Explaining The Reverse Diet

THE REVERSE DIET

By Vicky Hall BSc Nutritional Medicine BSc Biology mBANT

Fashionable diets seem to come and go every few weeks and the latest new diet, called the Reverse Diet, is based on the old adage 'breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dine like a pauper'.

We all know that we should eat breakfast if we want to lose weight, as it boosts our metabolism at the beginning of the day and also gives us plenty of energy. This diet takes this principle one step further and advocates eating your meals in reverse order - eat your dinner for breakfast and your breakfast for dinner.

The explanation behind this diet is simple. Food eaten in the evening doesn't get burned off as efficiently as that eaten in the morning, as we are less active. This makes it more likely to be turned into fat. Eating more calories at the beginning of the day, and burning them off more effectively, might therefore help with weight loss.

The Reverse Diet has become the latest celebrity diet in America and is becoming increasing well known over here too. Angelina Jolie attributes her slim-line figure to this diet and claims to eat a substantial breakfast and then breakfast cereal for her evening meal. Beyonce is also a fan.

The positive aspect of this diet is that you don't have to change what you eat, just the order you eat it in. However, if the thought of eating meat and vegetables for breakfast turns your stomach, you can still implement the basic principles of this diet without changing what you eat. Increase the amount of your normal breakfast and reduce the size of your meals as the day progresses, so that your dinner becomes the smallest meal of the day. Make sure you don't exceed your daily calorie allowance though!

The downside to this diet is that it is not much use to those of us who get the evening munchies. Although the principles of this new diet may help some people, the real key to losing weight is eating three healthy, balanced meals a day, keeping within your overall daily calorie allowance and exercising regularly. New diets seem to appear every few weeks, but are generally worth having a look at to see if there is something useful behind it that you can use in your crusade to shift those pounds.

Worth considering.....

.Always eat breakfast within an hour of getting up

.Try decreasing your portion sizes over the day, so that breakfast is your largest meal and dinner your smallest

.If you don't have a huge appetite at breakfast, make sure your lunch is larger than your dinner

Want to know more?

Read The Reverse Diet by Tricia Cunningham and Heidi Skolnik