Interview with Kurt Osiander, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu’s most hilarious, unfiltered and hardest working rock star.

If you are a sane human being that trains BJJ by now you better be familiar with the in-your-face-awesomeness that Kurt Osiander. He is a second degree black belt under Ralph Gracie, instructor at Ralph Gracie Academy in San Francisco, MMA veteran, promoter of KO Finisher BJJ competitions, the star of my favorite supplemental training videos “Kurt Osainder’s Move of the Week” and generally a pretty rad dude.











Kurt is known for is unfiltered straight to the point personality that is packed full of sound advice disguised in wit, humor and a lot of F bombs. But that is why we love Kurt. His Jiu Jitsu is much like his personality, straight forward, aggressive, and embraces the go all out and grind. As a well decorated competitor himself he has created a team of monsters within the competition circuit because of how they train, hard as fuck. Kurt Osiander is a legend and is sponsored by Shoyoroll, Q5 Labs, BioRhythm, Seventh Son Tattoo, OTM, and Bauerfeind knee pads. I had the pleasure of chatting with Kurt about something other than Jiu Jitsu, you guessed it, food.

You are a training animal yet, I mean this with all due respect, are an older guy, yet you are teaching 5 classes a day some days and having to keep up with the young guns. What do you eat throughout the day to maintain such a gas tank. Aka how do you fuel the machine?

Yea, I’m older, I eat a lot of vegetables I eat a shit ton of really great vegetables, Me I like to have something that’s crunchy, kale and spinach so that its more nutritious, I like the lettuce because of the crunch. I don’t starve myself, I eat well. I’ll be cooking this weekend for sure. What I do is substitute good shit for bad shit, and add flavor to a lot of stuff.

What is your average everyday diet like? Do you follow a certain guideline?

Ill get a small snack before my 7 am class, oatmeal or wheat toast, scramble eggs, you know something, or make a breakfast sandwich. Fruit a lot of fruit, that’s always good, basic to start your metabolism in the morning. Then Ill do a class, ill do some training. then I’m getting ready to train again right now, so I’ve already done some protein, instead of drinking my food Ill have a bar or something, just the act of eating is more fun. For lunch today Ill go get a huge Chicken Caesar salad and some sort of soup or something to go with it. Ill put two breasts of chicken in that Caesar salad. So that’s your protein right there, that’s a lot of protein.

So this is where the quote “Eating meat gives me the power to kill” probably came from.

Yea, instead of supplementing, I mean I take vitamins and everything else like that but I still eat real food. Ill do that for lunch two chicken breast in a Caesar salad, or whatever salad you like. I like to do a Salad rather than sandwich or something like that, because I have to come back and train again and I find I digest really quickly with the vegetables and chicken. And then at night time I do, what did I do last night? Last night I did brown rice with a couple eggs on it and a piece of steak. I’m gonna eat good and clean, but I’m gonna eat good shit.

Eating like that is not very hard, sometimes you just need to do a few things in advance to make it easier. That’s how I cook.

Yea exactly, Ill do a big batch of rice and put it in the fridge. I’d like to have rice right then and there but it’s a pain in the ass to make it right then and there.

I have written a big article on Bulk Roasting Vegetables for the week on here because that is a great way to ease the workload that night but also add in different flavor and texture to food because its not just boiled.

Yea they are so much better like that. I like doing a lot of things in the broiler, Ill broil my asparagus and its sooo tasty. Not a lot of people eat Brussels sprouts I like Brussels sprouts. I like Brussels, artichokes, a lot and Ill whip up a nice dressing or dip to put them in.

You have mentioned a lot of damn tasty vegetables and foods already, but if you had to pick what would you say your top 5 favorite foods are?

Ooooo, that’s hard. Man I really, really like sweet potatoes, a lot. Because that’s a slow burn carb and they are delicious. I don’t have any problems with it but I like to use a lot of garlic in things, Ill garlic it, sage it or basil it. I like to burn the food with actual fire. You know what I’m saying? Ill fire up the barbeque just to make my meat that flavor. It makes it that much better. The thing with these guys when they are cutting weight is they are miserable because they can’t cook. (Laughs) they just cannot cook, its not that there isn’t enough food it’s because they don’t know what the fuck to do.

Yea people tend to hate some foods such as Brussels sprouts because they’ve cooked them wrong by just boiling the piss out of them.

