Has anyone tried this? For a change, the establishment is singing its praises and saying how healthy it is. It's not far from how I used to eat pre childbirth when I had plenty of time to prepare food. I found I couldn't eat white bread or rice as they gave me constipation, but have slipped into bad habits. The cupboards are too full of quick unhealthy snacks and I find it hard to resist them. I think the problem is nowadays we have too much choice because the food industry is falling over itself to make money - and pretending it's giving us what we 'want' (not what we need).
I follow the broad basic principles of the diet, but I've modified it to acommodate the fact that I'm semi-vegetarian (I don't like meat or most dairy produce, but I do eat fish and yoghurt). I avoid highly processed carbs (white bread, jacket potatoes, white rice, pasta, pastry, cakes, biscuits, sugary soft drinks, alcohol, sweets) and try to eat more complex carbs (wholemeal stoneground bread, wholewheat pasta, basmati or brown rice, wholewheat cereals, oats and grains, raw or lightly steamed veggies, fruits) and some low-fat protein. If I'm having a sandwich, I accompany it with pickles or balsamic vinegar, as they tend to lower the overall GI load of the meal, and I'll follow it with fruit and a yoghurt, on the same rationale.
I started following this modified GI diet (loosely based on the South Beach diet) a while ago, after I was diagnosed with insulin resistance (I have poly-cystic ovaries) and my dad was diagnosed with diabetes. After reading tons of stuff on diabetes and insulin resistance, I found out that they can be controlled well with a low GI diet - and I've tried to follow the broad principles ever since.
I have to say I enjoy the eating pattern enormously - I never feel hungry or dissatisfied, and my old cravings for sugary sweets, biccies and chocolate have gone completely - as have the accompanying heartburn and bloated feeling. I know it's relatively early days (I'm 9 weeks into this and will be in the weight-loss phase for at least another year), but I strongly believe that this is a way of eating that I can stick with for the rest of my life, as I've never had so much energy, and I feel tons better in myself.
I too losely follow the GI Plan in my own version of healthy eating, rather than sticking to a diet plan as such. One of the good things about it is that the food does fill you up and for me (a big snacker) that really helped, plus you can eat snacks, can have red wine & chocolate (ideally when you've reached your goal weight - but I have managed to incorporate that into my plan - the chocolate being good quality dark choc).
I bought the Rick Gallop book, which is very easy to follow, he basically used a traffic light system. Red foods being a no-no, amber - don't eat many, green - go ahead & tuck in all you want. Some of the surprises are that bananas and potatoes aren't in the green section, but there's plenty of nice foods to eat, and lots of good recipes in the book. I eat the muesli most days, and also love the Thai Green Curry and the Cranberry Bran Muffins were a big favourite in our house (ooh, haven't made those for ages).
It's good stuff, and even the medical peeps are saying it's a good, not faddy diet, which is good for your heart due to the fact you get less insulin peaks, which is about as technical I can manage!! there was a good article on www.femail.co.uk which explains it much better than I can
I'm also not following it as such but roughly watching the GI level of what I eat, and it seems from what I've read that the stuff I'm eating does more or less fit the plan.
I follow a low GI diet too. I haven't read Rick Gallop's book, but I will do when I get a round to it. it's worked for me so far, and it certainly beats the cravings. It is kind of easy to follow, the basic principles certainly are, the GI load bit can get a bit boggling, that's the bit that confuses a lot of people.
I too do a modified version of Rick Gallops GI diet - and that coincides with my suddenly starting to lose weight!!!!!
I love his little shopping list book. It is easy to carry around with its red amber green lists!!!!
I also bought Anthony Worral Thompson's GI cookery book and Louis Blair's Low GI Cookbook. Both of which have good, simple and logical explanations of what low GI is without all of the scientific scary bits!
I found Rick Gallops book a bit self serving, but informative and VERY low on recipes! The 2 cookbooks are a bit 'bistro' but taste delicious and I mix the recipes up with my other 2 fave cookbooks which are grains and pulse based!
With all of this high starch low processed food going on I am still at the stage where my eyes pile food onto the plate and my hands shovel it onto my stomach and my stomach trys to protest!!!
It has taken a couple of weeks but we are now able to put less on the plate and - LEAVE SOME!!!
I have never felt so uncomfortably full in my life, and I am still losing weight! Imagine what will happen when eyes and belly are the same size!?!?!?!
I'd recommend this way of eating to anyone - anyone at all. It can be really cheap, is very tasty, is easy to figure out (if you ignore the counting this that and the other stuff some of the books require) and really seems to be a diet for life.
Thats eating diet not calorie restricted diet! Nothing to start, maintain and manage, just healthy eating with space to enjoy fave foods!!!
WOW! That was a bit OTT! Do you think I should ask for commission?!?!?!
I've got AWT's and Linda Blair's too!!! They are great books. You can sometimes pick up the AWT in discounted bookstores for a fiver, that's where I got mine, even though it is a brand new release.
Stef, was it you that had Fat Girl Slim??
It's a great way of eating, it's basically the way my mum always cooked for us, except I rebelled!!!! Paying for my rebellion big time now
I was flicking through Rick Gallop before! That's my problem can't be bothered to actually read them. I get to the bit where they say pasta should be a side dish and give up. What am I meant to have with the pasta? I have veg but I have 70g of pasta as well.
Mixing and matching these books is great - no boredom and a meal for every occasion!
Veggie! Shame on you!!! Pasta is your very best friend? I don't believe you!! Actually this was the hardest change me and the DH had to make a couple of years ago.
We struggled with the idea that the starches and carbs (all the best bits of a meal) should be much smaller. Bulk up with vegetables, don't make me laugh! But it seems to work! Now we have got our heads around that, we are eating smaller but bulkier portions of food, are losing 1/2 to 1lb per week and don't seem to notice it too much - well the bottles in the recycle bin haven't changed!!!!
It took forever to make any permanent changes, as anyone reading my posts over the last 2 years will know!! But we seem to be getting in to it, permanently!! So scary, but fingers crossed we keep it up!
Hellfire, I am even growing my own salad leaves - so we must be serious!!!!
GI Diet
- the chocolate being good quality dark choc).
