Is it possible to lose weight with the Fat Man's Breakfast diet?

You don't have to have breakfast!

Most Americans consider breakfast the most important meal of the day. A hearty, hearty breakfast is considered the cornerstone of a healthy diet. If you skip breakfast, you will lose your mind from hunger and will overeat throughout the rest of the day.

Although it seems to us that this is the case all over the world, this tradition is unique to North America. For example, the French drink coffee in the morning and that’s it. The French equivalent of the word "breakfast", petit dejeuner (small lunch), seems to hint that this meal should be modest in size.

If we turn to the etymology of the English word breakfast, “breakfast”, consisting of two words break, “break”, and fast, “fasting, fasting”, then literally its meaning can be conveyed as “food that breaks (break) fasting (fast) " Fasting in this case refers to the night, that is, the period of time when we sleep and do not eat. If your first meal occurs at noon, then you can “break your fast” with a salad with grilled salmon, there is nothing wrong with that.

It is absolutely not necessary to pounce on food immediately after waking up. We imagine that we need to refuel before the work day, but in reality our body prepares for the new day on its own.

Every morning, just before waking up, in accordance with the natural circadian rhythm, our body is charged with an explosive hormonal mixture: growth hormone, cortisol, epinephrine and norepinephrine (adrenaline) enter our blood. This cocktail stimulates the synthesis of glucose in the liver, so that nutrients are present in the body by the time you wake up. This process was first described several decades ago and was called the “dawn phenomenon.”

Many people don't feel like eating in the morning. The natural increase in cortisol and adrenaline levels creates a slight “fight or flight” effect that activates the sympathetic nervous system. In the morning, our bodies are completely ready for decisive action, and not for eating. All of the hormones listed above promote the release of glucose into the blood to quickly provide additional energy. We are already fully “refueled” and ready to go. There is no need to refill with sugary cereals or muffins. Morning hunger is a habit that is instilled in us since childhood.

Sample menu for the day

The first breakfast (9.00) may consist of the following dishes:

1. A cup of oatmeal with steamed dried apricots and berries, rye toast with avocado and herb paste, coffee.
2. A small portion of granola with nuts and dried fruits, 2-3 whole wheat pancakes with 1-2 tsp. berry jam, green tea.

A light second breakfast (at 12.00) may include the following products:

1. Curd mousse with half a peach or several raspberries.
2. A glass of natural yogurt without sugar.

Lunch is scheduled for 12.30 and includes one of the following sets of dishes:

1. Baked poultry or fish with lemon juice.
2. Eggs stuffed with seafood.

At 15.30 it is recommended to drink a cup of vegetable broth, and at 18.30 - 200-300 ml of low-fat chicken or beef broth.

To create a menu, you can use other breakfast recipes, taking into account the list of permitted products. The diet is allowed to be changed, shifting the time of meals by 0.5–1.5 hours (while maintaining a half-hour interval between second breakfast and lunch).

The most important meal of the day – for whom?

The problem is that in the morning we are always in a hurry. So we need something that is fast, convenient, affordable and non-perishable. That is, processed, ready-to-eat foods. In the mornings, cereal with sugar dominates the table. Other foods that require little or no cooking are also very popular: toast, bread, sweetened yogurt, Danish puffs, pancakes, doughnuts, muffins, instant oatmeal and fruit juices. In general, these are solid cheap refined carbohydrates.

So, breakfast is the most important meal of the day... for food tycoons. Finding an ideal opportunity to sell highly profitable refined breakfast foods, food magnates are circling the easy money like sharks circling wounded prey. They shout: “Eat breakfast!”, “This is the most important meal of the day!” They were able to “train” doctors, nutritionists, and other authority figures to tell people what they needed. And the money flowed like a river.

Under the influence of the belief that breakfasts are healthy, people rush to eat purchased ready-made foods, mainly containing refined carbohydrates, benefiting not themselves, but their producers.

Do you need to have breakfast?

It's worth asking yourself some smart questions about breakfast.

• Are you hungry in the morning? If not, listen to your body and don't eat.
• Do you feel hungry after breakfast? If you eat toast and drink a glass of orange juice, will you be hungry an hour later? If yes, then don't eat breakfast.
• If you are really hungry in the morning and want to eat breakfast, then do it. But avoid sugar and refined carbohydrates.

