The potato diet

sgds

Anyone tried the potatoe diet? It's the easiest diet that I have ever tried. I have lost half stone in seven days.

beertons

Vodka?

conzy

I find the calorie controlled varied diet of meat, veg, rice, pasta, bread, dairy and sensible amounts of chocolate / ice cream to be a bit easier than the ole potato diet. God forbid if there was another famine you would be killed stone dead

nowseperated

sgds wrote: »

Anyone tried the potatoe diet? It's the easiest diet that I have ever tried. I have lost half stone in seven days.

What are you allowed to eat and how do you cook your potato's

Stacker Pentecost

nowseperated wrote: »

What are you allowed to eat and how do you cook your potato's

The spud loving Irish may prefer this diet to any other. Here is what needs to be done, as outlined in ehow.com

1. Eat only potatoes, morning, noon and night. Eat them baked, mashed, steamed, roasted, and juiced, but never fried.

2. Never add milk or butter. Use Chives, mint, cumin, turmeric, fennel, caraway, paprika, dill, nutmeg, rosemary and fresh garlic. Use potato juice or herbal teas to aid in making mashed potatoes.

3. Very important -- Leave the skins on the potatoes. The skins account for over 75% of the potato's mineral value.

4. Drink plenty of water and herbal teas.

.

Essien

Never fried, never add milk or butter, but eat as much potato as you like and always leave the skins on?

Is this real life?

Alf Veedersane

These diets are a blight on healthy attitudes to nutrition.

Katgurl

uuuuugggggggghhhhhh

super_furry

niavd

I like a good spud as much as the next person but any diet that consists of just one thing cant be good for you!

Mars Bar

It sounds absolutely horrific.

mahoganygas

This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen.

intheclouds

Yes, you lost half a stone in 7 days because you are only eating potatoes.

It's hard to believe that anyone could be stupid enough to do this.

laoch na mona

not voluntarily no. I once had to live of a bag of spuds and milk for a week or two when I was in college, dark times, but the knowledge that potatoes and milk made Irish peasants the healthiest in Europe was some comfort.

And that was only for dinner I had cereal for breakfast

joeprivate

sgds wrote: »

Anyone tried the potatoe diet? It's the easiest diet that I have ever tried. I have lost half stone in seven days.

I have looked up some stuff on eating only potatoes and as unbelievable as it may seem for a lot of people eating only potatoes for a few weeks or longer may not do you much harm and for many people it will actually improve their health.
Its seemingly one of the most complete foods out there.

So much so Damon in 'The Martian' growing potatoes on Mars isn't that far off what NASA actually wants to do.
http://www.syracuse.com/us-news/index.ssf/2016/04/nasa_trying_to_grow_potatoes_on_mars.html

and Chris Voigt, the head of the Washington State Potato Commission, lost 21 pounds in two months and dropped his cholesterol by 60 points on a potato only diet. He and his doctor were astonished. He did it to prove to health officials in the state that potatoes were rich in all the right kind of nutrients and should not be banned from school meals

The spud loving Irish may prefer this diet to any other. Here is what needs to be done, as outlined in ehow.com

1. Eat only potatoes, morning, noon and night. Eat them baked, mashed, steamed, roasted, and juiced, but never fried.

2. Never add milk or butter. Use Chives, mint, cumin, turmeric, fennel, caraway, paprika, dill, nutmeg, rosemary and fresh garlic. Use potato juice or herbal teas to aid in making mashed potatoes.

3. Very important -- Leave the skins on the potatoes. The skins account for over 75% of the potato's mineral value.

4. Drink plenty of water and herbal teas.
http://www.irishcentral.com/culture/food-drink/the-miracle-irish-potato-diet-drop-21-pounds-in-two-months-111252359-237729391.html

An experiment is described in which two adults, a man and a woman,
lived over a period of 167 days in nitrogen equilibrium and in good health
on a diet in which the nitrogen was practically solely derived from the potato.
link here http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1252113/pdf/biochemj01140-0284.pdf

More at

seamus

*sigh*

Just another fad diet based on the principle of calorie control. Somewhere, there's somebody making or trying to make money by peddling this.

