Week 8 Day 1 Artichokes?

I have mentioned artichokes in previous menus but I haven't really said anything about them yet. I've grown up eating them a lot back home and love them! But they are unfortunately quite pricy here on the West Coast... I am also a bit amused every time I get to the cashier: he would hold the vegetable (flower?) in his hand, tilt his head side ways, and finally give up and ask "what is this thing?" because he doesn't know what to input on his screen.

PREPARING ARTICHOKES

Artichokes are really easy to cook. You basically rinse it with water to get rid of any superficial dust, then put it to boil for about 15mn for a small artichoke, up to 25mn for a big one. They are ready when you can grab a leaf from the middle and it stays in your hand (just watch out for the thorns at the leaf tip). You then serve it with any dip you'd like - I usually use low-fat olive oil mayonnaise. You can also keep the boiling water for other dishes (my mom drinks it as a tea).

To eat the artichoke, hold the leaf on the side of the thorn tip and dip the other soft end in the dip. Then place in your mouth between your teeth and gently "scrape" the delicious flesh from the leaf. Any part that is tough and doesn't "give" with this motion should be discarded. Continue until all the leaves are gone.

When you get to the heart of the artichoke (my favorite part!), you remove all the fuzzy hair that is inedible, and you are left with a big hearty piece of artichoke flesh to dip in your remaining sauce!

I think artichoke are great on fast days. They are relatively low calories (between 60 calories for a small one, up to 90 calories for the giant - scarily huge - ones) and it takes time to eat so your brain actually thinks you've had loads! A great snack if you like to munch in front of the tv for a while.


Menu Week 8 Day 1


Breakfast: approximately 146 calories
- 1/2 cup of egg whites (equivalent to 4 egg whites)
- 1 korean rice cracker
- 1 mini-babybel cheese


Lunch: approximately 192 calories
- 3oz chicken breast strips
- 3 cups of salad
- 7 grape tomatoes
- 1 tsp olive oil balsamic vinaigrette
- 1 date sliced


Dinner: approximately 185 calories
- 1 medium artichoke
- 1/4 cup egg white (equivalent to 2 egg whites) + 1 full egg beaten into an omelet
- 1/2 tbsp low fat olive oil mayonnaise


Total for the day: 512 calories

Week 7 Day 2 Making your food look nice to trick your brain

Eat with all your senses to make the most of every little bitsy calories you will swallow!

At the end of a busy day, after my Vita muffin top and my Lean Cuisine, I was left with just a bit over 100 calories for dinner and dessert. It kinda limits the options.
So here I was, trying to have some fun with my hummus and my cucumber. Hope you like the result as much as I did! It did cheer me up.

Breakfast: 100 calories
- 1 Chocolate Vita top muffin

Lunch: 260 calories
- Lean Cuisine wild salmon with basil

Dinner: approximately 100 calories
- 30g of hummus - caramelized onions flavor
- 200g of cucumber

Snack: approximately 32 calories
- 2 korean rice cracker

Total: 492 calories

Week 7 Day 1 Craving vietnamese food again

So here I am at the beginning of a fast day absolutely craving some vietnamese meatballs called "nem nuong". The problem is it is usually made of pork and so fairly high in calories. It is also quite time consuming to make. Luckily they can be frozen raw and popped in the oven when needed, so I usually make a big batch.

This website has a recipe that is pretty close to what my mom taught me (my mom, like almost all Asian mothers I know, doesn't measure anything when cooking so it makes it harder to precisely compare):

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/emeril-lagasse/vietnamese-bbq-pork-meatballs-nem-nuong-recipe/index.html

The only ingredient I am ABSOLUTELY skipping is the cubed pork fat (for obvious reason if the purpose is to eat these on a fast day!)... I have to say the idea of actually adding a chunk of fat into a recipe just grosses me out... But I have to say it IS in my mom's recipe too...

I usually like to serve them with a sweet sauce made of half a cup of applesauce mixed with 1tsp of hoisin sauce. This mix usually gives me enough sauce for 12 balls (200g) of nem nuong.