When you grill Brussels sprouts, god damn, they are so good. Then I make a really good and natural cheese sauce, dude. You know I’m really lucky because all my guys here are either hunters or fisherman or pretty rad guys so I have a big fucking aptitude for Wahoo or tuna. Any like crazy big fish that not fishy tasting Ill fucking eat. Fire up the grill for that because it makes it so much better. Cook it on some aluminum foil; get some real good flavor on it.

Do you have a favorite out of what your guys bring you?

Whatever those guys can catch and they bring to me here. You know last week, some of the hunters went out and they’ll bring me some wild boar which is some of my favorite stuff.

What about elk?

You know what I haven’t gotten any and the other day somebody brought me some deer meat and I tried to make it into shish kabobs but you know, it came out good but Id have to marinate it or something. Next time I’m going to marinate the deer meat for 24 hours or so to make it softer. It was tough and it didn’t release it. So I learned something about that, but the wild boar man, those guys brought me a haunch. Ill rock salt it and cook it Brazilian style on the grill. They brought me some Canadian bacon, Ill make some California egg sliders with that. They brought me some sausage and Ill make some baked ziti this weekend with some natural cheese and natural boar sausage.

Besides favorite foods ingredient wise, do you have a favorite cuisine or style?

Right now is my season of the year, Spring coming into summer, because that means barbeque weather. This season right now I fire up that grill every night and grill all of my vegetables and everything on it, unless I’m steaming them, then Ill do that on the stove.

This weekend for mother’s day I’ll make a super good breakfast, I’m a super good breakfast guy and good barbeque guy. I’m gonna hook her up with, the egg sliders, they aren’t super healthy but they are really good. Ill do an egg over easy ride, cheese, Canadian bacon, wheat muffin, avocado and then if you, that right there is just gonna be fucking awesome but then I whip up some homemade hollandaise sauce, then Ill pour that on the inside, just a little drizzle you know. Then I’ll do hash browns from scratch.

Are you going to use sweet potatoes for the hash?

You know what I really like to use a russet potato, then Ill do red and white onions, a little bit of garlic and Ill get them really crispy like that.

I am a huge breakfast nut, what is your number one breakfast choice?

My number one breakfast, oh man, I really like the egg slider with hash browns. I also like to do a really nice omelet or what Ill do is a traditional South American breakfast, Ill shred some tortillas and cook those, sauté those, then add egg and sausages to it, and spice it and then put that into another tortilla. (Laughs) In fact there should always be tortillas at breakfast.

What kind of spice do you use, hot sauce or chilis?

I will make that hot, not like burn your face off hot but Ill put in some peppers, cayenne, Ill def put some guac, I can make some good ass guacamole from scratch. Because there are all kinds of good avocados here in California so that’s what Ill do, Ill whip up something like that. It’s not really that time consuming. I mean you can’t do that during the week but on the weekend Ill always make breakfast.

As far as the diet goes, you have a “cheat day” worked into the mix?

Absolutely, my cheat day is Sunday night or Ill do Saturday night because I know Ill eat something really decadent because I know I can burn it off before Monday comes. My cheat day this Sunday will be that baked ziti. I just say I need the carbs for Monday.

On the topic of carbs, I have a training partner who will grab a 6 pack after class some nights, what are your thoughts on drinking?

6 pack of beer? Ah you can have beer but if you’re gonna drink beer, drink some good beer! You know something that’s naturally made. With the reinheitsgebot, the law that controls the purity of beer made in Germany it’s actually way better for you. That’s a big thing and it’s always been a big thing for me. You know my dads from Germany, so we drank a beer. So at one point in one of my lives here I was a brew master for a micro brew for many, many years so I know what good beer is. But for me, what my cheat night is, Ill get me some good whiskey. We have guys that own restaurants here and they’ll bring me bottles of single malt, single barrel, one batch, 15-year-old bottles, you know that’s my thing. I like a really good whiskey now or a rye.

So you primarily drink on your cheat nights?

Yea, I do, I drink for sure on Saturday and Sunday (laughs) I like my liquor dark and a mean white slut.

You mentioned “reinheitsgebot” which is a law that regulates the purity levels of ingredients that go into the beer made in Germany, is it fair to say you know a little bit about beer?

I got an internship at devil mountain brewery ages ago, I cant even remember, I moved up through the ranks, dish washer, bus boy, then I was running food for the restaurant and they were like “hey you know there is an opening in the brewery if you’d like to learn to do that?” I was like, ok. So eventually I started assisting then I was doing it all myself and they were like “wow you’re really good at this.” Then they sent me to classes and it took off from there. Eventually you know the restaurant was dragging down the brewery side. You know how the restaurant business is, if you don’t make it through the first year its rough. So the restaurant was dragging down the brewery then a South African company came and bought the whole thing and tried to make a go at it, then they tried to have me teach their guys and after I taught their guys they canned me. (Laughs) They shut down the restaurant, and then moved the brewing equipment into a warehouse where they were strictly into manufacturing and distributing.