A large potato has around 300 calories in it. If you're eating them morning, noon and and night, and you're not eating them as chips or using butter, then you're going to have severe difficulty putting away more than 2 per meal. 2 potatoes x 3 meals = 1,800 kcal.

A lot of people won't even be able to manage 2 large potatoes per meal, especially after day 3 when you're absolutely fncking sick of potato. Hence, you will drop large amounts of weight because you have a calorie deficit. Nothing novel or crazy here.

It's "easy" because decision making has been taken from you. Just cook potatoes and throw herbs and spices in to make you think it's not just potatoes. You don't have to look at menus and wonder what the calorie content is. If it's not spuds, it's off the menu. But you're probably still going to be starving between meals.

Health wise, I wouldn't be that concerned about doing this for 3 or even 4 months, if you can stick it. Potatoes are incredibly nutrient dense. But no food is perfect, in the medium or long term you will have issues. But I doubt anyone could stick it more than 6 months tbh.

If it's what works for you and makes you happy, then go for it, just remember two things;
1. It's just another calorie-controlled diet, not some miraculous discovery
2. When you come off it, you're going to put back on everything you've lost (and more) unless you learn how to control your food intake.

laoch na mona

seamus wrote: »

*sigh*

Just another fad diet based on the principle of calorie control. Somewhere, there's somebody making or trying to make money by peddling this.

A large potato has around 300 calories in it. If you're eating them morning, noon and and night, and you're not eating them as chips or using butter, then you're going to have severe difficulty putting away more than 2 per meal. 2 potatoes x 3 meals = 1,800 kcal.

A lot of people won't even be able to manage 2 large potatoes per meal, especially after day 3 when you're absolutely fncking sick of potato. Hence, you will drop large amounts of weight because you have a calorie deficit. Nothing novel or crazy here.

It's "easy" because decision making has been taken from you. Just cook potatoes and throw herbs and spices in to make you think it's not just potatoes. You don't have to look at menus and wonder what the calorie content is. If it's not spuds, it's off the menu. But you're probably still going to be starving between meals.

Health wise, I wouldn't be that concerned about doing this for 3 or even 4 months, if you can stick it. Potatoes are incredibly nutrient dense. But no food is perfect, in the medium or long term you will have issues. But I doubt anyone could stick it more than 6 months tbh.

If it's what works for you and makes you happy, then go for it, just remember two things;
1. It's just another calorie-controlled diet, not some miraculous discovery
2. When you come off it, you're going to put back on everything you've lost (and more) unless you learn how to control your food intake.

You are clearly unfamiliar with pre famine ireland


these eat x and lose weight diets are the greatest scam ever created

Zillah

joeprivate wrote: »

Chris Voigt, the head of the Washington State Potato Commission

No conflict of interest there, no siree.

Any diet that isn't the diet you will be on for the rest of your life is an idiotic gimmick that serves more to placate guilt and satisfy short term thinking than to do anything for your health.

What do you do when you stop engaging in this absurd potato binge? Go back to your previous eating habits? Congratulations, you're fat again.

ford2600

Since experiments with N=1 are as valid anything else what not eat Twinkies and a few doritos; cholesterol improved (what ever the fcuk that means) and weight dropped for this man
http://edition.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/11/08/twinkie.diet.professor/

Dial Hard

laoch na mona wrote:

not voluntarily no. I once had to live of a bag of spuds and milk for a week or two when I was in college, dark times, but the knowledge that potatoes and milk made Irish peasants the healthiest in Europe was some comfort.

Eh, no they really weren't. Even before the Famine we were one of the most malnourished populations in Europe.

(I may have missed a sarcasm flag there though.)

OP, Billy Bob Thornton got scurvy when he was a struggling actor because potatoes were all he could afford to eat. Let that tell you what an absolutely terrible idea this "diet" is.

Irishcrx

Wow - Fad diets and all that but I thought for the time being we were all a little beyond having to eat only potatoes.

I wish people would read up on proper nutrition and weight loss before subjecting themselves to this kind of thing.

Beyond all the merry go round information and fad transformations etc that is '100% guaranteed success' the truth is your diet only comes down to one thing...one thing...calories in vs calories out...that's it!

It matters less than you think what you eat , yes it should have balance , yes you should have protein , fats , carbs but don't obsess or follow blindly.

