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Steal this fad diet
What you can learn from popular weight loss plans.
By Kimberly Flynn for Lifetime Television
Most of us know someone who has lost a lot of weight scarfing down cheeseburger after cheeseburger or slurping nothing but cabbage soup for a week as part of a trendy diet plan. Of course, most of us are also sensible enough to recognize that fad diets are a little extreme — they're not called fads for nothing. But according to nutritionists, most popular weight-loss plans are based on a small grain of dietary wisdom.
For starters, these diets serve to make people more aware of what they're eating and discourage mindless munching, notes Dawn Jackson, a spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association (ADA) in Chicago. They also tend to promote home-cooked meals over dining out and frown upon sugary drinks and desserts — both sound weight-loss tactics. Here are the healthful morsels you can steal from four popular diets.
The Grapefruit Diet (aka The Hollywood Diet)
This diet instructs you to eat half a grapefruit at each meal — and not much else.
The claim: Grapefruit has a special fat-burning enzyme.
Sample lunch: Half a grapefruit, two eggs, two cups of cucumber-and-tomato salad, one piece of dry melba toast, and plain tea or coffee.
Weight-loss wisdom: As demonstrated by this meager 245-calorie lunch, the grapefruit diet lops off weight by restricting your calories, not by providing your body with some special enzyme. While you wouldn't want to follow this diet forever, its foundation is fairly healthful, says Jackson.
Healthful take-away: Grapefruit is full of antioxidants and vitamins — just like other fruits and vegetables. Up your intake by including produce in every meal, as this diet instructs.
The Cabbage Soup Diet
This seven-day plan is all cabbage soup, all the time.
The claim: Cabbage flushes fat from your body.
Sample day: Unlimited homemade cabbage soup, plus fat-free milk and up to eight bananas.
Weight-loss wisdom: The diet works in the short term by restricting calories and forcing you to eat plenty of high-fiber (read: filling) cabbage, says Wahida Karmally, an ADA spokesperson and director of nutrition at the Irving Center for Clinical Research at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in New York. "You can eat as much soup as you want, but you're going to be full before you eat very much!"
Healthful take-away: Cabbage is a good source of fiber and other nutrients, so hang on to the soup recipe. "I still make the cabbage soup sometimes, but I eat it with dinner, not as dinner," says Jackson.
The Atkins Diet
This high-protein, low-carb diet posits that eating foods containing protein and fat — but avoiding fruit, grains and vegetables — will help you lose weight.
The claim: Carbohydrates contribute to insulin resistance, a condition that causes the food you eat to be stored as fat instead of burned for energy. Sample breakfast: Two fried eggs, a slice of cheese and two strips of bacon.
Weight-loss wisdom: Weight gain, not carbohydrate consumption, contributes to insulin resistance, says Karmally. People experience dramatic weight loss on the Atkins plan for two reasons: The first is calorie restriction, since it's tough to find foods without carbs (believe it or not, the sample breakfast actually has fewer calories than a bagel with cream cheese and a glass of OJ, according to Karmally). Second, with no carbs in sight, your body stops retaining the water it ordinarily needs to metabolize them.
Healthful take-away: A diet high in saturated fat, such as the Atkins plan, may contribute to heart disease, and an extremely high protein intake may damage the kidneys. However, the Atkins diet's wisdom is understanding that a person will always be hungry on a fat-free diet. Your mind needs fat to feel full, and your body needs fat to absorb fat-soluble vitamins. If one of her patients expresses an interest in the Atkins diet, Jackson recommends a more healthful version: "We keep the protein, decrease the cheese and bacon, and increase the fruits and vegetables."
The Zone
In this plan, 40% of your daily calories come from carbohydrates, 30% from fat and 30% from protein.
The claim: Fat, protein and carbohydrates are all essential parts of your diet; but only certain complex carbs that are high in fiber are considered "favorable" and should be eaten. According to Zone creator Barry Sears, Ph.D., everyone has an ideal way to achieve the 40-30-30 calorie split, so everyone needs an individualized food plan (read: Please buy our pricey, prepackaged meals!).
Sample lunch: Chicken salad — cooked chicken breast mixed with light mayonnaise, celery and grapes — with lettuce and tomato on a piece of rye bread.
Weight-loss wisdom: Some carbohydrates are better than others. Simple carbs — such as sugar, white flour and white rice — are high-cal but low-fiber, leaving you unsatisfied. Complex carbs — such whole-wheat bread, brown rice, fruits, vegetables and beans — contain more nutrients than simple carbs, plus they're high in fiber, so they fill you up.
Healthful take-away: Though not convenient or cheap, this may just be the most sound of the fad diets. Simply keep the message — that not all carbs are created equal — and lose the prepackaged food gimmick, says Karmally.
