‘The Big Bang Theory’ Star Kaley Cuoco’s Weight Loss Secrets: Mindful Eating and the Power of Protein
Top experts reveal how you can adopt her healthy lifestyle habits
Known for her bubbly personality and quick wit, Kaley Cuoco, 39, made us all laugh as Penny on The Big Bang Theory. While the vivacious star—and mother of two-year-old Matilda with her partner, actor Tom Pelphrey—is the picture of health, she has talked openly about the tweaks she made to her diet and exercise regimen to slim down gradually and feel more energized. Spoiler alert: Cuoco’s plan—which saw her shed six pounds and improve her health—includes glorious peanut butter and even more glorious “cheat days”! We talked to a top dietician and doctor about how we can incorporate Kaley Cuoco’s wellness and weight loss strategies into our own lives.
What inspired Kaley Cuoco to get healthier
If looks told the whole tale, it would seem that Cuoco has never needed to lose weight. But the star of the upcoming suspense thriller series Vanished has been candid about putting on unwanted pounds during particularly stressful periods of her life (haven’t we all!).
She would also be the first to point out that health is much more than skin deep—it’s all about feeling strong from the inside out. And that begins with mindful eating, she told Shape, per Women’s Health magazine back in 2015, when she was married to now ex-husband, former professional tennis player Ryan Sweeting.
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“We got into this habit we called the bedtime snack,” Cuoco said. “The drawers next to the bed were filled with candy. Eventually, I realized it was mindless eating. I was just doing it because [Ryan] was doing it, and it was adding hundreds of calories I didn’t even think about.”
“So, I cut that out,” she told the publication. “Our refrigerator and pantry have completely changed, because we don’t eat crap anymore. No more soda, chips, cereal; we had boxes of stuff that only a 4-year-old would eat.”
Kaley Cuoco favors protein and veggies for weight loss
Every health journey starts with awareness, and simply acknowledging that her diet consisted of too much processed food helped Cuoco become more deliberate about her dietary choices.
Today, her meals are full of satiating protein and nutritious veggies. “When I wake up, I have the same little bit of peanut butter on toast every morning,” she shared with Women’s Health in 2016. Her lunch menu typically consists of half a sandwich while dinner is a colorful affair of vibrant veggies and lean protein like salmon.
We can all take inspiration from such intentional eating, says dietician Kristin Kirkpatrick, MS, RD, LD, coauthor of Regenerative Health: Discover Your Metabolic Type and Renew Your Liver for Life. But that doesn’t mean we have to put pressure on ourselves to be “perfect.”
She explains that while eating intentionally means focusing on nutrient-dense choices that keep us healthy, like fruits and veggies, and limiting ultra-processed foods, like the potato chips littering Cuoco’s pantry, that doesn’t mean we need to ditch junk food altogether.
“We can have processed foods about 10 percent of the time—for example, a frozen pizza every other Friday night with our family,” says Kirkpatrick. “When we look at the studies, it’s very clear that health problems and weight gain are tied to the amount of ultra-processed foods we’re eating each and every week. So instead of vilifying them, we need to be realistic that every once in a while, we can consume processed foods.”
Why Cuoco balances healthy eating with indulgences
Like Kirkpatrick, Cuoco knows deprivation is the enemy of maintaining a healthy weight. “I have to have a cheat day,” she admitted to Shape, per US Weekly. “I know when I’m being good all week long, that come Sunday, I’m going to lie by the pool, have a drink and eat some pizza. Then I wake up on Monday morning and I’m all ready to start the week again. I’m just going to be in a bad mood all the time if there’s no light at the end of the tunnel.”
Indeed, a “cheat day”—or more accurately, “cheat meal”—works for a lot of her patients, notes Kirkpatrick. “They plan it, schedule it and are very intentional about it,” she says. “But for others, it doesn’t help; it’s really going to be based on your personality, because some people will have a cheat day that turns into a cheat month.”
If you do decide to try it, be sure to take the “treat” in treat day seriously by indulging in only the finest, adds national women’s health expert Pamela Peeke, MD, author of The Hunger Fix: Food Addiction. “Go to the best ice cream shop that serves handmade flavors, for example. Or if you love chocolate, savor the highest quality dark chocolate you can find. There’s nothing wrong with having a cookie either—just not the ultra-processed big-box store kind.” When an indulgence feels truly special, she explains, it’s much harder to overeat.
She makes it a point to eat every two hours
Has it been a couple of hours since your last nosh? If you were Cuoco, it would be time for a snack. The actress told Women’s Health how her energy levels crash if she isn’t eating regularly throughout the day. “’I learned over the past few years that I have to eat every two hours. I just do. I’m not talking about giant meals, but I literally start to fall apart, especially when I’m shooting.”
If you’re wondering what the science says about this strategy, we have a very technical answer: To each her own. “Some of my patients might really benefit from having a smaller, healthy snack [like an apple with peanut butter or a smoothie with avocados and almond butter, like Cuoco favors] every two hours for blood sugar control,” says Kirkpatrick. “But for others, that simply won’t work for their schedule. I think we have to look at each individual person. For example, are they trying to avoid peaks and valleys of blood sugar levels and need to eat every two hours to keep things a little more even-keel?”
While this approach largely comes down to your personal situation and preferences, she says she is a huge proponent of eating when you feel hungry, not necessarily when the clock strikes noon for lunch or 6 p.m. for dinner. It sounds like that’s Cuoco’s philosophy, too.
Why Kaley Cuoco ditched diet soda to lose weight
One crucial change Cuoco made during her weight loss journey was curbing her intake of soda—a shift that didn’t come without sacrifice, as she revealed this is her favorite drink. That is, “until I saw that there were 17 spoonfuls of sugar in it and now I’m like, OK, maybe one sip and then throw it out,” she shared with US Weekly.
Research bears out her concerns, because sugar-laden soda is closely associated with increased risk of everything from diabetes to stroke to obesity. Just as important, Cuoco limits diet soda, because, along with messing with our metabolism and triggering weight gain, artificial sweeteners are also linked to long-term health problems and may even affect the brain.
“It’s believed that artificial sweeteners in diet soda are such good mimics for sugar that they cause an insulin spike in the brain, which is not good for it,” adds Harvard-trained neurologist Andrew E. Budson, MD, Professor of Neurology, Boston University and co-author of Seven Steps to Managing Your Aging Memory.
The red-hot exercise routine Kaley Cuoco raves about
While the famous animal-lover keeps active by doing everything from walking her dogs to riding her horses, she told Women’s Health that hot yoga is her exercise of choice. “I realized I don’t like running…I refuse to do it. I like spinning, so I try to mix that in. When I found hot yoga, I fell in love with it and was like, this is my thing.”
But if hot yoga isn’t your thing, just take a page out of Cuoco’s book and experiment with different activities until you find what works for you, encourages Kirkpatrick. “Moving your body in any capacity is really important,” she says. “Exercise, however, is not the holy grail of weight loss—the main driver is food, while exercise has been shown to be very effective with weight maintenance.”
To that end, she cautions against the rigors of hot yoga, particularly if you have heart issues, and instead recommends good old-fashioned walking for its many brain-and-body benefits. But even if this trendy workout may not be accessible for all of us, most of Cuoco’s tips—from mindful eating to “cheat days”—are happily within reach.
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