One Possible Route to Successful Dieting!!

Or, what not to do when you go on a diet. Or, how to decide which sort of diet to go on. Or, should you go on a diet at all? It’s a subject that is constantly around once middle age hits. As well as being constantly around your middle.

Yeah, yeah I hear you say, heard it all before, done it so many times and forgotten more than I could ever write about dieting. Very likely, but you know what, I’m going to talk about it anyway. Because this is the time of year, when most people lose heart over their post Christmas diets. It’s still winter and our bodies are insisting on hanging on to the fat to keep us warm – that’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it. And just because the daffodils and crocuses are confused and poking their heads up early, don’t think it won’t come cold again just as you leave off your winter vest!

I have to own up here and say that I don’t have much of a weight problem. I don’t have a huge appetite and rarely gain more than I can easily lose, so have escaped the yo-yo effect of dieting that besets many people. But I have bought and read quite a few diet books over the years as such things interest me. One person who has recently stood out is Paul McKenna. He seemed to be on our screens more than he was off them for a couple of years and successfully tours doing shows and lectures, as well as writing books. In his book ‘I Will Make you Thin’, Paul McKenna states four main rules for dieting:

1. Eat when you want
2. Eat what you want
3. Chew every mouthful thoroughly – eat slowly
4. Stop eating before you are full

He’s not alone with this concept. It is accepted that our body stores food when it thinks it is not going to get any more. So if you stop eating you achieve the opposite to what you are trying to achieve. It actually works better if you eat more often, BUT eat less. Become a grazer! Fine, but what do you graze on? Well again, Paul McKenna says, ‘eat what you want’ – he should add the proviso ‘but in moderation’. After all if you ate all you wanted whenever you wanted there wouldn’t be much point to the diet. The trick is to fool your stomach and digestive system into reducing its needs. So if you are used to eating a three course meal, cut back to two courses, or spread the three courses out over a longer period of time. Reduce quantities – a little at a time and you will hardly notice the difference.

So here’s one possible route to success . . .

Around mid February my partner decided that he was going on a soup diet. The extra stone he has been carrying around was outliving its welcome and he had made up his mind it had to go. This was announced one weekend having spent the Sunday entertaining most of the family and a few friends – plenty of food and alcohol around as you can imagine. Well we are a sociable family!

So the request was for lots of home made soup which were nourishing and wholesome without being fattening. OK, I figured that should be pretty easy. I quite like that sort of cooking – you know, chop it all up, throw it in a saucepan and leave it to do its stuff. Then go back and emaciate it in a food processor. Lovely! Not so simple in reality.

We started off with the obvious – vegetable soup. What was left over from the Sunday lunch became the first port of call – sadly this actually doesn’t work that well, depending on what you had for Sunday lunch and the palate of the person you are cooking for. I discovered quite quickly that I could not just throw any old leftover into a soup and expect it to work. Too much spinach in one vegetable mix was a disaster, though fortunately my partner’s son loved it! Phew! I clearly had to become much more discerning about the recipes I chose.

All the cookery books were delved into and a selection of soups chosen to work my way through, with a series of stars to decide which ones to repeat. After all if soup and fruit were the only things the poor man was going to have to eat every week day, then he should at least enjoy it, right? Now we are talking about a curry connoisseur here – a male with a decided penchant for spicy food. So all soups with lots of pepper or curry powder were a magnet for him. Mulligatawny is a favourite so far. His theory is that spice decreases hunger pangs. Anyone else agree? Soups that were full of meat and vegetables unprocessed did not work so well as he can’t pour them out of a flask very easily.

At this point I can well imagine all the cooks in the house thinking, well that’s all very well, but it’s a lot of work when you can pick up a can in the supermarket. Absolutely – I agree wholeheartedly! However, most cans/packets are laden with preservatives and salts and the flavour compared to home made is definitely lacking. Neither is it expensive to make soups. The best soups you can buy are the fresh ones in the cartons, and they range from around £1.35 - £2.00 depending on flavour and supermarket. (At one carton a day, that’s up to £10 a week). Whether that is acceptable to your budget is of course for you to decide.

But my main criteria for making the soup myself was I could control exactly what went into them. I could substitute any fattening substance for one that was less so – low fat yoghurt for cream for example, without detracting from the flavours. I can add roughage from fresh vegetables, include ones that neither of us like particularly (celery especially!) and not even notice they are there. And mostly I can just chop it all up (or use the dicer on the food processor), add it to the saucepan, go away and leave it all to simmer for a while and then come back and whirl it through the food processor once more before adding the final seasoning and measuring and freezing. Oh and I get to try them out as well.

Has he lost any weight? Well yes, he has. About 9 pounds so far. Slow but sure – although he is starting to introduce some exercise as well, treadmill and some light weights. Sorry guys, but you do actually have to work a little as well to burn off those calories. He has cut out all bread – at least the lunchtime sandwich variety – and only has the odd slice when we entertain or go out.

I can think of worse ways to lose weight, can’t you?

If you’re interested in soups – for a diet or otherwise – email me at the blog email address and I will send you my collection of tried and trusted soup recipes.