Menu Week 7 Day 1

Lunch: approximately 285 calories
- 100g nem nuong
- half of the hoisin-applesauce

Dinner: approximately 233 calories
- 80g nem nuong
- half of the hoisin-applesauce

Total: 518 calories

Now I did say I had a craving for this particular dish... because otherwise, that is not a lot of food... and not very filling either... but it does give you an idea of how much pork you can really eat on this diet.

Week 6 Day 2 What is in your pantry?

There are weeks like that, when I just don't have time to cook and much less go to the grocery. I then end up shuffling through my pantry looking for something low calorie that I could eat if I am not in the mood for the frozen dinners mentioned in the previous post.

I think my pantry is pretty basic. I wished I had learned to use the many herbs that could spice up my food to a whole new level without adding that many calories... but my basics are at least enough to keep meals from being too dull on diet days. My go-to usually include: salt, pepper, low-sodium soy sauce, unsweetened rice vinegar, freeze dried dill, chives and basil. I also have an olive oil spray to prevent food from sticking to my pan when grilling food.

Low calorie food wise, I always have a few cans of crab, shrimps, tuna and snails lying around. I used to have canned salmon but it is a bit higher in calories so I'd rather have it sashimi now... I also have a few bags of miso soups and seaweeds, vacuum packed pork and beef jerky, and individually packed apple sauces. That about rounds-up my emergency diet kit.

So for today's menu plan, all I had left in my fridge was an avocado. Everything else was dug out of the emergency pantry!

Menu Week 6 Day 2

Breakfast: approximately 41 calories
- 1 pack of instant shiro miso soup in 1 cup of boiling water
- 3g of dried wakame added to the soup

Lunch: approximately 314 calories
- 1 can of crab meat
- 1 small avocado
- 1 tsp of unsweetened rice vinegar
- a dash of salt

Dinner: approximately 125 calories
- 29g (1oz) of beef jerky
- 2 korean rice crackers

Total for the day: 480 calories

Week 6 Day 1 The Fast Diet when you are short on time...

I hate this when it happens, when I don't even have enough time to cook food...

In the book, they really recommend eating healthy fresh food for your Fast Days. But let's be realistic, sometimes life gets in the way, and there's just no time for me to do groceries... so I figured a few prepackaged meals once in a while are not going to hurt.

The thing is, if you go through your grocery store's frozen section, chances are, not much will fit into the Fast diet recommendation. Even a couple of the supposedly "healthy" portioned packages would cover your whole daily allowance in one swoop.

I found a couple of Lean Cuisine boxes and Amy's Light and Lean that fit both my taste buds and the calories requirements for Fast Days and packed my freezer full with them for emergencies. I have to say though that they really don't keep me full for as long as my homemade meals. So if you think frozen prepackaged meals are your easy way through the diet, you're probably going to feel like the diet is a bit difficult when you're left famished at the end of the day...

Week 6 Day 1 Emergency Fast Diet Menu:

Breakfast: Vita Top Chocolate muffin 100 calories

Lunch: Lean Cuisine Four Cheese Cannelloni 230 calories

Dinner: Lean Cuisine Chicken in Wine Sauce 160 calories

Night snack: korean rice cracker 16 calories

Total: 506 calories

Week 5 Day 2 About recording your calories

I guess I probably should have talked about this earlier. The Fast Diet book has a table of how many calories you get per quantity of food for the most common foods... but really, who carries the book with them everywhere? One thing I learned while reading the book though was to weight your food after you cook it for an accurate calories count (something I was doing wrong for years!).

I have used quite a few calories tracker websites over the years including Calorie Count and Calorie King. Now in our digital era, I mostly use apps to be able to count my calories on the go, and I found "MyFitnessPal" works quite well for me. Some of my friends use "Lose It!" and quite like it. All of these are free so do check them all out and find the one that appeals the most to you. Both apps have exhaustive American food content. For the Canadians out there reading this, I think the database in MyFitnessPal contains more of our canadian products. Happy calorie counting!