Eat what you want as long as you stay in a deficet consistantly, you will lose weight , eat enough protein and lift you will retain muscle mass..

That means you can eat dairy , chocolate , cake , ice cream , pizza , pasta , bread you name it as long as it's counted for and in moderation.

LeinsterDub

laoch na mona

Dial Hard wrote: »

Eh, no they really weren't. Even before the Famine we were one of the most malnourished populations in Europe.

(I may have missed a sarcasm flag there though.)

OP, Billy Bob Thornton got scurvy when he was a struggling actor because potatoes were all he could afford to eat. Let that tell you what an absolutely terrible idea this "diet" is.

do you have a source for that? I'd be interested in reading it, two different history professors told us that the Irish peasant was considered much healthier than his European counterpart, of course being a peasant meant you weren't fully healthy but apparently (unless university Irish history is wrong) Irish peasants had the best of a bad lot:)

Clampdown

Well unless you can stick to spuds for the rest of your life you'll gain it all back.

Also, anyone with psoriasis or arthritis/joint issues should steer clear of a potato diet (they cause inflammation and route the absorption of calcium into tissue instead of the bones)

joeprivate

Clampdown wrote: »

Well unless you can stick to spuds for the rest of your life you'll gain it all back.

Also, anyone with psoriasis or arthritis/joint issues should steer clear of a potato diet (they cause inflammation and route the absorption of calcium into tissue instead of the bones)

Potatoes are one of one of the least lightly foods to cause problems for arthritis/joint issues according to this study.
n 1980, Hicklin reported clinical improvement in 24 of 72 rheumatoid patients on an exclusion diet. Food sensitivities were reported to: grains in 14, milk in 4, nuts in 8, beef in 4, cheese in 7, eggs in 5, and one each to chicken, fish, potato, and liver (Clin Allergy 10:463, 1980)

Dr mcdougall has this advice at the link https://www.drmcdougall.com/health/education/health-science/featured-articles/articles/diet-only-hope-for-arthritis/
The final step is to follow an elimination diet based on the foods least likely to cause problems, such as sweet potatoes and brown rice with the addition of noncitrus fruits, and green and yellow vegetables. All thoroughly cooked. Water is the beverage. If improvement is found (usually within 1 to 2 weeks), then foods are added back one at a time to see if there is an adverse reaction.

Zillah

You sure do like this Dr. McDougall fellow.

"The McDougall plan has been categorized as a fad diet with possible disadvantages including a boring food choice, flatulence and the risk of feeling too hungry.[2] Reviewing McDougall's book, The McDougall Program for Maximum Weight Loss, nutritionist Frederick J. Stare and epidemiologist Elizabeth Whelan criticized its restrictive regime and "poor advice", concluding that the diet's concepts were "extreme and out of keeping with nutritional reality"."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_A._McDougall

Alf Veedersane

"Did you say 'potatoes'?"

Dial Hard

laoch na mona wrote: »

do you have a source for that? I'd be interested in reading it, two different history professors told us that the Irish peasant was considered much healthier than his European counterpart, of course being a peasant meant you weren't fully healthy but apparently (unless university Irish history is wrong) Irish peasants had the best of a bad lot:)

I'll see if I can dig it up, it was a few modules ago so I may have sold on the textbooks/chucked the course notes. Leave it with me for a few days, I'm currently drowning under the weight of a primary research project on the effects of the Contagious Diseases Acts on Irish prostitutes between 1864 and 1887. I shouldn't even be on Boards!

StupidLikeAFox

Dial Hard wrote: »

I'll see if I can dig it up, it was a few modules ago so I may have sold on the textbooks/chucked the course notes. Leave it with me for a few days, I'm currently drowning under the weight of a primary research project on the effects of the Contagious Diseases Acts on Irish prostitutes between 1864 and 1887. I shouldn't even be on Boards!

*no pun intended

joeprivate

Zillah wrote: »

You sure do like this Dr. McDougall fellow.

