Ed Levine's Serious Diet, Week 54: What Kind of a Diet Am I On?
"What does this mean? It means that when I go to Katz's I have a third of a pastrami sandwich...It means that when eating pizza, I try to make sure it has a supremely light crust and sparse toppings."
I had a revealing conversation with Serious Eater Linnea yesterday afternoon that started me thinking about the exact nature of my diet. I was talking about what I was going to eat last night in anticipation of my weigh-in this morning. I mentioned the slice of pizza possibility.
"A slice of pizza?" Linnea responded incredulously. "Doesn't that have a ton of fat? There's all that cheese. What kind of diet are you on, anyway?" I told her that the pizza I order has very little cheese (most of my favorite pizzas around the world go light on the cheese) and that I often have a slice of pizza for dinner, and that furthermore I'm on a diet that involves eating less and still deriving maximum pleasure from whatever it is I do eat.
So does anyone except me subscribe to the "Eat Less of the Foods You Love" Diet?
My interaction with Linnea made me realize that a lot of people don't understand my diet because I'm not on Weight Watchers, Nutrisystem, Jenny Craig, the Zone, Protein Power, South Beach, Atkins, or the grapefruit-only diet. Nope, I'm on the Eat Less Seriously Delicious Food and Weigh Less diet. Is this such a radical concept?
I hope not. If I had to give up pizza, hot dogs, pastrami, cheeseburgers, fried chicken, barbecue, ramen noodles, french fries, pie, fleur de sel caramels, and ice cream (among many, many other foods) I would be a miserably unhappy camper feeling utterly deprived day in and day out. Those feelings of food pleasure deprivation would quickly lead to depression, which in turn would make it that much harder to control my weight.
What does this mean? It means that when I go to Katz's I have a third of a pastrami sandwich. Damn their hand-cut pastrami is good. It means that when eating pizza, I try to make sure it has a supremely light crust and sparse toppings. Una Pizza Napoletana and Co. in Manhattan and Pizzeria Bianco in Phoenix, I'm talkin' to you. If I have a burger it's going to be a four or five ouncer with cheese, but there will be no fries and shake with that. At restaurants with either friends or colleagues I have tastes of things and eat half of what's put in front of me.
As most of you know, I'm a Serious Eater. I derive serious satisfaction and pleasure from eating seriously delicious food. Somehow I have managed to drop more than thirty-five pounds since I started watching my weight almost a year and a half ago
(I started posting about Ed Levine's Serious Diet 54 weeks ago).
I have good days and bad days, good weeks and bad, peaks and valleys, plateaus that can get me down that I have to fight through, meals and vacations where I am not as careful as I should be, but somehow, some way I have made it this far.
Making it this far means having two slices of very light (and not very good, at least last night) pizza for dinner on Thursday night, along with a one ounce, 100-calorie bag of dried cranberries for dessert (I know they have sugar added). And sometimes it means having a banana and a box of raisins for dinner on Thursday night because I know I'm going to have to face the Serious Eaters and Thinner on Friday morning. I know that a banana and a box of raisins is not a balanced meal. But I'm not looking to eat a balanced meal three times a day. I'm looking for a balanced life, and maybe, just maybe, I can get there. We'll see.
The Weigh-In
Let's see if my two slices of pizza and dried cranberries dinner worked. I was 231 when I got on the scale yesterday, but my weight has been yo-yoing around all week, from 232 to 229. This morning it's 230. Same as last week, but no, definitely not same as it ever was.
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20 Comments:
You go, Ed. The kind of diet you are on is the kind that works for you.
(Although, not to be too much of a scold, I do hope that every day you also include some whole grains, fruits, and vegetables along with the pizza, pastrami, etc.)
Everything in moderation, including moderation.
Dee at 9:27AM on 02/13/09
Ed,
Like you, I am a serious eater and having to be deprived of any of the things I want to eat would kill me. I remain thin today, and have lost weight in the past, by following your type of diet.
It means that I can eat anything I want, just not everything I want. I feel so much more in control of my life. It makes me feel more satisfied and content, and I stay on track.
FYI--Paul Bocuse lost 60 lbs. on your type of diet. You do not need to be "one of the pack" to succeed. Keep up the very good work you do.
Michele P at 9:31AM on 02/13/09
Ed,
We are 100% behind you and your eat less of the things you love diet - as a serious lover of food it doesn't make any sense to sacrifice taste for weight! We too believe strongly in eating in moderation, no need to stop eating delicious and tasty things.