Week 5 Day 2 menu


Breakfast: approximately 118 calories
- 32g of pork jerky
- 1 korean rice cracker


Lunch: approximately 215 calories
- 2 cups of baby spinach
- 1 tsp olive oil balsamic vinaigrette
- 1 sliced date
- 50g grape tomatoes
- 2 eggs, sliced


Dinner: approximately 170 calories
- homemade crab frittata (mix 1 can of crab meat, 1 egg, 1 tsp of chives and salt to taste, and place in the oven at 400F for 10-15mn for an easy quick meal on a busy work night!)


Total: 503 calories

Week 5 Day 1 About getting a doctor to supervise your diet

Alright, so after a full month on the diet, I had great results on the scale. Now according to Dr Mosley, the loss of weight should only be considered "a bonus", and the real benefit of fasting is that it improves your health. Well, like I've said before, I was already pretty healthy except for being a bit on the chubby side and borderline anemic. But I decided to run some blood tests just to see if there really was an effect (not the big fancy ones like you saw in his movie which are a bit expensive, just the regular ones).

The results: all counts (sugar, cholesterol, etc.) went down (good!)... including iron (bad for my anemia!) although still not down to a critical level. So looking back at my diet over the last few weeks, I realized I had cut down on most iron rich red meats because they are higher in calories and don't stretch as far to make me feeling fuller longer... So I had two choices: 1- make sure I get a lot of iron rich foods in my diet on non fast days to compensate, or 2- get creative and find some lighter ways to get iron intakes. Well, I did both. But just to be on the safe side, I also added a multivitamin on Fast Days. So please consult your doctor and/or a nutritionist to monitor your progress through this journey and have them tailor the diet to your personal needs!

Menu Week 5 Day 1:

Breakfast: approximately 41 calories
- lemonade: juice of 1 Meyer lemon + 2 packs of stevia + water to taste
- 1 korean rice cracker

Lunch: approximately 215 calories
- 2 cups of baby spinach
- 1 tsp olive oil balsamic vinaigrette
- 1 sliced date
- 8 grape tomatoes, each cut in 2
- 2oz filet mignon, sliced in mouth sized pieces

Dinner: approximately 242 calories
- 3 cups of baby spinach
- 1 tsp olive oil balsamic
- 1 sliced date
- 9 grape tomatoes, each cut in 2
- 2.3oz filet mignon

Total: 498 calories

Week 4 Day 2 Results after one month

So after one month on the Fast Diet, I have lost 3kg (a bit more than 6lbs). To treat myself, I went out to buy some new clothes :) It feels good to see I am now one dress size down already!

Breakfast: 80 calories
- 1 Liberte peach and passion fruit 0% greek yogurt

Lunch: approximately 110 calories
- 1 artichoke
- 1 tbsp of Hellman's light olive oil mayonnaise

Dinner: approximately 332 calories
- ordered a sashimi platter for take out (90g of salmon, 90g of tuna, 30g squid, and 20g of an unknown fish)
- 1 chopped scallop nigiri

Total: 522 calories

Week 4 Day 1 About exercising on Fast days

If you have read the book, you saw Dr Mosley's advice about keeping your exercises routine on fast days. If you are like me, you will think he is nuts!... Well at least initially. The first two weeks on the diet were hard enough with just keeping your mind off food. The third week was ok but still a bit hesitant. By the fourth week, a Fast Day felt pretty much like any other day. I didn't really have any food craving, I had already planned all the foods I would be eating for the whole day and I just felt that I did have energy to spare and thought I would give some exercises a try.

So I hit my local gym and decided to start with something light. I had recently downloaded a free app on my phone called C25K (standing for "couch to 5km run") but never had the willpower to actually use it. I thought I would try their first workout (hey, if a couch potato can do it!) which was alternating intervals of jogging and walking for a total duration of 30mn. I'm not gonna say it was easy (I'd never really run before) but it wasn't bad. Also, the high amount of water I was taking during the exercises helped me feel fuller longer and I wasn't hungry in the evening. So I decided to keep doing cardio exercises on fast days from then on. It also helped me not to feel guilty about going slightly above the 500 calories allowance on some days... What I have noticed over time is that my body now feels like it performs better at the gym on a fast day. On regular food days, I just feel heavier and get tired faster... So yes, start slow, but do give it a try! I think you will overall feel better!


