When we think of Gwyneth Paltrow, a few defining thoughts immediately come to mind: her sprucing of a controversial raw food diet, ‘earthing’, some pretty intimate steaming rituals.
But as left-of-centre—and sometimes extreme—as Paltrow’s alternative wellness advice can be, her everyday diet and exercise routine is surprisingly balanced, and often flexible.
Paltrow owes her ripped physique to a balanced, clean diet, frequent workouts with long-time trainer Tracy Anderson, and a whole lot of self-care.
DIET: A (Mostly) Clean Diet
While we could wax lyrical about the controversial diets Paltrow has chosen in the past, her own personal food choices are a little less extreme.
“I just try to eat pretty clean during the day,” Paltrow told Shape. “Good proteins and lots of vegetables and not too much grain or sugar, and nothing baked
In the morning, the actress’ go-to breakfast is typically a smoothie. Sharing her recipe on the Goop Podcast, she revealed her smoothie recipe includes “almond milk, coconut oil, vanilla mushroom protein powder and Moon Juice dust.” But according to an interview she gave with Porter, Paltrow may also choose to skip breakfast all together.
DIET: A (Mostly) Clean Diet
When skipping breakfast, her first meal of the day is typically lunch. She told with Porter that her lunches are typically “light on carbs.”
If she’s cooking at home, Paltrow puts together quick carb and vegetable-loaded dishes for herself and her family. “I have a bunch of chicken dishes and pasta go-tos, and I do a lot of stir-fry for the kids,” she told Shape.
“I always keep cooked brown rice in the fridge. Then it takes two minutes to chop up some vegetables, make a nice sauce, and you’re done.”
Her daily diet aside, Paltrow makes a point of allowing herself to splurge as often as she can, even with the knowledge that some food and drink may not be great for her body. “I have a pretty healthy diet, so when I’m eating processed foods and not watching my alcohol intake, I feel it,” she told Women’s Health.
“But at the same time, you want deliciousness, you want a fun life—pleasure! You’re going to have a baguette-and-cheese-and-red-wine frenzy sometimes—but you want it to be a choice you’re awake to: “I know this might not make me feel great, but today I’m choosing it anyway.”
DIET: Dinner Is A Free-For-All
If Paltrow does allow herself to splurge, she typically reserves more indulgent foods for the evening.
“I tend to eat whatever I want for dinner,” she told Shape. Sharing her top picks for cheat foods, she confessed to Porter that she usually indulges in a “glass of wine, maybe a baguette dripping in cheese, some fries…”
She also sticks by this same lax attitude on holiday. “I eat what I want—and there’s no exercising, either,” she said.
DIET: Cleanses
You may find this hard to believe, but Paltrow isn’t a huge fan of frequent cleansing.
“I can’t be on a cleanse all the time … I did one for seven weeks last year and it was awful,” Paltrow told Porter.
But she has tried her fair share of them in the past: “So I’ve basically tried everything, from a one-day gallbladder flush fast to a seven-week nightmare,” she said. “It’s great for eliminating bloat and firming your skin, and just feeling your best.”
DIET: Cleanses
Typically, Paltrow will only cleanse once a year, or if she’s road testing one for her website, Goop. “I’m basically never cleansing,” she told Instyle US. “Only if I’m guinea pigging something for the website. Or I try to do one good cleanse a year.”
Her once-a-year cleanse, which has been published on her website, lasts for 6 days, and still allows you to have breakfast, lunch, dinner and a snack each day. But in order to properly complete the cleanse, every single one of your meals must be totally free of the below ingredients:
- Caffeine
- Alcohol
- Dairy
- Gluten
- Corn
- Nightshades (tomatoes, eggplants, peppers, potatoes)
- Soy
- Refined Sugar
- Shellfish
- White Rice
- Eggs
DIET: Cleanses
Aside from her once-yearly stint, one cleanse Paltrow is loving at the moment is the ‘Goat’s Milk Cleanse‘, which limits your diet to nothing more than goat’s milk and herbs for eight days to rid your body of parasites.
“At Goop they call me ‘GP the guinea pig’, because I’ll try anything,” she told Shape.
