Atkins Diet Basics

Posted in Low Carb Recipes on March 30th, 2010 by admin

The Atkins diet is not a new phenomenon. The diet first appeared in the late 1970s and has grown popularity in recent years in response to the low-fat diet craze. As dieters had trouble with low-fat plans, they searched for a new solution and Dr. Atkins New Diet Revolution book found a new audience.

A lot of people have jumped on the Atkins bandwagon and there has been a lot of hype as a result. But what are the basic principles of the Atkins diet?

The Atkins diet is based on a theory of why we get fat. According to Dr. Atkins, the over-consumption of carbohydrates and simple sugars leads to weight gain. The way your body processes the carbohydrates you eat have more to do with your waistline than the amount of fat or calories that you consume. In his book, Atkins outlines a phenomenon called insulin resistance. He theorizes that many overweight people have cells that do not work correctly.

When you eat excess carbohydrates and sugar, your body notices that sugar levels are elevated. Insulin is released from the pancreas in order to store sugar as glycogen in the liver and muscle cells for extra energy later on. However, your body can only store so much glycogen at once. As soon as your body reaches its limit for glycogen storage, the excess carbohydrates are stored as fat. This happens to everyone who eats too many carbohydrates.

However, insulin resistant individuals have an even harder time of using and storing excess carbohydrates. The more insulin that your body is exposed to, the more resistant it becomes. Overtime, the pancreas releases more insulin and cells become insulin resistant. The cells are trying to protect themselves from the toxic effects of high insulin. They create less glycogen and more fat.

As a result, insulin resistant individuals gain extra weight. The carbohydrates get converted into fat instead of energy. Other side effects include fatigue, brain fog (the inability to focus, poor memory, loss of creativity), low blood sugar (which can leads to hypoglycemia), intestinal bloating, sleepiness, depression and increased blood sugar. There is much more than weight at stake when you are insulin resistant.

The remedy for people who are insulin resistant is a diet restricted in carbohydrates. The crux of the Atkins diet is a limitation of carbohydrates in all of its forms. The foods restricted on the Atkins plan include simple sugars (like cookies, sodas and sweets) and complex carbohydrates (like bread, rice and grains). Even carbohydrates that are considered healthy, such as oatmeal, brown rice and whole wheat bread, are restricted on the program.

The diet has you restrict your carbohydrate intake to less than 40 grams a day. This will put your body in a state of ketosis. While in ketosis, your body will burn fat as fuel. According to Dr. Atkins research, the ketosis state will also affect insulin production and it will prevent more fat from being formed. Your body will begin using your stored fat as an efficient form of fuel, and youll lose weight.
Another benefit of the Atkins plan is that ketosis will end your cravings for carbohydrates. If youve been living on a carb-heavy diet, you may have found that you simply cannot get enough carbohydrates. With carbohydrate restriction and ketosis comes a reduction in carbohydrate cravings. People who have been on the Atkins diet for some time report that they do not crave carbohydrates as they once did.

Although the initial phases of the Atkins diet are rather strict, the program teaches you to restore balance to your diet in the long run. People who use the diet slowly reintroduce minimal amounts of carbohydrate into their eating until they find a comfortable balance between their health and carbohydrate use.

The basic principles of the Atkins diet have been adapted to many other low-carb diet plans. However, Atkins popularity still remains strong as one of the most effective low-carbohydrate solutions for those who are insulin resistant.

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All You Need To Know About Raw Food Diet

Posted in Low Carb Recipes on March 23rd, 2010 by admin

Many of dieters out there are trying this kind of diet. What is it, actually? What are the advantages and disadvantages? How to do it?

Let me help you get all the answers in the following detailed explanations about raw food diet before you decide to apply it:

What is Raw Food Diet?

Raw food diet is a diet composed mainly or entirely of raw and living foods. These foods include mostly raw vegan food, such as fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds.

The raw foodists can consume any foods which have not been cooked, frozen, or treated with chemical preservatives.

There are 3 types of raw foodists:

1. Living foodists, who eat a diet made up of plant food in active form, such as sprouted nuts and seeds.
2. Juicarians, who eat a diet made up entirely of juices.
3. Raw foodists who are not vegetarians, and therefore eat raw meats and unpasteurized milk

How to Start a Raw Food Diet?

Going on a raw food diet can be similar to detoxifying your body, and there can be some side effects. So when considering the raw food diet, you should start slowly, with one or more raw meals per day, and one or more meals with a raw main dish and a small cooked side dish. This can be easier on your body as well as your habits.