Menu Week 4 Day 1


Brunch: approximately 198 calories
- 1 can of shrimps
- half of an avocado
- half the juice of a Meyer lemon (saw them at the grocery store and thought I would give them a try. They are a cross between a mandarin and a lemon)
- 1 tsp of chives


Dinner: approximately 270 calories
- 1 egg
- half of an avocado
- half the juice of a Meyer lemon
- 2 cups of lettuce
- 10 grape tomatoes
- 1 sliced date


Total for the day: 468 calories

Week 3 Day 2 About Easter chocolates, and using vegetables to replace pastas

My third week on the diet came just around... Easter! Yes, the celebration of everything chocolate. And I love chocolate. So I looked at the nutritional information on chocolate bunnies, and the creme eggs... and well, guess they were a no go for the fast diet days. Except for one: Cadbury mini eggs! They have 11 calories each. So as long as you can just take out a few (and quickly hide the rest of the pack) then you can have your chocolate fix without busting your fast.

In Canada, they are available only around Easter. So I bought a big supply and store the pack on the very top shelf of my pantry (I need to get the step stool out every time I want some!). But if I remember correctly, they were available year-round when I was living in the USA. So maybe you don't need to have a big supply at home to uselessly put your willpower to the test...


Week 3 Day 2 Menu


Lunch: approximately 171 calories
- zucchini noodles (I used a spiralizer to make noodles out of one fresh zucchini)
- 3 mini bocconcini (fresh mozarella) balls
- 3/4 cup of crushed tomatoes for the sauce
- a pinch of salt to taste


Dinner: approximately 291 calories
- 3 cups of baby spinach
- 1 tsp olive oil balsamic vinaigrette
- 1 date sliced in small pieces
- 9 grape tomatoes
- 85g (3oz) of beef tenderloin, grilled then sliced in small pieces


Snack: 33 calories
- 3 Cadbury mini eggs

Week 3 Day 1 The scale's ups and downs

I really should have started this blog earlier instead of now adding all my menus retrospectively... Oh well, at least you know it worked for me so maybe it adds a component of motivation? If you are on the diet too and have suggestions, please feel free to let me know. I am always trying to fill my 500 calories days in the yummiest way possible.

In any cases, at the beginning of week 3, I had lost a total of 2lb. For those of you who are compulsively weighting themselves every morning (I was doing the same before!), I noticed that on this diet my weight would do a type of zigzag curve as in drop after a fast diet day, go back up a little bit on the two days of regular diet, then go further down at the next fast diet day. Knowing that, I decided to only weight myself the morning after a fast day. It keeps me motivated! And it also avoids the urge to add more days of fasting which would irrevocably lead to a decrease in your metabolism. That would ruin everything and you absolutely don't want that!

Week 3 Day 1 Menu:

Woke up late. Didn't have breakfast.

Lunch: approximately 92 calories
- 1 mini babybel cheese, softly melted in the microwave for 10 seconds
- 2 korean rice crackers (they have more air than the regular rice crackers and clock in at about 16 calories each)

Dinner: approximately 375 calories
- 200g pacific salmon fillet, grilled
- 3 cups of baby spinach
- 12 grape tomatoes
- 1 tsp olive oil balsamic vinaigrette
- 1 date sliced in small pieces

Total for the day: 467 calories

Week 2 Day 2 Discovering chocolaty alternatives

How is the second week of Fast Diet going?
In my case, this was when I suddenly craved chocolate and HAD to have it...
Looking through my pantry, I looked at the nutritional information on all my chocolate bars and none could fit in the Fast Diet allowance of 500 calories without making me need to skip a meal or so... So I went to the grocery store and was lucky enough to find this:

NOMU sugar-free hot chocolate: 18 calories for a 6g serving. I don't like my hot chocolate too sweet so I was happy with just 3g for a cup of skim milk. YES!!!

