How To Identify Fad Diet Plans #1 - You Are Allowed To Eat Very Few Calories A Day

If you are thinking about weight loss, you know you will have to go onto a diet and do moderate exercise. The problem now is choosing a diet that will work. Most important, of course, is to be able to

identify Fad Diet Plans.

As fad diet plans can lead to many problems taking the time to make sure you do not fall for any of the fad diet plans is a good idea. To be able to do this you must be able to identify fad diet plans and steer clear from any of them.

Once you know all the characteristics of fad diet plans you will be able to choose a healthy diet that suits you. In this way you will have a far better chance of having long term success with your weight loss efforts.

How To Identify Fad Diet Plans #1:

We all know that if we are looking at How To Lose Weight Calories have to be reduced. That we cannot dispute, but in fad diet plans this is taken too far.

This is the very first dead giveaway of fad diet plans. You are only allowed to eat very little. The amount of calories you are allowed to eat on fad diet plans are way too little for your health's sake. So, if you see a diet where you are only allowed to eat very little you can be very sure it is a fad diet plan.

Eating so little will now have any good effects in the long run and you will also not be able to keep it up as you will simply be too hungry, in fact you will just about be starving.

So, do not even look at a diet where you are allowed very few calories a day. It is not safe to reduce your calorie intake per day with more than 500 calories than your body needs to maintain your weight.

To know how many you are supposed to eat to maintain your present weight you do the following math:

If you lead a mostly sedentary life you need 13 x your weight in calories to maintain your weight. So, from this you subtract the 500 calories and you know how many you need to eat each day.

If you are moderately active you take 16 x your weight and for very active you take 19 times your weight. From this you have to, once again, subtract 500.

There are easier ways than this to reduce the calories in a healthy way. Have a look at How To Lose Weight Calories for a few good ideas.

So, do not make the mistake of falling for Fad Diet Plans.

Somersize Eating Plan

There are many diets on the market that promises you that they are the ultimate "Lose Weight Diets" and the Somersize Eating Plan is not different. Have a look at how the diet works and decide for yourself whether it is a good diet or just another of the Fad Diet Plans doing the rounds.

Remember Chrissy from Three’s Company? This plan was developed by her. Suzanne Somers has gotten into nutrition and fitness in a big way. It started with the Thigh Master® and has continued with what people are calling the Somersize diet.

Somersize gets its basis from the ideas behind several other plans. Eating food in certain combinations will help the participants lose weight. The body’s metabolism has to learn to function properly. Eating junk food and greasy fare has ruined our metabolism and thrown our bodies out of whack.

The Somersize plan blames white flour for the problem. Foods created with white flour are high on the glycemic index. This means that consuming these foods will increase insulin production in the body. We get hungry more often and overeat to maintain energy levels.

The Somersize plan came out of Suzanne’s book, Get Skinny on Fabulous Food. It sounds like a gimmick and several people consider that it is. It is not a complete plan that teaches the basis behind food composition, but does offer lists of eliminated foods.

The plan divides food into four groups. The first group is the protein/fats group. It combines these two food types because protein and fat in combination leads to slower digestion of the food.

The veggie group is self-explanatory. Most veggies can be eaten as long as they don’t contain a lot of starch. This still leaves a large pool to pick from.

Carbohydrate groups lean towards whole grain sources. Since white flour products are frowned upon, any carbohydrate that comes from healthier grains is a better choice. Participants can still eat cereal, cheese, and milk, but varieties with less fat and better ingredients.

Fruits are the last group. Fruits provide healthy sugars. No fruits are off limits just don’t add sugar or other sweeteners to them or you’ll defeat the purpose.

There is a list of foods to eliminate while on the plan included. They are foods that most plans which stress low calorie carbohydrates tell participants to limit. The only problem with this list is that there is no plan for incorporating them back into the diet in small quantities if the participant wants to do so.

The guidelines are general. Fats and protein can be eaten together but can’t be eaten with carbohydrates. Vegetables are allowed to be eaten with fats and proteins and carbohydrates. Fruit should be eaten at the beginning of the day.

There needs to be a span of several hours between a carbohydrate meal before eating one with proteins and fats. The Somersize plan is quite generic so participants definitely should do their research and be sure they understand the importance of portion control before beginning.

To be honest, I think you should also have a look at How Can I Lose Fat and the guidelines in it before you make a decision on your course of action.