“I just tried a goat milk cleanse for eight days to rid my system of parasites. That was really interesting. It’s only goat’s milk and herbs. The theory is that we all have parasites, and they love the milk protein. So if you eat nothing else, they all come out of the intestinal wall and then you kill them with the herbs. I had to try it for Goop, but I felt so good after it.”
DIET: Supplements
To support her (almost) clean diet, Paltrow ropes in the help of a few supplements to ensure her body is getting all the nutrients it needs.
“I’ve always experimented with supplements,” she told Women’s Health. “And I believe the combination of toxic load, the modern environment, and nutritional deficiency makes our bodies more vulnerable to breaking down. There are so many options for vitamins out there.”
“The idea is to boost a (most of the time) nutrient-dense diet with high-quality supplements. We’re low in so many nutrients. Even if we’re careful about going organic and nontoxic, because we’ve degraded our soil, the nutritional value of the food we do eat, however healthy, is less than it was 100 years ago.”
Talking to Shape, Paltrow said that her supplement intake typically consists of “a good multivitamin, and a fish oil, and then… other herbs for various things.” She’s even developed a line of vitamin supplements herself.
LIFESTYLE: Clean Sleeping
Not only does Paltrow hold clean eating in high regard, she’s also a big advocate for ‘clean sleeping’—a term she has coined for the healthy amount of sleep you need each night.
In a piece she wrote for Daily Mail UK, the actress said she gets “at least seven or eight hours of good, quality sleep—and ideally even ten.”
“Sleep plays such a powerful role in determining your appetite and energy levels that I believe it should be your first priority—even before you think about your diet,” she said. “Call it vanity, call it health, but I know there’s a huge correlation between how I feel and what I look like when I roll out of bed in the morning.”
Quoting her go-to nutrition expert, Dr Frank Lipman, Paltrow advised that “poor-quality sleep can be unsettling for the metabolism and hormones, which can lead to weight gain, bad moods, impaired memory and brain fog, as well as serious health concerns such as inflammation and reduced immunity (which can increase your risk of chronic disease).”
LIFESTYLE: A Tonne Of Self-Care
Aside from ‘clean sleeping’, Paltrow has adopted a very self-care approach to the way she leads her life, experimenting with a tonne of different treatments to give her body that little bit more support.
“I also try to meditate, but I run out of time a lot,” she told Shape. “And I love to take an infrared sauna; it’s really detoxifying. It’s a real gift to myself.”
“I haven’t tried cryotherapy yet because I’m kind of scared to, but they say it’s great for pain. Our diets are so full of inflammatory foods that I think we need to do increasingly extreme things to combat it.”
EXERCISE: Daily Workouts
Along with every other thing she does to keep her body fighting fit, Paltrow is a big believer in getting a workout in as often as she can—every day if possible.
“I like feeling good, and I know I feel my best when I exercise,” she told Women’s Health.
“But it depends on the day—I definitely don’t always feel like doing it. I’ve made it a habit, just like brushing your teeth. That’s how you have to look at it. I’ve been a Tracy Anderson fanatic for over a decade, I’m an investor in her company, so yeah, I go every morning.”
EXERCISE: The Tracy Anderson Method
This may not be a surprise to some, but considering how often she notes Tracy Anderson for whipping her body into shape, it should come as no surprise to learn that she is a big believer in the trainer’s eponymous method.
“You know, I’m a total die-hard Tracy Anderson fan,” she told Shape. “Her method works so well for me. I’ve seen all these fads come and go, and nothing works for me the way that Tracy’s approach does, so I really stick with it. She’s amazing.”
“I stream her whenever I can when I’m in New York, and when I’m in California, I try to go to her classes five days a week for an hour. But now I’m so busy with my company, that I only do it three or four times a week. When I started doing her method, I had 20 pounds to lose, and I had just had a baby, so I did it six days a week for a long time. I did it for so long it’s in my DNA now.”
EXERCISE: The Tracy Anderson Method
According to ELLE US, a typical Tracy Anderson class goes something like this. First, the trainer will begin the class with a dance-inspired warm-up, complete with integrated arm movements. Meanwhile, she heats the room so it’s temperate reached approximately 29 degrees, and 65 per cent humidity.