So if you have a chocolate craving, don't despair. I am not sure how easy it is to find this stuff where you are, but just walk through your supermarket alleys and don't be afraid to look for and try the new unusual stuff that just might do it for you and not bust your diet!


Meal Week 2 Day 2:


Breakfast: approximately 41 calories
- 1 Kikkoman shiro miso soup pack in 1 cup of boiled water
- 2g of dried seaweed


Lunch: approximately 130 calories
- 1 egg
- 1 can of crab
- 1 tbsp of chives
All 3 ingredients mixed together and baked in the oven at 400F for 15mn for a healthy omelet.


Dinner: approximately 293 calories
- 1 hard boiled egg
- 1 cup of NOMU hot chocolate made with skim milk
- 0.5 cup of cereals mixed in with
- 100g of vanilla greek yogurt

Total for the day: 474 calories

Week 2 Day 1 Adapting Bo La Lot (beef in betel leaves) to the diet

I found the second week on the Fast Diet 100 times easier than the first. I was still hungry by the end of the day, but at least I wasn't constantly thinking about food or reminding myself that "it's ok, you can have that tomorrow"... In any cases, after one week on the diet I had already lost 1lb, so it was good motivation :)

For today's meal, I adapted one of my favorite vietnamese dishes - bo la lot (beef in betel leaves) to have a good quantity without too many calories.

BO LA LOT - light version:

Ingredients for 6 portions of 150g:
- 1lb (450g) extra lean ground beef
- 1lb (450g) raw onions
- 2 tsp chopped garlic
- 2 tsp white granulated sugar
- 0.5 tbsp of peanut oil
- a bag of betel leaves: fresh or frozen - I find the thawed betel leaves are a little bit easier to use. You need roughly 50 leaves for the recipe depending on how big they are.

In a big bowl, mix together the beef, onions, garlic, sugar and peanut oil.
Put the mix in a food processor until you get an overall smooth texture (the more onions you put in, the runnier the mix will be - if you decide to cut back on the onions, you might want to switch to lean ground beef otherwise the recipe might be too dry).
Take one betel leaf, place a small amount of the mix in the middle, and roll the leaf around it.
You can easily freeze the portion you do not need for later use. When you are ready to eat it, place the frozen rolls in the oven at 400F for 15 minutes. Enjoy!

PS: Some people replace the betel leaves with grape leaves. That substitution just never did it for me. Maybe because I've grown up eating them that way, but I just think the betel leaves have an irreplaceable aroma...

Diet Menu Week 2 Day 1:

Breakfast: approximately 41 calories
- 1 Kikkoman Shiro Miso Soup pack in a cup of boiled water
- 2g of wakame dried seaweed

Lunch: approximately 324 calories
- 150g of bo la lot
- 90g (3oz) of pickled radishes (available in most asian groceries)
- 1 mandarin

Dinner: approximately 151 calories
- 3 cups of mixed salad
- 40g of cherry tomatoes
- 1 tsp of olive oil balsamic vinaigrette
- 3 mini balls of bocconcini (fresh mozarella), cut in even smaller pieces to spread through the salad
- 1 date sliced

Total for the day: 516 calories

Week 1 Day 2 About finding the right rythmn

Alright, so the first day was hard. The second fast day in my week was a bit better. Yes, I still had my stomach growling a bit toward the end of the day, but it just motivated me to hit bed early. Hey! That's supposed to be good for weight loss too isn't it?

In his book, Dr Mosley recommended a Monday-Thursday regimen. In my case, I found it really hard to stick to this diet on two week days... probably because a lot of my colleagues LOVE to cook and bake and there is always a big platter of cookies, cakes and chocolates in our break room. I also have very little time during the week to cook or plan my meals. I found a Sunday - Thursday rhythm to suit me better... leaving Saturday as my "splurge" day where I would go out with friends and not worry about healthy food count whatsoever.