-M+Y
frontstudio at 9:38AM on 02/13/09
Right there with ya, Ed. I lost about 50 pounds over the course of a year by eating less (trying to only eat when I was actually hungry and stopping when I wasn't hungry) and exercising. I've maintained it for two years essentially doing the same thing. I still eat what I want, I just eat less of it.
iahawk89 at 9:45AM on 02/13/09
Ed, what it all boils down to is that you are doing it right! You're not on a diet, you are changing your lifestyle in a manner that you can maintain for a lifetime. Diets end, and when they do, people gain the weight back because they don't learn how to modify their behavior without the diet there to tell them what to eat. If more people understood that they could eat the things they love in moderation, there'd be far fewer obese people in the world!
mnrobb at 9:52AM on 02/13/09
mnrobb hits the nail on the head - if the only way you can maintain the weight loss you achieve on fill-in-the-blank-name-diet-here is to keep counting points/weighing everything/ordering your food from them, you're setting yourself up for eventual failure. By eating the same thing you always have, but eating smaller portions (which are probably closer to what we all SHOULD be eating anyway), you are developing a habit that will keep you going without much change once you reach your goal weight.
trillian42 at 10:09AM on 02/13/09
Don't get me going on the American definition and attitude towards diets!!!!!!!!!!! The American attitude and definition of a diet is a negative one, one where you must deprive yourself of things you love in order to restrict the calories and lose weight. Success is measured by being good or bad. This whole attitude drives me insane and gets me really mad. Why does American society have to go at things in a negative way?? I looked up the definition of diet in my online dictionary, and there are 2, 1) is a restricted course of eating and the 2) the food a person habitually eats.
Ed, you are on an empowering diet. You are training yourself to ENJOY your food but not eat as much of it. I agree with mnrobb's comment above. If more people focused on the quality and amount of food they were eating, people would be happier, less deprived and the weight would stay off. You are learning, your boundaries and limits with food and still ENJOYING it!!! WHich goes back to the word DIET again, the word comes up with Americans and it is so NEGATIVE....
So I continue to lose weight and I call it The Sarah's Pastries diet, in Chicago she has a little cafe, bake shop on Oak Street and I'll have one of her empandas and I'll by one of her macarons which taste almost exactly the same as Laduree in Paris(okay maybe not exactly, but pretty close) and that will sometimes be breakfast/lunch but the point is they hit the spot, I love them and I am happy. So again I agree with mnrobb above, you are adjusting your diet to one you and your body can live with and still enjoy your food...so the next time someone tries to guilt you with the word diet....ignore it because you are learning the true way to keep weight off, that you don't have to go through misery to lose weight!!!!!!!!!
Jbout at 10:13AM on 02/13/09
I'm totally on that diet. I don't deprive myself of a flavor I am craving, I just try to remember portion control and to make good choices. I can't give up all of the foods I love totally, but I can limit my consumption of them. Those who read my comments know I'm a "sleeve of fig newtons" kind of gal. Well, when I need a fig newton (and I say "need", because in fact, I do have needs of this sort...) I have a fig newton or two. Just not the sleeve, like I used to. :o)
juliebugsmama at 11:00AM on 02/13/09
Oh, and remember what Julia Child said, "Diet food is what you eat while you are waiting for the steak to cook."
juliebugsmama at 11:01AM on 02/13/09
First off, bravo Ed for indulging yourself before making it into a trainwreck scene at the local pizza joint when you can't handle another day of anti-pizza lifestyle. You live in NY, how are you suppose to avoid it? I know I couldn't.
Second, here's the deal with losing weight that I bet 90% of people just don't get. It's about calories in vs. calories out. If you need 2500 cals to get you through the day but you only consume 2000, you are going to lose weight. Doesn't matter if those 2000 cals are all carbs, all fat or all protein, in a deficit you will always lose weight. Now I'm not promoting eating 2000cals of fat, especially since you should limit yourself to 20g of sat fat per day, but Ed if you want to eat two slices of pizza per week you go right ahead. You're still going to lose weight if you are in a deficit, pizza or no pizza.
pgbakes at 11:12AM on 02/13/09
Ed, I'm working on eating a very similar "diet". I refuse to eat lowfat cheese, but rather than a whole block, I enjoy a slice or two. I could never give up those sausage links, but I eat them as a side to an egg white veggie omlete. I'm working on eating more fruits and vegetables as snacks and the main part of meals, so I don't eat as much of the bad-for-you foods. On this site everyone loves to eat tasty foods, if you can't enjoy the best out there or occationally satisfy a pizza craving, whats the point?
jennben24 at 11:45AM on 02/13/09
Hey Ed,
I could not be more with you. I'm on just that type of diet. Since Jan. 1 I have lost six pounds (yay) and during that time I haven't excluded anything from my diet. In fact, I eat dessert (at least a few bites of dessert) three or four times a week. I have really been working on stopping eating when I'm 75 to 80 percent full. That's helped me a lot.