Have you started your own batch of home brews since then?

My guys here at the academy are all little home brewers and they come into the academy and ask me what I think so I get my fair share of home made beer. In fact 2 doors down from the academy a place called cellar makers opened up and I was watching them and I was like what are you guys gonna do like brewing here? And they were like yea you know that’s pretty cool. If you want really good beer you just go two doors down after class and get yourself a beer.

I read an article recently about how a beer after a workout is a good thing because it helps your body break down and absorb proteins, do you have your guys crushing a beer after class?

(Laughs) I read the article and everything, I’ve know about this and heard about this, so then I hear “oh no, you’ve got to have chocolate milk afterwards.” So one of my guys here works for Nesquik so we started getting cases of chocolate milk here in the refrigerator and guys here are now like “can I have a chocolate milk, I just got done training.” These guys are now all about their chocolate milk after they train.

Are you also on the chocolate milk ride then?

I do if I’ve got it, but I make a b-line for my after training stuff, I’m sponsored by afterglow which is made by BioRhythm and Ill shit you not that stuff fucking works. It’s got protein, glutamine, and some creatine in it and I recover. So I get a dose of that in and I immediately go and eat some real food.

What about for pre training, what do you take?

Well pre Ill do fruit, really like stuff like apples or you know what I like to do is scarf down a whole avocado which is better, I don’t know how but it makes you lean out more. Almonds and avocados and then go train. Or fruits and slow burns, I really, really like refrigerated oranges. I just slice them up. I used to be a soccer player, before, during and after a nice cold orange is always fucking good.

You mentioned your sponsor BioRhythm, you are also sponsored by Q5, so what is your daily supplement routine like?

I get here in the morning and I take my multivitamins and then Ill take all my Q5 stuff, Ill take the Metabolic Overdrive, Groove XL BP8, I will take the Joint Armor, I will mix myself my Warrior Orange with Launch Fuel and I will go. During the day Ill take my other stuff, there is one supplement the warrior purple and the warrior green, the purple is all your fruits and stuff like that and the greens all your vegetables, then Ill of course run a protein shake between all that stuff. I am a big advocate of drinking 2 gallons of water a day. I don’t care how much I pee, if I am hydrated I am feeling a lot better.

That is one aspect that is really overlooked in gyms and life in general, staying hydrated.

Your performance goes down 10% then as it goes it gets to be a larger percent, 20% bad performance to 30% of your performance you know. I tell all my guys “have a bucket” and now all of my guys are walking around with a big gallon jugs. (Laughs) How can you drink this much water? Well you don’t have to do it all at once. You know a quart here, a pint here then another pint and you’re already 2 quarts down. As I drive into the city I drink a whole quart. Its really good for your system, it keeps your skin clear. Besides the hydration our being as it is, is 90% water. The first thing that happens to you as you start to lose water is you start making bad decisions. That’s why those guys in the desert wander around and drink sand.

Yea you can happen in reverse too, you can drink too much water.

That happened here in Sacramento here. They did Wee for a Week so they had to drink immense amounts of water and not go pee so I forget the name of the thing is but it made it toxic and she had too much water in her and it killed her.

So would you say that water is the most important aspect of your every day diet?

Yea you wanna get your calories in and you want to drink a lot of water.

You did spend some time in MMA, how were those type of weight cuts?

It was easy for me to make my cuts, I wasn’t trying to cut 30 fucking lbs, I’m pretty much at it, I naturally walk around at like 196 so when I made my cut to 185 so by the time the camp was over it leaned me out so Id only have to make like a 6 lb cut. Id put on a sweat suit before going to the weigh ins, roll around on the floor for like 15 minutes and I’m there. I have a gallon right here, I’m drinking 8 point something lbs of water right now.

Recently I listened to an interview Ralph Gracie and yourself did and in there he was talking about when he first met you and he said when he first met you you were “a fat fuck.”

Yes I was, I was 325! I was down at breakfast every day. Not only was I at breakfast every day all day, I was drinking everything and eating like, you know whatever. 3 lbs burritos, I was just fucking eating.

Would you credit Jiu-Jitsu to the weight loss or diet?