Menu Week 1 Day 2:

Breakfast: approximately 41 calories
- one pack of Kikkoman Shiro Miso soup
- 2g of wakame dried seaweed









Lunch: approximately 183 calories
- 2 large eggs
- 3 cups of mixed salads
- 40g cherry tomatoes
- 1 tsp olive oil and balsamic vinaigrette









Dinner: approximately 289 calories
- sashimi platter including
    - 100g salmon sashimi
    - 80g tuna sashimi
    - 40g snapper sashimi





Total for the day: 513 calories

Week 1 Day 1 Starting the diet with ong choy

In retrospect, this was probably THE hardest day of the whole diet. The day when your inner voice whispers: how will I ever survive with only 500 calories??? Well the truth is most of us have enough fat stored to keep us going for that "light" day. So be brave and take that first step!

The vegetable I used for the day's meals is an asian green vegetable called Ong Choy (apparently translated as "water spinach" or rau muong in vietnamese).

How to cook ONG CHOY to keep it low calories:
- wash your ong choy and cut it in 3-4 inches (10cm) long pieces.
- boil about 2 cups of water with a dash of salt, and place in your ong choy for roughly 1-2mn until lightly soft. Take out the ong choy and preserve the water (you can use it as a soup).
- in a non stick pan, saute 2 minced cloves of garlic and add in the ong choy. Stir well for 30 seconds and it is ready!

Breakfast: Approximately 53 calories
- half a banana

Lunch: Approximately 278 calories
- Ong choy cooking broth
- 200g (7 oz) of ong choy
- 150g (5oz) of grilled firm tofu

Dinner: Approximately 185 calories
- 100g (3.5oz) of ong choy
- 150g (5oz) of grilled pacific salmon fillet

Total for the day: 516 calories. Bon Appetit!

Why I created this blog

Hi everyone!

This is my first true public blog. If you have found your way to this page, I am guessing you somehow were looking for more information about "The Fast Diet" by Dr. Michael Mosley. I will just start with this disclaimer that I have no conflict of interest with anything written or published or released by Dr. Michael Mosley nor is he endorsing anything that I will be writing here. This is just my own journey through the diet.

Why did I finally decide to write this blog? Well, I started this journey back in March 2013, and it worked for me. I have lost 15 pounds in 6 months so far. When I googled up on the fast diet this morning looking for new meals ideas, I found very little on that topic, and tons of websites urging people to not start this diet. Then most of the other more helpful websites were in Europe and really not tailored to a North American reality food wise... combine to that the fact that I am of asian decent and I really didn't think their meals were that palatable...  I thought that was a shame...

Do I think this diet is for everyone? No I don't. I have tried different diets in the past (Montignac, Dukan, etc) and although they worked for a lot of people, they didn't for me. I would say people should read everything carefully, see if it matches their personality, see if it actually works for a couple of days, and if not, let it go immediately before the discouragement and guilt spiral kick in.

Before starting this diet, I was eating well with little junk food, clocking in between 1,800 to 2,200 calories a day (probably up to 2,500-3,000 on days when I would go out with friends). I was weighting 150lbs for 5'7, so was in the BMI normal range, but kinda chubby for an asian girl with a very annoying muffin top and carrying a "food baby" after every meal. I was, and am still, working out roughly one hour 2-3 times a week.

Just like Dr. Michael Mosley, I am a doctor as well. I am actually an oncologist. But to anyone who asks if I think this diet will make you healthier, I will reply: I DO NOT KNOW. There is just not enough research data on humans released at this time. All I can say is that after watching "Eat, Fast, and Live Longer", I got curious and I did some basic blood tests throughout the diet. The result: well, I always was lightly anemic, and because my way of cutting down calories involved cutting out a lot of the red meat, my result came in with slightly decreased iron levels. Armed with that fact, I now take one multi-vitamin with iron on fast days, and have increased my iron-rich food intake on non-fast day, and my bloodwork at the 6 months mark came back clean as a whistle. I guess what I am trying to say is: pay attention to your body's response and diet intelligently!

I am now 135lbs, went from a size 8 to a size 2, and am continuing on the diet a bit more lax just to maintain my weight. I have religiously recorded everything I ate and taken a lot of photos of my food on diet days and will be posting them on. I hope they can encourage you and give you some ideas to go through this journey. Good luck!