Dr. Atkins started the Atkins diet by making the clinical ketogenic diet (very low-carb, relatively low-protein, very high-fat) friendlier for the lay dieters. In the process, he lost an important point of controlling protein intake and keeping the proper ratios of carbs:protein: fat.
It resulted in uncertainty regarding actual carbohydrate amounts circulating in the blood because almost half of the eaten protein can be turned into glucose by the body. It in turn resulted in a weight loss failure or plateau.
He called such cases "metabolic resistance" - but they could be simply results of protein overeating. Dr. Atkins advised attempting the "fat fast" consisting of 90% fat.
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Diet Television Tip: Atkins Diet: Advantage Or Not?
Although the low-carb/high-protein craze has faded and pushed the Atkins Diet plan away from center stage, it still provides some short-term diet options for people who want to lose weight or maintain weight loss. The company now calls itself Atkins Nutritional Advantage, or ANA, rather than Atkins Diet. It is also attempting to position Atkins as a lifestyle eating plan for healthy, active people by marketing its own brand of food products (such as snack bars) to compete with other energy bars such as Clif Bars or Power Bars. The ANA endorses five principles: high protein, high fiber, low sugar, no trans fats and “abundant” vitamins and minerals.
But the principles of ANA remain the same as those of the Atkins Diet and consist of four phases: the induction phase, ongoing weight loss phase, pre-maintenance phase and lifetime maintenance phase. The ANA still emphasizes controlling carbohydrates during the first two phases, but allows for gradually adding carbs back into your diet (but in moderation compared with proteins and healthy fats) assuming that you will attempt to follow the ANA guidelines to help you maintain a healthy weight. The ANA has its own food pyramid, with carbs at the tip and protein as the base, so the emphasis is still that of a relatively low-carb/high-protein eating plan. If you are tempted to follow the high-protein/low-carb plan outlined in the first two phases as a way to lose weight fast, just remember that these early phases aren’t meant to be followed for the long term. Some studies of low-carb/high-protein dieters have shown that many people who lose weight quickly on these diets find the regimen (and the weight loss) difficult to maintain.
The bottom line: If a structured plan for the short-term and long-term intrigues you, Atkins may be a viable choice, but it involves more planning and effort in food preparation and selection compared with other diet plans.
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What Are Low Carb "Negative Calorie" Foods?
The popular Negative Calorie Diet is in fact a low-fat, low-energy-density diet. What is offered by vast varieties of low carb diets, is just the opposite - high-fat, high-energy-density diets. But if we stop to think in terms of negative calorie balance, we'll see that any diet can do. Another thing is what's called "fat burning effect" of foods. From this standpoint, low-carb, high-fat foods are indeed able to make the body burn its own fat for fuel, the effect that low fat diets cant achieve.
The matter is, our metabolic mode is directly affected by the ratio carbs+protein to fat. If there's at least 1.5 tiles more fat in a food or meal than there's carbs+protein combined, the body's metabolic mode shifts into the fat burning mode. The higher the ratio in favor of fat grams, the deeper into the fat burning mode our body is. This condition is called ketosis and low carb foods and meals are what causes ketosis.
Here's a sample list of foods that can be eaten without portion control and still cause ketosis.
"Free" foods - eat all you want. The higher on the list the better.
Combining foods that with low ketogenic capacities and those with high, you can have just about any food and still get into the ketosis state. For example, 2 leaves of Romaine lettuce plus 2 tablespoons of sour cream or 1/3 cup of Chinese cabbage plus 1 tablespoon of oil are negative calorie" meals though the lettuce or cabbage alone are not.
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Diet Television Tip: How the Rich Get Thin, If They Can Handle The Restrictions
The How the Rich Get Thin Diet is a relative newcomer on the diet scene. The diet is explained in a book, "How the Rich Get Thin: Park Avenue’s Top Diet Doctor Reveals the Secrets to Losing Weight and Feeling Great." The book was written by a doctor, Jana Klauer, M.D., who treats patients from some of Manhattan’s wealthiest neighborhoods. According to an excerpt from the book, Dr. Klauer’s patients are busy with their work and under pressure to look great, but they often don’t know how to eat well or maintain a healthy weight.