The “fat man’s breakfast” diet: how does it work?

To lose excess weight, you need not only to limit yourself to junk food, but also to adhere to a certain diet plan. The “fat man’s breakfast” diet is considered quite original and at the same time it has many undeniable advantages.

“Fat Man’s Breakfast” is a program aimed at active weight loss, which allows a person to become slimmer without experiencing hunger pangs. It is ideal for early risers. Those who are used to getting up late and going to bed late need to choose a different way to lose weight, or even better, reconsider their lifestyle.

The principle of the “fat man’s breakfast” diet is quite simple. Food is allowed only until 14:00, that is, in the first half of the day. There are certain recommendations for the type of food consumed, but not for its quantity. This nutrition system is perfect for those who do not like to work on an empty stomach. In this case, the person is full and full of strength and vigor. Even people engaged in heavy mental and physical labor can follow the diet.

The undoubted advantage of this program is that a person can independently choose what he will eat, and not suffer from the need to eat foods that he does not like. There is no need to be afraid of the diet, because after a couple of days you no longer want to eat in the evenings. An addiction to a certain regime is formed. After 14:00 it is allowed to consume liquid low-calorie food. This includes not only tea, unsweetened coffee, mineral and pure water, but also low-fat broths. It is perfectly acceptable to treat yourself to vegetable broth for dinner, but the evening meal should take place no later than 6 p.m.

The “fat man’s breakfast” diet has virtually no restrictions. The only exceptions are people with serious chronic diseases, as well as expectant mothers. Experts recommend that you consult a doctor before starting active weight loss.

An approximate diet for the “fat man’s breakfast” diet is quite simple. The very first breakfast can take place after waking up, but it is better to first drink a glass of clean water, and after 20 minutes have breakfast. You are allowed to eat foods rich in carbohydrates: porridge, rye bread. You can even drink tea with sugar.

The second breakfast should take place in 1-2 hours. This time you need to eat foods containing protein. These include boiled eggs, cottage cheese, milk, kefir, and yogurt.

The third breakfast should consist of animal protein: boiled meat, steamed chicken breast or a piece of fish. Eating bread and vegetable salads is prohibited. You should also not drink sugary drinks. If a person wants to drink a glass of tea, there is no need to add sugar to it. The third breakfast should take place around 2 pm or even earlier.

The duration of such a diet should be about 10 days. During this period, it is quite possible to get rid of 5-7 extra pounds. Such a program will be even more effective if you return to your usual diet gradually. There is no need to radically change your routine right away. To begin with, you can start eating cottage cheese or any other fermented milk products for dinner. If you adhere to the principles of proper nutrition, you can continue to lose weight after leaving the diet, because while you are following it, metabolic processes begin to occur more actively in the body.

The “fat man’s breakfast” diet involves going to bed early at night. It is very difficult to maintain such a diet when a person goes to bed closer to midnight. This method of losing weight is not suitable for those who are forced to work in shifts or even daily.

The fat man's breakfast diet works very well. It is based on the treatment of separate nutrition, and you need to eat only in the first half of the day, when the rate of metabolic processes in the body is maximum and everything eaten is absorbed almost completely.

Do snacking help you lose weight?

Along with mandatory breakfasts, nutritionists today confidently recommend that their patients eat snacks, although previously snacking between meals was considered unacceptable. At the same time, research confirms that having snacks means eating more.

Subjects who were required to snack ate slightly fewer calories than usual at their next meal, but not enough to justify the caloric value of the snack. The results were similar for fatty and sugary snacks. Eating more frequently does not help you lose weight4. Grandma was right: snacking can make you fat.

As for the quality of the diet in general, it inexorably decreases due to snacking, because ready-to-eat foods are mostly highly processed. This is driven by the benefits of food tycoons because processed food makes more money than real whole foods. The main thing in snacks is convenience and a long shelf life, so most often they consist of refined carbohydrates.