Where to Find the Foods?

The best kind of raw food is organic food. Organic foods are now available in a wide variety of products, not just fruits but even cookies.

While organic foods can be more expensive then regular foods, they can also be more convenient, as there are many companies starting in cities that will actually deliver organic fruits and vegetables to your front door.

What Are The Advantages?

Many raw foodists choose the diet because they believe that cooking, freezing or otherwise processing foods can destroy vitamins, bacteria, and enzymes. They also believe that cooking food makes food harder to digest, partially due to destroying enzymes which are acting as catalysts in the digestion of food.

Raw foods contain less chemicals and preservatives, which are not natural in foods. Raw food is also less toxic and more easily digested, while containing more vitamins and minerals than processed foods.

The raw foodists also believe that the diet can improve health, lower risk of heart disease (because of a diet low in trans-fats), improve digestion, improve skin appearance, and increase the energy levels.

What Are The Disadvantages?

An important concern in a raw food diet is the lack of animal proteins. One needs to get all the essential amino acids.

To fulfill all the nutrition and avoid deficiencies in protein and vitamin B12, a raw foodist might need some nutritional supplements.

So, after you find out all you need to know about raw food diet, are you ready to start one now?

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Add High Fiber Fruit To A Healthy Diet

Posted in Low Carb Recipes on March 16th, 2010 by admin

High fiber fruit is a very crucial element of any healthy diet. It enhances our opportunity of living a long and healthy life, which is what most people strive and wish for. While most people recognize that eating high fiber fruit is excellent for them, they are unsure concerning what high fiber fruit to add to their diet.

Various government health agencies are attempting to educate people in terms of healthy diets, as well as what type of high fiber fruit to add to the diet.

One of the tools to assist us find out how much of this fruit we are consuming in our diets, are the ingredient labels that we discover on food products. Not only do these labels tell us regarding the adverse ingredients of the product, they additionally inform us about the good ingredients such as high fiber fruit.

Alas, even with the edifying efforts of lots of agencies and other organizations, many people are still ignorant of the benefits of high fiber, they just simply don’t care, or they don’t have time to plan a accurate diet for themselves. Many of these people in all probability couldn’t even tell you that there were food packaging labels on the food products.

These high fiber fruits are amazing trimmings to any diet. Fruits that are classified as high fiber consist of cantaloupe, strawberries, apricots, kiwi avocadoes, papaya, and grapefruit. Not merely do they taste magnificent they are similarly wonderful for our health.

The benefit of fiber is the clearout action that it performs on the digestive system. It acts as a transport mechanism for other foods through the digestive tract and it also enhances the disposal of waste products. The benefits of fiber on the digestive system might assist people in avoiding diseases like diabetes and high cholesterol.

Whole grains, fruits, and vegetables are food groups that are high in dietary fiber. Plants are a superb to source of fiber. Adding vegetables to one’s diet will additionally add additional fiber.

Many people launch their day with breakfast consisting of high fiber by eating a cereal or grain breakfast. That is a very good start. Nonetheless frequently that is also where it ends. For the full benefits of nutritional fiber we need to consume it throughout the day and add enough water to our consumption to aid the digestive system.

Government agencies have gone to great lengths to help people eat better food. The required information is available each time we buy food, and the people who go by these guidelines ought to lead healthier and longer lives.

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Posted in Low Carb Recipes on March 9th, 2010 by admin

Title:
A Successful Weight Loss Diet Starts from the Inside

Word Count:
515

Summary:
You’ve probably bought into the propaganda that says you’ve failed at dieting; a different – and more accurate – way of looking at it is that the weight loss diet has failed you.

Keywords:
weight loss diets, weight loss tips, diesel, lose weight fast, weight watchers, diet for summer, skinny jeans, tight jea

Article Body:
If you’re like most women, you’ve been on a million weight loss diets, from Weight Watchers and Atkins to South Beach and celeb diets. You voraciously read magazines for their weight loss tips and gravitate toward the headlines that promise you can lose weight fast. The chances are good that you have, indeed, lost weight on many of these diets, but the chances are even better that you’ve gained it all back – plus some. Your skinny jeans become your tight jeans, and then they get tucked in the back of your closet, along with your fantasies of becoming a size 0.