Although in theory the diet is aimed at busy professionals, it requires careful attention to meal planning and advocates an hour of exercise daily. With those restrictions, it may or may not be realistic for some of its supposed target audience. The plan also includes some often-cited tips for weight loss, such as drinking plenty of water, eating high-calcium snacks and avoiding the bread basket when dining out.
The How the Rich Get Thin Diet plan emphasizes meals high in protein, calcium and omega-3 fatty acids and no processed foods are allowed. The weight loss plan consists of several phases, similar to the Atkins or South Beach diets, in which you start out with very restricted food choices and gradually increase the variety of foods that you are eating over a period of weeks. The first phase of the plan is a 3-day “jump-start” protocol of high protein, but few calories. It is meant to help you shed several pounds of water weight (the type of weight that is notorious for creeping back once you start to eat a greater variety of foods).
The book was published early in 2006, so it’s too soon to determine whether the diet has caught on and whether dieters are reporting success, failure or disinterest. An online accompaniment to the diet has yet to appear, so if you want to try to diet like the rich, it is just you and the book, at least for now.
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Low carb foods for weight loss
Carbohydrate requirement can be different on different diets, and finding low carb foods for low carb diets can be difficult. There are diets advising consuming "good" carbs like in whole grains versus "bad" carbs like in white bread or sugar.
Another group of carbohydrate-regulating diets, such as, for example, the Zone, prescribes very precise combination of carbs/protein/fat. The Zone defines this combination as the 40/30/30 ratio and this is a very liberal carbohydrate allowance comparing with a 'standard' low carb diet permitting 100 carb grams a day or less.
The strictest of all is the ketogenic diet requiring that carb and protein grams combined should be at least 3 to 4 times lower than fat grams. Concrete gram amounts depend on caloric requirements.
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Diet Television Tip: Learn Your Low-Carb Options
Not all low-carb diets are created equal. The Atkins Diet (now known as Atkins Nutritional Advantage) and the Sugar Busters diet are quite restrictive, but many dieters have found that the SouthBeach diet is more flexible and therefore easier to follow for the long-term as a way to maintain weight loss.
The South Beach Diet does feature a reduced percentage of carbs in proportion to proteins and fats, but it doesn’t eliminate food groups and the low-carb recipes include healthy fats such as olive oil and canola oil, lean protein sources, and nutritious (not junk) carbs from sources such as fruits and whole grains.
When it comes to choosing low-carb foods, lower-carb diet plans such as the South Beach Diet or the How the Rich Get Thin Diet offer suggestions for low-carb meals that you can make at home. If you’re too busy to cook or worry about which foods are allowed in what phase of the diet, you can still buy “low-carb” prepackaged food products, although the waning of the low-carb diet craze has left fewer prepared low-carb foods and snacks available in most grocery stores. You can order Atkins and South Beach Diet-branded low-carb foods by searching for these diet names online, and low-carb diet plans include specific meal ideas to follow during different phases of the diets.
The take-home message is that a calorie is a calorie no matter when or how you eat it, so there’s nothing magical about a low-carb diet. And remember that many carbohydrate-containing foods that are restricting or eliminated from some low-carb plans, such as fruits and whole grains, contain nutrients that are important for overall good health. So even if you go low-carb to lose some weight before your cousin’s wedding, you may want to adopt a less restrictive healthy eating plan for long-term weight management.
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Low Carb Diet Safety
Low carb diets, even it their extreme manifestation, the ketogenic diet, and the well researched Atkins diet, were reported as being safe and efficient.
Children on clinical ketogenic diet, which is highest in fat and lowest in carbohydrates out of all the diets, resulted in no serious health problems for decades after their diet.