Advantages and disadvantages

The benefits of the diet are:

1. Activation of metabolism. Eating carbohydrates in the morning allows you to “wake up” your metabolism and stimulates digestive function. The greatest activity of metabolic processes occurs between 9.00 and 12.00. After burning the calories received with food, the body uses accumulated fat deposits for everyday activities.
2. Calorie restriction without controlling weight and nutritional value of portions. Despite the lack of calculations, limiting the timing of meals helps reduce the total caloric intake of the diet. A hearty carbohydrate breakfast, a light snack and a lunch of lean protein foods contain no more than 1100–1300 kcal.
3. Balanced diet. Unlike express diets, the “Fat Man’s Breakfast” system does not involve a sharp restriction of the consumption of carbohydrates or fats, which affects well-being and health. Together with two breakfasts and lunch, those losing weight receive all the necessary substances: proteins, fats, carbohydrates, vitamins and microelements. Bakery products, cereals and dried fruits, which are recommended for breakfast, saturate the body with dietary fiber, which helps cleanse the intestines.
4. Maintaining the achieved results in the long term. In the short term, the diet may be inferior in effectiveness to more strict methods based on limiting the caloric content of the diet to 1000–1100 kcal. Those losing weight who didn’t count calories and ate a large breakfast were much less likely to gain weight back than people who strictly limited their diet. This is due to the absence of a sharp slowdown in metabolism and the habit of a light dinner.
5. Availability of recommended products. The composition of the diet has only slight restrictions, and those losing weight can create a menu depending on their own preferences and financial capabilities.

Contraindications

The use of this weight loss method is contraindicated if:

• peptic ulcer of the stomach and duodenum (for heartburn, gastritis and other inflammatory diseases of the gastrointestinal tract, the method is used with caution);
• pregnancy;
• lactation;
• adolescence and childhood;
• high level of activity in the evening, work at night;
• intense sports activities, heavy physical labor;
• recovery period after operations and infectious diseases;
• exhaustion.

Recipes for diet

Breakfast recipes for weight loss vary in composition depending on the recommended set of foods and basic nutrients (carbohydrates, proteins).

For the first breakfast

Granola . In 1–2 days, germinate 2–3 cups of cereals (oats, buckwheat or wheat). Soak 1 cup of sunflower seeds overnight (you can also add pumpkin seeds).

In the morning, steam a handful of dark raisins and grate 1 large apple, including the peel, on a coarse grater. Remove the pits from 20-25 dates and grind them in a blender. If the date pulp is too hard, it is recommended to pre-steam them in a small amount of hot water for 1-2 hours. After grinding, a thick mass should remain in the blender bowl, which is suitable for gluing granola.

Mix sprouted grains, seeds, raisins, grated apple and date paste. Add a pinch of pink Himalayan or sea salt, cinnamon and vanilla (if vanilla is missing, you can do without this spice or add vanilla extract, but not vanillin).

The cereal mass should be carefully distributed in a layer of 5–10 mm over the working surfaces of a dryer for vegetables and fruits or a baking tray covered with baking paper. When using a dryer, keep the granola for 12–15 hours at a temperature of +40..+50°C until completely dry. In the oven, the mass is baked with the door open at the minimum temperature.

Carrot porridge with dried fruits . Place 100 g of 7-grain flakes and 3-5 prunes in a thermos or thick-walled mug, fill them with hot water and leave overnight. In the morning, transfer the resulting porridge into a bowl, pour in 100–150 ml of carrot or pumpkin juice, add cinnamon. Heat in the microwave. Sprinkle the finished dish with 5-10 finely chopped cashew nuts.

For a protein lunch

Baked fish . Take a small hake carcass, remove the entrails, fins, tail and head. Cut it into pieces 2-3 cm wide. Pour lemon juice (15 ml, from a quarter of a lemon), salt and season with black pepper. Cut 1 onion into thin rings. Finely chop a small bunch of parsley.

Place the fish pieces on a baking sheet covered with baking paper. Place onion rings on top and sprinkle with chopped parsley. Pour lemon juice over the hake again. Cover with foil, shiny side down. Place the baking sheet in the oven for 30 minutes at a temperature of +190...+200°C.

Stuffed eggs with shrimp . Boil 3 eggs. Cool and cut them into halves, removing the yolks. Grind 50 g of krill, mix with a small amount of chopped herbs and finely chopped yolks, season and top with natural yoghurt. Stuff the egg white boats with the egg-shrimp mixture and garnish with parsley sprigs.