Atkins Diet

If Sarah Jessica Parker matches your image of a style diva, Atkins diet is the one for you. It’s basically about cutting down on carbs and watching what you eat. This diet is so popular in the US that many restaurants even have an 'Atkins' page on the menu. Why this diet is so popular is because the followers are allowed to eat reasonable quantities of meat, cheese, eggs, vegetables, nuts and fish. But the foods that are restricted include potatoes, fruit, rice, pasta, bread, caffeine and alcohol. This diet is more often followed in five phases with the first phase witnessing the maximum weight loss. This diet is definitely not without its flipside —  deviation from the diet, i.e. eating carbs again, can put the weight back on very quickly. And it's also reported to cause constipation and bad breath.

The Calorie Restriction Diet

Admire those super-skinny models who walk the ramps of Milan? Get latched on to this diet then. This is the favourite diet with all super models around the world. The calorie restriction diet, if followed systematically, will eventually enable you to form a lifestyle around the diet making it a part of you, life long. This diet works on a simple principle that the amount of calories consumed is directly proportional to the amount of weight gain. So how does one reduce the weight? Simple, reduce the calories taken. According to the scientists, approximately 500g of fat is equal to 3,500 calories. By cutting the calorie by 500 every day, your weight can drop to around half a kilogram a week. Isn't that great? So what you can do is, reduce 500 in calories and cut down another 500 through proper exercise and the weight reduced a week can be close to a kg a week. Moreover, regular exercise leads to increased metabolism and that is another few inches down. Calorie restriction, apart from reducing weight, is shown to improve health, reduce ageing and blood pressure, plus a lot of other benefits. A calorie-restricted diet comprises mainly fruits, vegetables and low-calorie proteins. This controls calorie consumption, ensures nutrition and hydrates the body. Good low-calorie sources of protein are beans, chicken, steamed/baked fish, egg whites, low fat yoghurt   and milk.

Cleansing and Fasting Diet

If a diet can give you shinier nails and hair, reduced body odour, weight loss, reduced cellulite, glowing complexion, more beautiful eyes and a heavenly feel after it, who wouldn't want to try it? Yes, cleansing/ fasting will definitely give you all the above results and a bit more.

There are liver, kidney and colon cleanses which a person can do though colon cleansing is the most popular. Colon cleansing will help you get rid of the old fecal matter that invariably gets stored in your body. By flushing it out, you are reducing the weight and improving your looks, all at the same time. Fasting once or twice a week can also help you break bad eating habits and start all over again. There are different ways one can fast to good health. Even the father of the nation Mahatma Gandhi is said to have fasted on a regular basis which gave him the energy to remain active till the end of his life.

The diet can be done with a combination of fresh carrot, celery, beetroot, spinach, apple and coconut. Avoid citrus or tomato juice and remember to gulp down lots of water. Do not consume anything other than broth, juice or water during the diet. This diet should normally last only three days to a week, after which you should go back to your normal diet or consumption.

Here's a recipe for a good vegetable broth:

Ingredients:

* 2 litres of water
* 2 large potatoes (peeled)
* 1 onion
* 3 carrots
* 4 garlic cloves

Chop all the vegetables and add to water. Cover and simmer for 30 minutes, then drain the vegetables.
This diet is a little hard to stick to.

You may also feel hungry, tired and perhaps a little dizzy during the beginning.

With a slight variation to this diet, a six-day diet plan can also be followed. Prepare a broth of vegetables (the recipe will follow) and follow this diet plan for six days.

* Day one: Only fruits
* Day two: Only vegetables
* Day three: Both fruits and vegetables
* Day four: Only potatoes
* Day five: White meat
* Day six: A whole meal

Recipe for the broth

*1 whole cabbage, 4 tomatoes, 4 capsicum, 4 white onions and a bunch of celery leaves. Cut them, boil in a huge vessel with water up to the brim and add some rasam masala just for taste. Try to take this at least one time a day.

The South Beach Diet

This is the diet of the Clintons. Like Atkins, The South Beach too restricts you to take some food which are high in calorie content. This diet is usually followed in three phases. The first phase lets you get a hang of the food to be consumed and those to be restricted.  It also differentiates between food with good carbs and bad carbs.
Eat only carbs that are high in fibre, and that are digested slowly. For example, brown rice is allowed but white rice is a no no. As for fats, eat polyunsaturated or mono-unsaturated fats, not saturated or trans fats. Complicated? That's the catch.

The three phases of this diet include:

Phase 1
Familiarising with what to eat and what to avoid. Here's the chart:

Phase 2
Whole grain foods and fruits are gradually returned to the diet. Refer to the above chart, but a few other things can be introduced to the diet like whole fresh fruits (apples, bananas, berries, grapes, oranges, pears, plums), selected starchy vegetables (carrots, green peas, sweet potatoes) and wholegrain breads.

Phase 3
You reach this phase when you have grasped enough about what is good and bad carbs. This phase has no restriction on food, but this is where you take the knowledge you have gained and shape your lifestyle accordingly.

The problem with this diet is that, like Atkins, you may put on extra weight, once you stop following it. Moreover, following this in the Indian context is not easy.

*Inputs from           the net

Call the chef, please!

In posh restaurants and hotels, one expects high standards of hygiene, sanitation and food palatability. I have often noticed customers asking to speak to the chef, either to compliment him on the food or to criticise. In today’s age where health and fitness is an obsession, what I would like customers to ask chefs is how they cook, how many calories does a dish have, what nutrients am I getting etc — in fact, I would like them to question chefs about food issues that are conveniently swept under the carpet.

Chefs are usually only worried about the taste and rarely are motivated to serve ‘healthy stuff’. The mantra for them is ‘cook for taste, health is not my concern’. I am not saying that a chef should become a dietitian or a nutritionist but a fundamental understanding of the ill-effects of the excess oil and sugar they tend to use, is mandatory. Many of the Kitchen Executive Trainees chose the profession because they think that they will not have to deal anymore with science and maths. This is a misconception. Food and nutrition is nothing but science and math. There is a medical as well as public health angle to it too; if the sanitary conditions of the food handler, storage and kitchen are not checked, there could be a food poisoning. There is also the image of the happy, portly chef; I would like to see a fit chef who looks at  food more closely.

The hospitality industry needs to look at customer satisfaction in a fresh manner. An emphasis on the actual food and its nutrition has to start appearing on menu cards, perhaps with exclusive sections designed for those increasingly health and fitness conscious customers.

Health Professions Council, UK