How To Lose Fat With A Chicken Recipe - Low Fat Recipe

If you are asking the question: "how can I lose fat?" One part of the solution is to eat a sensible diet with lots of low fat foods, such as skinless chicken breasts, low fat dairy products and lots of fruit and vegetables. Sometimes that can really result in a tasteless, although healthy, eating plan.

It does not have to be that way, though, as you can prepare tasty meals will within your limits if you know how to do it. Always think of low-fat and non-fat ways to enhance the taste of a dish. Add the taste and not the fat as you can see with this slow cooker recipe as an example. If you have a West Bend Slow Cooker, this low fat, and very tasty, recipe will be a pleasant surprise to you.

Lemon Pucker Chicken Low Fat Recipe

What You Need:

• 4 chicken breasts, boneless and skinless
• 1 fresh lemon
• 1 tsp. lemon pepper
• 1 tsp. paprika

How to Make It:

1. Lay the chicken breasts in the bottom of the crock pot
2. Slice the lemon in half and squeeze the juice from 1/2 over the chicken.
3. Sprinkle with the lemon pepper and paprika.
4. Slice the remaining half of lemon into thin slices.
5. Lay the lemon slices on top of the chicken.
6. Cover and cook on high 4 hours.

Tip: 1 T of lemon juice can be used in place of squeezing the lemon. Garlic is also good in place of the paprika. Orange juice and a fresh orange can be used for a little different taste.

Well, there you have the best of all worlds! A really low fat chicken recipe that really falls in with all kinds of eating plans, all the taste and the convenience of slow cooker cooking. What can anyone ever wish to have more?

Make Some Tasty Low Fat Smoothies That Will Not Ruin Your Diet

With summer coming you will want to enjoy some smoothies. Well if you have a blender such as the Cuisinart CBT 700 Blender than you can easily make yourself tasty, low fat and low sugar smoothies that will not ruin your diet.

In any healthy balanced diet, see How Can I Lose Fat, you will have skim milk, low fat yogurt and fruit, all you need to make a tasty smoothie. It will be a life saver when it is hot and you feel like something cold.

To start off with take your days allowance in fruit and chop it up into bite size pieces. Then you freeze the fruit in a flat layer. The reason for this is that you can break the pieces apart to use in your smoothie.

Now all you need to do is take some of your skim milk allowance, some of your fat free yogurt allowance and us much of your fruit allowance as you want and make a smoothie with it.

It is best to only add a little of the frozen fruit to start with and then you add the rest little by little until you get the consistence you want. If you cannot use a full portion you can simply use the rest in another dish.

Of course, if you do not have a Cuisinart CBT 700 Blender you can also use one of the Cuisinart 11 Cup Pro Custom 11 Food Processors or even a Cuisinart CSB-76 Smart Stick Hand Blender. It will be quite OK with any of them, but the Cuisinart CBT 700 Blender will the best and it will give you the best results.

So, now you can see how making tasty smoothies this summer does not have to ruin your diet. If you prefer a little more sweetness you can add artificial sweetener, but I do not recommend it as artificial sweeteners come with a lot of problem of their own.

To see what I means go to: Stumbling Blocks On The Road To Weight Loss Diet Sodas. The long term effect of sweeteners on your metabolism is not very good. So, I would avoid them if I can.

Fruit As Part Of Your Answer To How Can I Lose Fat

Sometimes I find people have difficulty with fruit in a weight loss diet. portion control is always difficult and if you are saying "How can I lose weight?" it is possible that you have problems with fruit. If you want to know more about this problem you can also look at Stumbling Blocks On The Road To Weight Loss Stumbling Block #11 - Fruit about this problem.

In the meantime, you may have a look at this smoothie recipe. It is a very good way to get in your fruit as part of your weight loss efforts. It is suitable for a quick breakfast because Skipping Meals is also on of the stumbling blocks on the road to weight loss. If you drink this smoothie you have taken care of your fruit for the day, one of your protein portions and 11/2 cup of your dairy.

Pineapple, Apricot And Strawberry Smoothie Recipe

Ingredients for this recipe:

• 1/4 cup fresh crushed pineapple
• 2 fresh apricots, diced, seed removed
• 10 strawberries, frozen
• A small banana (about 2 ounces) sliced and frozen
• 11/2 Cup skimmed milk
• 1 heaping tbsp. high-quality protein powder

Method:

1. In a blender, such as a Cuisinart Smoothie Maker also called a Cuisinart CBT 700 Blender, process fruit with the rest of the ingredients
2. Blend until thoroughly mixed and serve.
3. Because some of the fruit is frozen you will end up with a tasty, thick smoothie