“The heat’s important because the muscles become more mouldable when it’s warm,” said Anderson. “It’s like warming up clay so that you can actually work with them more.” And wow, do they get a work out.”
The dance warm up is then follow-up by floor work, which is typically some sort of leg lift movement with ankle weights attached. The class is then concluded with a stretch.
EXERCISE: The Tracy Anderson Method
Speaking to W about her custom method, Anderson explains her well-studied approach to toning and shaping the body.
“What the method consists of is a series of movements, sequenced in a specific order,” she said. “This is based on 20 years of studying how to design bodies that are balanced. I create movements that create balance.”
She also advocates for doing some form of exercise each day of the week: “I believe that we should connect to our physical selves seven days a week—but in what form? That depends,” she said.
“Do I believe we should be doing an hour of cardio seven days a week? No. I don’t. I do my muscular structure program… seven days a week. I feel so much better after I do the muscular structure. It actually makes me cranky to not do it. But I only do 30 minutes of cardio, probably four times a week.”
EXERCISE: Her Butt And Legs Workout
To perfectly sculpt her backside and legs, Anderson created this ‘broomstick workout’ just for Paltrow.
Kick & Reach—works abs, butt and legs
This move with challenge your balance and get your brain engaged in the workout. With your broomstick in one hand, face sideways and extend your leg up and out. As you extend your leg, reach your opposite hand to the ground. Then, bring your leg back in front of you. That’s one rep
Plié Sweep—works butt and thighs
To start, place your feet hip-width apart, and turn your toes out so that your heels touch. Using the stick for balance, dip down into a grand plié. Then, come up to standing position before extending a single leg up and out behind you as high as you can.
T-Pole Hold—works arms, back, abs, butt and legs
Get down on your knees and place your broomstick on your upper back, draping your wrists over each side in a ‘W’ position. Then, twist to one side, put one hand on the floor and keep one knee on the ground to support you. From here, you will hinge your other knee open and closed. For every second knew hinge, reach the leg you’re working on out and extend it.
EXERCISE: Her Ab Workout
For rock-hard abs, Anderson has Paltrow complete three sets of the three below moves, three times a week.
Side Lift To Rolling Plank
“Lie on your right side, legs straight, your weight on your right elbow,” Anderson told Women’s Health. “Lift your left leg up to the ceiling (a), then rise onto your right foot and both forearms to roll into a low plank, keeping your left leg out to the side (option to lower it) (b). Reverse the movement to return to start. That’s one rep; do 30. Switch sides.”
Plank Up-Down
“Start in a push-up position, hands under your shoulders and body in a straight line (a),” said Anderson. “Lower onto your right forearm (b), then your left forearm (c), keeping your hips as still as possible. Reverse the movement to return to start. That’s one rep; do 30, switching the order of your arms as you go.”
Wide-Split Crunch
“Lie on your back with your legs extended and feet separated more than shoulder-width apart (a)” she said. “Place your hands behind your head, then lift your shoulder blades off the floor to curl into a crunch, keeping your lower back on the floor (b). Reverse the movement to return to start. That’s one rep; do 30.”
EXERCISE: Her Ab Workout
In addition to those three tummy-sculpting moves, Anderson shared these extra ab-favourites with Health magazine. All completed with ankle weights, Anderson has Paltrow complete 30 reps per side, 6 times a week:
- Sit-Up And Split
- Knee-Pull Crunch
- Cross And Kick
- Cross-Leg Crunch
- Cross-Leg Reach
- Wisting Kick
- Running-Split Crunch
EXERCISE: Her Arm Workout
To whittle down her arms, Anderson told SELF that Paltrow never goes past these two toning moves.
V-Punch
Stand with feet just wider than hip-width apart, a 3-pound weight in each hand at hips. Punch right arm all the way up, with palm facing front, 4 times. Repeat with palm facing back. Complete sequence 3 times. Switch sides; repeat.
Walking Plank
Start in a high plank. Imagine feet pointed to 6 on a clock face. Keep body straight as you rotate counterclockwise slowly until feet are at 3 o’clock. Step back to 6. Rotate clockwise to 9 and back for 1 rep. Do 3 to 5 reps. Take a short break; repeat.
