It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a woman in possession of a large backside must be in need of a diet book.
As I browse the diet section in my local bookstore, I realise that I have bought them all – and most of them are sitting on my shelves -at home.
But I will give it one more chance, so I buy the “the Sirt food diet” on Amazon Kindle. I choose the Kindle edition so that the book will not sit on my kitchen shelf and mock me when I fail again. Adele’s amazing weight loss is all down to this diet apparently and who knows I might even be able to sing in tune.
However, I am not encouraged when I see it is not written by a doctor or dietician but two celebrity nutritionists. I am never sure what a “nutritionist” is. It is a bit of a vague category. Is it someone who has studied at university to be a qualified dietitian? or is someone who has done a few courses online or even someone who works at a private gym and makes it all up. I know that I should be relying on evidence-based research.
The diet is based on sirt foods (SIRTS). It is thought that certain natural plant compounds (polyphenols) may be able to trigger the body into weight loss and miraculously at the same time maintain muscle mass and protect from chronic disease. It all sounds very encouraging and possibly too good to be true.
Most of these ingredients are easy to find and not bad at all. Red wine, strawberries, extra virgin olive oil, dark chocolate, walnuts and kale. I can do that.
The diet consists of 2 phases and involves making three green juices a day. The authors suggest that one should use a juicer but I didn’t have one and I thought I would be losing out on fibre so I put the kale, apples, celery and other stuff in my new fancy Vitamix, which I bought at great expense for my last diet.
Whilst the green juice was a bit hard core and did make a bit of a mess in my kitchen the diet allowed one proper meal a day and the recipes for those were fabulous -miso and sesame glazed fish, prawns with buck wheat noodles and vegetarian options too. “Him indoors”, who should lose weight but does not think it is doable enjoyed all these meals. Just don’t mention the diet word.
I think this diet is for me, the food is beyond delicious, quite unlike any boring diet food I have tried before. Don’t get me started on diet food like “light and sleezy”. My secret stash of sirfood bites sits in my fridge and is my go-to sweet treat. No guilt then. If you can get through the three days which are 1000 calories, then you will enjoy it – and lose weight. I have lent it to the fat lawyer, watch this space.