Steal this fad diet
What you can learn from popular weight loss plans.
By Kimberly Flynn for Lifetime Television
Most of us know someone who has lost a lot of weight scarfing down cheeseburger after cheeseburger or slurping nothing but cabbage soup for a week as part of a trendy diet plan. Of course, most of us are also sensible enough to recognize that fad diets are a little extreme — they're not called fads for nothing. But according to nutritionists, most popular weight-loss plans are based on a small grain of dietary wisdom.
For starters, these diets serve to make people more aware of what they're eating and discourage mindless munching, notes Dawn Jackson, a spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association (ADA) in Chicago. They also tend to promote home-cooked meals over dining out and frown upon sugary drinks and desserts — both sound weight-loss tactics. Here are the healthful morsels you can steal from four popular diets.
The Grapefruit Diet (aka The Hollywood Diet)
This diet instructs you to eat half a grapefruit at each meal — and not much else.
The claim: Grapefruit has a special fat-burning enzyme.
Sample lunch: Half a grapefruit, two eggs, two cups of cucumber-and-tomato salad, one piece of dry melba toast, and plain tea or coffee.
Weight-loss wisdom: As demonstrated by this meager 245-calorie lunch, the grapefruit diet lops off weight by restricting your calories, not by providing your body with some special enzyme. While you wouldn't want to follow this diet forever, its foundation is fairly healthful, says Jackson.
Healthful take-away: Grapefruit is full of antioxidants and vitamins — just like other fruits and vegetables. Up your intake by including produce in every meal, as this diet instructs.
The Cabbage Soup Diet
This seven-day plan is all cabbage soup, all the time.
The claim: Cabbage flushes fat from your body.
Sample day: Unlimited homemade cabbage soup, plus fat-free milk and up to eight bananas.
Weight-loss wisdom: The diet works in the short term by restricting calories and forcing you to eat plenty of high-fiber (read: filling) cabbage, says Wahida Karmally, an ADA spokesperson and director of nutrition at the Irving Center for Clinical Research at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in New York. "You can eat as much soup as you want, but you're going to be full before you eat very much!"
Healthful take-away: Cabbage is a good source of fiber and other nutrients, so hang on to the soup recipe. "I still make the cabbage soup sometimes, but I eat it with dinner, not as dinner," says Jackson.
The Atkins Diet
This high-protein, low-carb diet posits that eating foods containing protein and fat — but avoiding fruit, grains and vegetables — will help you lose weight.
The claim: Carbohydrates contribute to insulin resistance, a condition that causes the food you eat to be stored as fat instead of burned for energy. Sample breakfast: Two fried eggs, a slice of cheese and two strips of bacon.
Weight-loss wisdom: Weight gain, not carbohydrate consumption, contributes to insulin resistance, says Karmally. People experience dramatic weight loss on the Atkins plan for two reasons: The first is calorie restriction, since it's tough to find foods without carbs (believe it or not, the sample breakfast actually has fewer calories than a bagel with cream cheese and a glass of OJ, according to Karmally). Second, with no carbs in sight, your body stops retaining the water it ordinarily needs to metabolize them.
Healthful take-away: A diet high in saturated fat, such as the Atkins plan, may contribute to heart disease, and an extremely high protein intake may damage the kidneys. However, the Atkins diet's wisdom is understanding that a person will always be hungry on a fat-free diet. Your mind needs fat to feel full, and your body needs fat to absorb fat-soluble vitamins. If one of her patients expresses an interest in the Atkins diet, Jackson recommends a more healthful version: "We keep the protein, decrease the cheese and bacon, and increase the fruits and vegetables."
The Zone
In this plan, 40% of your daily calories come from carbohydrates, 30% from fat and 30% from protein.
The claim: Fat, protein and carbohydrates are all essential parts of your diet; but only certain complex carbs that are high in fiber are considered "favorable" and should be eaten. According to Zone creator Barry Sears, Ph.D., everyone has an ideal way to achieve the 40-30-30 calorie split, so everyone needs an individualized food plan (read: Please buy our pricey, prepackaged meals!).
Sample lunch: Chicken salad — cooked chicken breast mixed with light mayonnaise, celery and grapes — with lettuce and tomato on a piece of rye bread.
Weight-loss wisdom: Some carbohydrates are better than others. Simple carbs — such as sugar, white flour and white rice — are high-cal but low-fiber, leaving you unsatisfied. Complex carbs — such whole-wheat bread, brown rice, fruits, vegetables and beans — contain more nutrients than simple carbs, plus they're high in fiber, so they fill you up.
Healthful take-away: Though not convenient or cheap, this may just be the most sound of the fad diets. Simply keep the message — that not all carbs are created equal — and lose the prepackaged food gimmick, says Karmally.
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