"The McDougall plan has been categorized as a fad diet with possible disadvantages including a boring food choice, flatulence and the risk of feeling too hungry.[2] Reviewing McDougall's book, The McDougall Program for Maximum Weight Loss, nutritionist Frederick J. Stare and epidemiologist Elizabeth Whelan criticized its restrictive regime and "poor advice", concluding that the diet's concepts were "extreme and out of keeping with nutritional reality"."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_A._McDougall

I do like this McDougall fellow and even if only half his claims are true then I can put up with possible disadvantages including a boring food choice, flatulence and the risk of feeling too hungry.
He claims that most of the diseases that affect the people in Ireland and in western culture are caused by poor food choices and in most cases the same diseases can be cured , reversed or the progression of them slowed down by changing to a plant-based diet.
Broadly speaking his claims are cancer 60% less, heart disease , stroke ,prostate cancer ,high blood pressure ,and type 2 diabetes almost always caused by the food we eat.

Caldwell Esselstyn ,T. Colin Campbell and Dean Ornish as seen in this video where Bill Clinton done his own research and endorsed these 3 guys who say largely the same thing

doireannod

Clampdown wrote: »

Well unless you can stick to spuds for the rest of your life you'll gain it all back.

Also, anyone with psoriasis or arthritis/joint issues should steer clear of a potato diet (they cause inflammation and route the absorption of calcium into tissue instead of the bones)

Was just about to make this point. Potatoes are "nightshades". Very inflammatory. Should be avoided in large quantities, particularly in those predisposed to IBS, psoriasis, rheumatoid arthritis and other inflammatory or autoimmune diseases.

Ruu

Sorry, on carrot only diet.

Cake Man

LeinsterDub wrote: »

"We didn't want to go on a sustained eating plan of meat, eggs, healthy fats, fruit and veg...........because they were haunted"

The M

Eat every 3 hours set alarm try it and don't eat after 8pm

Precious flower

If you only eat potatoes without milk or butter you'll be deficient in Vitamin A, Vitamin B-12 and vitamin D if not taking fish oils. That's why people drink milk/eat butter with it. People ate it because there was feck all else, you should feel grateful you're not in that situation, eat a varied diet for goodness sake. The only way this diet is sustainable is literally if you have gone back in time to pre 1850's because that's all you'd be having. That and porridge and some bread.
SIDENOTE: The Irish peasants were actually physically healthier, stronger and taller than the English, Scots and Welsh. Infact they were often recruited into the police force and as soldiers in England because they exceeded the height requirement. They were only taller by an inch or two but they were still taller and healthier than other the peasants who had a more bread based diet. I don't have a link on that, but I did research on the Irish potato for college and how beneficial it was to the Irish people. Easy to grow, very filling, easy to fit many seeds in a small amount of ground and healthy.

ThisRegard

So what happened to us, how come we've lost an inch or two on them?

Precious flower

ThisRegard wrote: »

So what happened to us, how come we've lost an inch or two on them?

Famine tends to cause stunted growth that can last up to a few generation only with other things like heart disease etc. Though it seemed to work in favour of the Dutch, though they didn't have it for 5 plus years, but that may have had more to do with how prosperous the country became a little while after the famine. Though it's a little off topic the long term effect and immediate effect of famine is actually an interesting topic to research.

http://iussp.org/sites/default/files/event_call_for_papers/DCLK_Commune.pdf

many people are dying either from the lack of food itself or
from the diseases that take advantage of the weakened bodies. Yet, famines also have long-term effects, by impeding the physical growth of survivors. The brutal and severe lack of nutriment endured by the body during famine periods means that even those who survive the famine will
face its consequences for some time. Second, both effects are certainly linked. On the one hand, people who survived are selected and may therefore bias heights up: if those who died as a result of the famine are the shortest, then we may observe unusually tall individuals after the famine.
On the other hand, everyone, including those who survived, experienced a lack of food and thus we may think that on average people would be shorter as a result from the famine.

http://ftp.iza.org/dp2543.pdf

If shorter children are less likely to survive a famine (e.g. Fawzi et al., 1997;Smedman et al., 1987), then this selection effect has to be controlled for before we may conclude that the famine did not cause stunting. The surviving populations may be taller or shorter depending on the relative size of these two effects

4068ac1elhodqr

Those sweet potatoes aren't half-bad all the same, cover them in tumeric, garlic, ginger, oils, sea salt and a few other herbs and spices.
Maybe add copious amounts of fresh Guinness & Vit' C to cover some bases.

Sweet potatoes will 'help you live to 100', BBC1 documentary discovers