teriyaki, peri‑peri), coatings (cornflake ‘zinger’ chicken), and quick sauces (yogurt‑based dressings, satay, chimichurri) plus garlic, chili and herbs to turn basic protein and veg into meals you actually want to eat, whether you’re bulking or dieting.
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Notable Quotes
“You need to think of food as that really important thing that fuels your body. It allows us to be more productive… how we can train harder, how we can get stronger, how we can be better people.”
— Chris Baber
“If it's not in the house, I can't eat it.”
— Chris Baber
“Everyone can cook delicious food. Everyone's got the ability in them to become an amazing home cook.”
— Chris Baber
“You’ve actually just written a full day of the week off by doing that… You don’t necessarily need to do seven days in a row.”
— Chris Baber
“Weirdly, the things that have the biggest impact on our lives are the ones that are so close, they're staring us in the face and we don't look at it.”
— Chris Williamson
Questions Answered in This Episode
How can someone who’s genuinely time‑poor start building a cooking habit without overwhelming themselves?
Chris Baber joins Chris Williamson to teach how to cook simple, tasty food that supports training and health, especially for people who feel useless in the kitchen.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
What are a few ‘template’ base recipes that can reliably morph into three or four different meals each week?
They cover fundamentals: how to stock a smart cupboard and freezer, shop and plan around your week, minimize waste, and store/reheat food safely and well.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
For lifters tracking macros, how would you adapt these recipes to very low‑fat cuts, high‑carb phases, or aggressive deficits?
Baber explains the minimum equipment you actually need, how to batch-cook without wrecking Sunday, and how to turn one base dish into several different meals.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
What are some practical ways to learn seasoning—salt, acid, spice—without formal training so food consistently tastes restaurant‑level?
Throughout, he shares practical, high‑protein recipes (curries, burgers, peri‑peri chicken, tofu, noodles, steak) while reframing cooking as a skill anyone can learn and a source of joy, not just fuel.
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
How could schools or workplaces incorporate this kind of simple, performance‑focused cooking education to improve public health at scale?
Get the full analysis with uListen AI
Transcript Preview
You need to think of food as that really important thing that fuels your body. It allows us to be more productive. It's how we can alter our health, how we can train harder, how we can get stronger. How we can be better people.
(wind blowing) I've been meaning to reach out to you for ages. I'm pretty crap at cooking.
Yeah.
I have, like, three meals in my chef's repertoire.
Yeah.
And you are my best friend that knows how to cook food.
(laughs)
You're the peak black belt Brazilian jiu-jitsu in food making.
Yeah.
And, uh, I just wanted to get you on, because I don't think it's just me. I think a lot of the... Especially the guys-
Yeah.
... um, struggle, especially people that want to do fitness meal prep.
Mm-hmm.
They just don't have a very good range of foods and I wanted to bring you in-
Yeah.
... to your specialist subject, making, making stuff taste good. I wanted you to-
Yeah.
... take us through the principles and then maybe give us some recipes as well.
Yeah, absolutely. I'm really looking forward to it. And, um, in terms of the sort of the meal prep and the fitness side, I used to compete as a runner, um, 800 meters. So for me, that's where it all really started with making delicious foo- Like, 'cause I'm such a foodie and always have been, it's, "How do I, how can I create amazing food that fuels my needs as an athlete, but also fuels my needs as someone that's obsessed with food?" So I've got quite a, quite a good experience in this.
I love it, man. So where do we start? What's the, what's the principles we need to understand before we can even get into it?
Yeah. I think for me, shopping and stocking your cupboard for success is a great way to start because... I think in terms of let's start with stock cupboard essentials. Like, so many things with a recipe, you really only ever need to buy the fresh stuff. If you've got an amazing selection of, like, spices, herbs in the cupboard, tins, chopped tomatoes, beans, your rices, pastas and pulses and stuff, and in the freezer, like frozen veggies, things like that, you've always got a meal to hand. Like, I could for instance, open the cupboard, grab some pasta, make a delicious tomato sauce using tinned tomatoes, some garlic, flake through some tuna and put some frozen broccoli in, and I've just made, like, an amazing meal without even going to the shops. So I think the best place to start is sort of stocking the cupboard for success. And I can certainly share details on what I guess my stock cupboard essentials are. But, yeah, olive oil, a balsamic vinegar, red wine vinegar, selection of herbs, selection of spices, all dried. Um-
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