If I temporarily banned something or a group of things from my diet, I would never stick to it. I've been down that road before.
I find that most other people don't understand this method, but seriously delicious food is a non negotiable part of my life, too. Keep up the good work. I'm rooting for you!
Joy Manning at 11:47AM on 02/13/09
The diet I subscribe to is the Henry Rollins philosophy:
"Eat Less, Move More"
I eat butter and sugar and fat. But I don't gorge myself on it and I make sure to work out at least 4 times per week, minimum.
blogkitten at 12:17PM on 02/13/09
Hi Ed,
I'm on the same diet as well. I used to be on Weight Watchers for three years, but I realized that I still can eat my favorite things as long as I did my portion control! So I left WW, and enter everything that I ate in an Excel sheet everyday (I try to keep at 1300 cal/day).
Since the switch, it's been two weeks and I have lost 3 lbs already, which is great because I had been plateauing during my last months at WW.
I realized that banning favorite foods would cause me to binge later on. So I tend to indulge in awkwardly small amounts of foods, like 1/2 a grilled cheese sandwich or a 1/4 cup of rum raisin ice cream.
Keep up the good work!
inomthings at 12:21PM on 02/13/09
Ed, I completely agree with you in theory, and what you're doing is the only way to maintain a healthy weight over time. But, in practice, I just don't have the patience.
When I see five or ten pounds I don't like, I want to see immediate results. I guess I liken it to a judge offering me 30 days in the slammer versus a year of house arrest. I take the prison time and then walk.
Michele Humes at 12:21PM on 02/13/09
This is so inspirational, and I'm proud of you listening to your body and not joining some sort of fad diet. That's the thing about the word "diet"-it seems to mean something temporary, and with most fad diets, they're supposed to be temporary. This is mostly because the body will shut down if you only feed it just one type of food or deprive it of a certain type of food (ie. The Atkin's diet, restricting the amount of carbs you eat).
Although you're calling this a diet, you're actually making a lifestyle change, which is not temporary. And you know your habits and body well enough that you're making this change through realistic goals that you know you can obtain. I believe portion control is the biggest problem with the typical American diet, and even adjusting this one aspect of how you eat can make a huge difference for your health.
So in short, you rock! And I appreciate you sharing this very personal journey with us.
sfuller84 at 1:23PM on 02/13/09
Okay don't hate me here, Ed, but not only do I subscribe to your kind of loving food anti-diet but while my friends restrict & count calories, I eat whatever I want & have weighed 90 lbs for most of my adult life. (let's say 12 years) now am I also the proud owner of a super, super firm bod? No. But I'd rather be in good health and enjoy those foods! Bring on the birthday icecream breakfasts, the late night extra glass of wine, and my bf's need to find the most luscious gelato in the dead of summer, serve it in a stem glass for two. I'd rather have the real stuff than some chemical-loaded filler any day!
healthygirl78 at 1:53PM on 02/13/09
Rock on, Ed! You're helping people figure out that healthy eating doesn't have to be all or nothing. It's all about finding the right balance for you. Bravo for blogging about it!
girlhealthy at 5:23PM on 02/13/09
Ed, this is what skinny people do naturally. We often eat whatever we want but don't eat as much of it (at least not all of the time) as many others.
The only thing I would caution you against is viewing what you are doing as a diet. If you treat it as something that will come to an end so that you can go back to your previous way of eating, you will still fail. Once or twice I thought I should stop indulging in whatever I wanted when I would go through a period that was clearly not going to be kind to my waistline. I would always eat more trying to satisfy myself than if I had just eaten what I wanted in the first place.
I'll admit that I'm lucky and my body tends to stop wanting fat, carb and calorie laden foods after a certain point of indulgence. However, this doesn't mean that I don't eat way more than 2,000 calories some days with most of those calories doing nothing to meet my nutritional requirements. I just don't worry about it and know that I'll probably have several days when I'm really good that balance it out. My weight has been stable since high school eating this way.
Granted, if I had your job, it might not work as well. :)
rudbeckia at 5:53PM on 02/13/09
I know a lot of commenters have said it already, but what you're doing is RIGHT. The basic premise behind ALL "diets" is that people are eating less calories than they need. For some people this might mean eating more vegetables and less meat, or replacing full-fat products with low-fat products, but if just cutting the portion size is something you can do, then stick to it!
I also agree with the commenters that say you should view this as a change in lifestyle, as opposed to a "diet", because otherwise you might gain all the weight back... and then some!
Keep up the good work - you're an inspiration!
Vincci at 8:39PM on 02/13/09