The low carb diets that advise on high protein intake can cause kidney problems, but those instructing on limiting protein intake and having more "good" fats instead are beneficial even for this condition.
Low carb diets are not more nutritionally challenging than any restrictive diet though they can require a different set of supplements, for nutritional balancing.
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Diet Television Tip: How Lower-Carb Diets Work, or Don’t Work
You can lose weight by following low-to-moderate carb diets such as the Atkins Diet, the South Beach Diet, the Sugar Busters! Diet and the How the Rich Get Thin Diet. But these diets are at least as hard to stick with for the long-term as any other diets and the emphasis on high-protein and sometimes high-fat foods in some low-carb diets may be detrimental to your health depending on what other health issues you have. No data yet exist to show whether long-term adherence to low-carb diets increase your risk of heart disease, cancer, kidney problems or bone problems. But if are trying to cut cholesterol, for example, you would be better off with a moderate protein, low-fat diet than a low-carb diet.
In a nutshell, here’s how low-carb diets make you lose weight:
Losing water weight. During the first phase of these diets, calories are restricted and carbohydrates are completely cut out. A rapid weight loss will usually be seen during this initial phase, but it is mostly due to water loss.
Cutting overall calories. Because most low-carb diets restrict the types of foods that you can eat, your overall calorie intake is regulated almost by default. The average person consumes at least half of his or her daily calories from carbs including bread, pasta, cereal, milk, and most types of sweets. By cutting out these food groups, you’re cutting calories.
Making You Feel Full.Fat takes longer to digest than carbohydrate, so you will feel fuller longer after eating a high-fat, low-carb meal than if you had a low-fat, high-carb meal.
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Low Carb Diets and Low Carb Recipes
Low carb diet plans are vast and varied and involve low carb recipes. The mild low carb diets and recipes, such as the Zone, don't even restrict carb intake emphasizing proper ratios of carbs:fat:protein, which, by the way, is pretty close to the new diet guide pyramid.
All low carb diets prohibit the intake of refined carbohydrates coming from processed sugar, white flour, high-fructose corn syrup, etc. Some low carb diets assume that the dangers of saturated fats are overrated, and make note of that in their low carb recipe suggestions.
Most of the low carb diets are especially beneficial for people with the "apple" body shape, with body fat concentrated mostly around the middle. This is because even a mild low carb diet results in improved insulin sensitivity and insulin resistance is the reason of abdominal fat accumulation.
One of the more attractive features in the low carb diet is a decreased appetite and increased sense of well being, which are attributed to the ketone bodies released by body fat tissues when carbohydrate intake is limited.
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Diet Television Tip: Zone Diet Hones in on Protein Power
The Zone Diet, popularized by Dr. Barry Sears, claims to promote weight loss through a high-protein low-carb equation. Ideally, your daily calorie intake should consist of 40 percent protein, 30 percent carbohydrate and 30 percent fat.
The Zone Diet is restrictive, but not as much as some low-carb diets and you are able to increase your variety of foods the longer you spend on the diet.
Zone diet foods include all types of lean protein, as well as low-fat dairy products, most types of fresh fruit and non-starchy veggies. The idea behind consuming each meal and snack in the right combination of protein, fat and carbs will help manage insulin levels and keep the dieter’s mind and body at its ultimate state.
Restricted items on the Zone Diet include carrots, bananas, raisins and most grain products, all of which are healthy foods that are high in fiber. One of the criticisms of the Zone Diet is that it is too low in fiber, which has been shown to improve digestion, cholesterol levels and overall health. Oatmeal and barley, which are whole-grain and fiber-rich foods, are allowed in the Zone, however.
Northwestern University’s nutritional analysis of a typical day on the Zone Diet came up with 28 grams of fiber for the day. That’s more than many average Americans eat per day, but some health organizations recommend 25 to 38 grams daily, so the Zone may be on the low end of the fiber spectrum.
