The Ground Beef Diet

The ground beef diet is a high-protein, low-cost eating system built around one anchor food: cooked ground beef. It's designed for people who need to build muscle, stay lean, and maintain mental clarity—without spending hours meal planning or weighing food.

But this isn't just another bodybuilding meal prep guide.

This is the diet for modern-day field generals—people who lead, decide, and execute in high-stakes environments where both physical presence and mental clarity compound into leverage.

Startup founders making pivots with six months of runway left. CEOs managing boards while scaling from 10 to 100 employees. Poker players grinding $5/$10 stakes at 3am when a single decision represents months of profit. Football coaches calling plays with the season on the line. Entrepreneurs building companies where every hire, every product decision, every client conversation is a bet on the future.

What these people have in common: they can't afford to look weak, think slowly, or waste decisions on food. They need a system that handles nutrition the same way a field general handles logistics—automated, reliable, and built for chaos.

Paul Graham's "Ramen Profitable" taught a generation of founders to calculate their minimum viable living expenses. If you can cover your costs with revenue—even if it's just $3,000/month for two 25-year-olds living on ramen—you buy yourself time and negotiating power. You don't need investors. You can just keep building.

Brilliant framework.

But here's what happens when you only optimize for survival: you end up constantly trading money for health. "I'll get in shape after the exit." "I'll fix my back once the product launches." "I'll start dating when things calm down."

The problem is those things compound in the wrong direction. The longer you wait, the harder it gets. And the opportunity cost is massive—you're building a company but missing the best years to also build your body, your relationships, your life.

That's the trap of ramen profitability. It solves for survival, not for winning.

But you're different.

You're the type of person who cares deeply about your physical appearance—who believes you must see your optimized human form. You refuse to cheat on health. Can't quite explain it, but you'd just never touch a PED. Nothing against them, you just feel like you need to accomplish this completely clean.

But here's the thing: even though you clearly care about looking incredible, you somehow care about decision-making more than fitness.

Optimal decision-making and optimal body. Those are the two things that govern most of your interests.

But there's a third thing nobody talks about: you need both of those things while actually building a great life.

This isn't about being a fit dork who brings Tupperware to every social event and goes to bed at 9pm. Lots of systems for that. This is about having enough flexibility to drink with clients when you need to, be social when it matters, travel on a whim, function in chaos, and still wake up sharp the next day ready to make the decision that matters.

You need to always look great, always be ready to make high-risk/high-stress/high-leverage decisions, always be creative... but you're doing all of this in the real world. A high-stakes world where you thrive in hostile environments.

This system was built across hostile environments:

Flipping houses and coaching football taught me food logistics when you're away from home 16 hours a day. No kitchen access. No meal prep time. Just results. Came out looking better.

Building a smash burger and ice cream restaurant taught me satiation and craving management when surrounded by exactly what you can't eat. Constant temptation. Zero room for willpower. Came out looking better.

Playing poker professionally taught me food as a cognitive tool. How to stay sharp at 3am when months of profit ride on one decision. When your body is tired and focus is expensive. When the environment is designed to break you. Came out looking better.

Digital nomad building businesses put it all together. Any city. Any timeline. No excuses. Thriving in chaos while continuing to look better.

You need a food system where you can always get the foods—casino, airport, foreign city, construction site, conference. Where you can travel with a week's worth of calories in a backpack if needed. Where zero decisions are wasted on "what should I eat?"

Because field generals don't have time to think about food. They have companies to build, teams to lead, and decisions to make that actually compound.

Physical presence and mental clarity aren't luxuries. They're competitive advantages that multiply every other advantage you have.

This is a system for field generals who refuse to trade their body for their business.