Weight Loss Diet Failure

You’ve probably bought into the propaganda that says you’ve failed at dieting; a different – and more accurate – way of looking at it is that the weight loss diet has failed you. That’s because most diets focus on short-term changes that result in temporary weight loss, but never tackle the underlying factors that make you put on the pounds to begin with. In other words, they focus only on the “outside” problem – your body – and neglect everything below the surface – your emotions, your intellect, and your relationships.

A diet for summer might work for swimsuit season, but if you don’t strengthen your foundations before you lose weight, those Diesel skinny jeans won’t fit when fall rolls around.

Turning Failure into Success

In order to lose weight and keep it off, you need a guide who will lead you on an exploratory journey to discover the power and control that you possess. Then, you need to be taught how to harness those powers to achieve all that you want in life – including fitting into your skinny jeans.

You may have been told – either verbally or through insidious advertisements – that if you don’t have power over your eating, you have no power at all. Nothing could be further from the truth. Every woman is magnificent, and every woman has mental powers, emotional powers, social powers and physical powers just waiting to be tapped. When you heal your past wounds, and recognize and reinforce the power within you, you have laid the foundation for permanent weight loss.

Practical and Fun

If a weight loss diet is a drag, you’ll never succeed in reaching your goals. On the other hand, if you have an empowering program to follow that is also practical and fun, you hold the keys to success. In fact, you can even drop a whole size in two weeks.

The “secret” – if you want to call it that – is to adopt a well-tested exercise program that can instantly fit into your lifestyle. Remember, the success lies in simplicity, clarity, and practicality. Then, you need to adopt an eating plan that works synergistically with your exercise plan to build on the foundation of the inner work you have done in order to embrace your personal power.

Remember that, with the right guide, you can do more than go on yet another weight loss diet; you can truly win in all areas of your life and achieve an outer beauty than matches your inner beauty.

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Posted in Low Carb Recipes on March 2nd, 2010 by admin

Title:
A Low Carb Diet Worked For Me

Word Count:
489

Summary:
There has been a lot of talk in recent years about the important of cutting out carbohydrates, or carbs, from a normal diet. I cannot tell you how many articles I have read and how many news clips I have watched about the benefits of a low-carb eating plan. Frankly, I’m a little tired of hearing all the reasons that I should alter what I eat. I’m sick of hearing about all of the consequences if I don’t make these changes. I do not, therefore, want to attempt to convince anyon…

Keywords:
low carb

Article Body:
There has been a lot of talk in recent years about the important of cutting out carbohydrates, or carbs, from a normal diet. I cannot tell you how many articles I have read and how many news clips I have watched about the benefits of a low-carb eating plan. Frankly, I’m a little tired of hearing all the reasons that I should alter what I eat. I’m sick of hearing about all of the consequences if I don’t make these changes. I do not, therefore, want to attempt to convince anyone reading to make the change to a low-carb diet. I simply want to share that changing to a low-carb diet completely worked for me and my lifestyle.

I cannot remember exactly what it was that led me to taking the plunge into the world of low-carb for myself. I think perhaps I was just tired of being overweight and of feeling lethargic all the time. I guess it is true that life has to get really bad and that we have to want to make changes before we actually will. My physical health got bad enough that I really desired to make changes. So I spent a few afternoons at my local bookstore and came away with a few books that seemed the most reasonable and the most helpful at the end of my search. One of them was all about going low-carb.

I was leery of going low-carb for one main reason: I liked carbs and most foods that were carb-filled a lot. I liked eating breads, pastries, sandwiches, cookies and many other carb-friendly things. I knew that if I attempted to cut back on carbs it would really alter my diet. It took me a few days of debating before I came to realize that yes, I did want to try the low-carb plan and see if it worked.

I began my trial of low-carb eating by going through my pantry and refrigerator and tossing out everything that went against what the low-carb book said I should be eating. I was amazed at how little was left. Only at that moment did I truly see how unbalanced my diet had been. I went to the store and replaced the carbs with fresh fruits, vegetables, and lean protein foods. I picked up a couple of whole-grain items to fulfill the small amount of carbs I was supposed to be eating.

This marked the beginning of a sixty day trial eating a low-carb diet. Within days I was shocked by how different I felt and by how much my cravings had changed. Sixty days after I started my low-carb diet I was many pounds lighter, full of more energy, and I looked better than I had in a decade. So, take this for what it’s worth. I’m not saying you should do a low-carb eating plan. I’m simply saying that doing a low-carb plan radically changed my life.

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