A sample breakfast meal on the Zone Diet is 1 cup of strawberries, 2/3 cup of oatmeal and 6 egg whites scrambled with 2 tablespoons of olive oil and asparagus.
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Meal Frequency And Carbohydrate Control
There's at least two aspects of effects of meal frequency on controlling carbohydrate metabolism: daily calorie intake change and blood sugar regulation. For some reasons, more frequent meals can decrease appetite thus reducing calorie intake in some people while increasing appetite in others. Researchers think that this can depend on intensity or/and duration as well as types of exercise and fitness level. However, all people benefit from frequent meals if it doesn't cause calorie intake increase -- either by naturally reduced appetite or by keeping the portions small.
The benefits of carbohydrate control by reducing portion and increasing frequencies of meals are the following:
Lower fluctuations in appetite
Lower total cholesterol and "bad" cholesterol
Lower insulin secretion and glucose levels
Lower free fatty acids levels and adipose (fat) enzyme levels
Lower uric acid levels (risk factor for coronary heart disease)
Increased bile acid secretion, which is good for your liver, gallbladder, and digestion
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Exercising And Low Carb Foods
By exercising, you maintain your muscle mass while encouraging the burning of fat for energy. On early stages of any low carb diet, people are often unable to exercise vigorously, because of the limited amount of low carb food in their system. But moderate-intensity exercises of longer durations are encouraged by most of the low carb diets, even while maintaining a low carb food recipe regime. When your body adapts to its new way of eating, more intensive exercises become possible. It is important to start or continue perfecting strength training for both preserving the muscles and "earning" the right to eat nutritious foods even if they contain some more carbs.
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Low Fat Versus Low Carb: Long Term Results
Low fat diet craze is over and the low carb diet popularity is on decline but researchers keep publishing results of the studies that started almost 10 years ago. When first short term clinical trials revealed that the Atkins diet is safe and efficient, low fat gurus suggested that we wait for several years to see how their approach will win on the long run. Now, our wait seem to be over -- one of the leading American medical journals, JAMA, published results of their 7.5-year long trial. So were the low fat gurus right? Doesn't seem so.
The group of women that complied with low-fat eating plan for all these years didn't show any signs of better health than the control group eating as much fat as they pleased. What's worse, their waist-to-hip ratio increased over the years as compared with women who were not limiting their fat intake. This ratio reflects insulin sensitivity and blood sugar control -- the greater the ratio, the worse.
One possible explanation is usually, that the lower in fat a diet is, the higher it is in carbohydrates and higher intake of carbohydrates was shown to associate with higher 'bad' cholesterol and lower 'good' cholesterol. Also, diets that are higher in 'good' fats like olive oil and fatty fish seem to increase energy expenditure by increasing heat dissipation through the skin. In one study, Atkins dieters were able to eat up to 300 Cal. extra a day and still lose more weight than those in the control eating higher-carbohydrate diet.
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Low carb foods in Low Carb Diets
Some diets rely on low carb foods with a low glycemic load. The term "glycemic load" is used to describe the amount of carbohydrates appearing in the blood after eating a certain serving of a food. Meats and dairy products are low carbohydrate foods because of their low carbohydrate content leading to low glycemic load.
Raw vegetables and fruits, while containing the same amounts of carbohydrates as cooked ones, are considered acceptable under low carb diets because ounce for once, they only elevate blood glucose levels to a lesser degree.
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Atkins induction phase and caffeine
Many low carb dieters reported that cheating on the Atkins diet by drinking coffee cased weight loss stalling. During the Atkins induction phase, carbohydrate limitation is strict in order to induce ketosis and to shift the metabolism from running on carbohydrates to running on ketone bodies.
Insulin is a potent anti-ketogenic hormone. It was shown in an experiment that insulin level can be elevated by caffeine. Daily consumption of coffee and caffeine-containing drinks caused decrease insulin sensitivity and compromises efficiency of any low carb diet.
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