I got down under 220 because of BJJ and then, luckily my dad is a world class soccer coach, and coached the US nationals and Olympic team also, then when I was little I would sit there and watch him eat a cantaloupe with a scoop of cottage cheese in it and say “well why are you eating that?” and he would say “Well that’s what you eat.” So after I finally got down to about 220 I start to hit him up and that’s where I started to learn about nutrition. I also grew up hanging out in the kitchen with my mom so I learned not to be scared of cooking and then I realized if you cook you can get lots of chicks.

“Hey why don’t you come over and Ill cook you dinner, and they are like ‘oooo yea.’”

So are there any cooking skills you lack in?

No, no I’m pretty well rounded, you know I’m pretty well rounded and that’s really, really cool. I can make cold dishes, hot dishes, and different culture dishes based on all the different people I know. They give me their recipes and I’m very good at writing down recipes so I ask people how they do this or that. I have one of the moms from the kids class she has a Thai restaurant so I learned how to do that. My moms from El Salvador so I learned that. My dads from Germany and German food is pretty fucking hearty and easy. MY mom got into fucking cooking a long time ago so I learned how to cook Italian food, I have a bunch of Asians here so I go to the Asian stores and can do Asian food, so yea. I like cooking, its fun.

If you were on death row, what would your last meal be and what song would you go out to?

(Laughs) Ok my last meal, I would want my mom’s pork roast, and her lasagna, with her cheese cake and sweet potato fries and a bottle of really nice whiskey and you can play “5 Minutes Alone” by Pantera.

Would you have any dipping sauce for the sweet potato fries?

Yea I’ll do like a Sriracha, some sort of Sriracha, thousand island and a little bit of mayonnaise. (Laughs)

That’s a damn good mix, I am big on horseradish honey mustard for mine. I love horseradish.

Dude I’m totally into that too! On a nice piece of cheese. Some good ass cheese. Now I’m doing just the sandwiches, there is this really nice deli over here that has some really nice cheeses and they had a horseradish cheese and holy shit bro.

You are also a big history buff, are there any foods in certain cultures that have stuck out to you in particular?

Each culture has their staple and it’s funny that it’s like the same for every culture, you know its like, and these are the basics on which you can survive on. I haven’t found a culture that I don’t like their food much yet except that African food is just fucking gnarly bro. I’ll eat European food for sure, Ill eat Middle Eastern food, I love Middle Eastern food. I will eat English food even Ill eat all the Asian foods and stuff like that. But Ill experiment every now and again. There will be an Ethiopian restaurant or a Sudan restaurant, San Francisco’s got everything, but it just doesn’t cut it. It’s no good and that’s why they are fucking starving over there.

What about some of the worst foods you’ve eaten? For instance those half developed chicken egg monstrosities.

Oh yea I’ve had those, those are good, it’s a Filipino thing! Those are good you’ve got to have it. I’ve eaten it and its ok. They are crunchy. Dude I’m sure there are some disgusting foods. I have tried that and that’s ok but I’m not eating fucking bugs. I’m not going to eat it unless I really have to then I guess Ill eat bugs. I’m not eating a fucking bug.

Well I hope no one tries to feed you bugs. But people that do treat you well are your sponsors, so who would you like to thank?

My list of sponsors that Id like to thank is Shoyoroll, Q5 combat, BioRhythm, OTM, Bauerfeind knee pads, and the North Cal fight shops.

Are there any K.O. Finishers in the near future?

I’m gonna go host one at the end of June in Canada.

What about in California? I hear there is a pretty savage one in the works.

Yea man I’m def gonna get a DJ, I’ve got a hook up with all the really good local skaters so we will see what size venue we get but at the very least it will be a really cool event with a lot of fights with prize money for the black belt and brown belt open and we will go from there.

What kind of food will be there, hopefully not the typical carnival burgers and bags of chips?

I have a food truck, there is a truck that drives around the city here called Adams Grub Truck and they make some fucking good shit bro. They’ve got some waffle fries with pulled pork on them with some Sriracha sauce on them which are fucking awesome. They make a soft shell crab sandwich. I’m gonna have that truck at KO finisher here in the city. There is no date on that yet but we will get that up there with a 2 month notice.

Id like to extend a huge shout out to Kurt Osiander for taking the time to chat with me here and giving some awesome advice on how to eat like a hero. If you haven’t already go check out Kurt’s site KurtOsiander.com, his sponsors, and hit up his YouTube channel Kurt Osiander’s Move of the Week. Now take the best advice Kurt gives and GO TRAIN!

Also check out this great video about Kurt:



Images:Bestfoodtrucks JDCollector Kurt Osainder