This diet is also known as the Hollywood diet, and is thought to have been developed around the 1930′s.

The grapefruit diet is based on the fact that eating grapefruit daily can help increase your metabolism and by following the diet plan you could lose up to 10 pounds in around 12 days. That’s nearly a pound a day but remember you cannot stay on this diet for longer than 12 days, the reason will be explained further on in the article.

How to make the grapefruit diet work for you

Obviously as with any diet we have to cut back on our calories, dropping our intake to around 800 per day. So other than the grapefruit we need to avoid or cut down the amount we eat of the usual foods we eat pretty drastically.

As a general rule 1/2 a grapefruit should be eaten before every meal, you will still be eating 3 meals a day but due to the low calorie intake these meals should be small and lean [fat free].

As with all diets perseverance is the key, so try to stay on this diet for at least 12 days and avoid snacking. If you feel the need to snack why not try the “cookie diet” which lets you eat specially made cookies while dieting, or check out the fad diet called “snacking the right way”.

Simple meal plans:

There are a whole lot of variations out there but I have listed one for each meal to give you the idea.

Breakfast
1/2 grapefruit
2 eggs – boiled or scrambled [use fat free milk or water]
1 slice of toast [wholewheat]
pat of butter to lightly butter the toast
or a little jam – not both.

Lunch
1/2 a grapefruit
3 ounces of chicken, turkey or fish – not fried but grilled or steamed.
A small salad with a little dash of fat free salad dressing

Dinner
1/2 grapefruit
3 ounces of lean meat like chicken, turkey or fish [not fried]
a small salad with a dash of fat free dressing.

Remember to drink a lot more water during this time as not only will it help the hunger pangs but it is also good for you. Avoid all alcohol as they tend to have empty calories. Fizzy drinks are also a big NO!

This diet lasts for 12 days and should never be continued for more than this unless you have eaten normally for at least 4 days. You body will tend to lack in some vital vitamins, proteins and nutrients during this time and this could be detrimental to your health if you just continue with the diet with out a break in between, a good rule here is to take some multi-vitamins during this period.

Considered a fad diet, this diet can be potentially harmful to the person who does try it in a attempt to lose those extra pounds as it could aggravate certain medical conditions. Seek the advice of your doctor before starting this diet if you have any underlying medical problems.

As with all the diets around – remember to persevere, exercise and be above all be patient!

Candice is a full time author and loves to write about her interests. These include a variety of diets, be it for weight loss or for the benefit of ones health she puts pen to paper. She also loves shopping, bowling, beading, dabbles in the forex market and enjoys internet marketing. You can visit her at Black Chrome Wheels to find the black chrome wheels you have always wanted.

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Technorati Tags: Grapefruit, weight

The grapefruit diet was popularized by movie stars as long ago as the 1930s. It is also known as the Hollywood diet and it is still followed by many people today.

What Is Involved?

It is a short term, high protein, low carbohydrate diet that you follow for 12-18 days. You must eat 3 meals a day plus 1 snack. Do not skip any meals. There is no published original version of the plan so it varies a little but this is an example menu plan:

Breakfast: 1/2 grapefruit, 2 eggs, 2 slices bacon, black coffee if wished.

Lunch: 1/2 grapefruit, large salad with dressing, unlimited meat.

Dinner: 1/2 grapefruit, unlimited salad or cooked red or green vegetables (except those on the banned list below), unlimited meat or fish.

Evening snack: 8 oz skim milk.

You can use butter and oil including frying the allowed foods if you want to. You must drink 8 x 8oz glasses of water per day. Apart from water and the breakfast time coffee, no other drinks are allowed.

The following foods are banned: starchy vegetables (potato, pumpkin, corn etc), peas, beans, nuts, seeds, grains, bread, cereals, sugar, and fruit – except grapefruit of course!

Why Does It Work?

The aim of the grapefruit diet is to get weight back to normal if you have a few pounds to lose. It accomplishes this by restricting calories for the 12-18 days of the diet plan. Despite the high fat content, most people will be eating far fewer calories than normal, so they will lose weight during this time if they stick to the plan. No high carbohydrate foods are allowed so the body will burn fat for energy in the same way as on the Atkins diet.

The original claim was that grapefruit has a weight loss effect in itself – that is, by adding half a grapefruit before each meal you would slowly lose weight even if you changed nothing else. People may say either that grapefruit contains a fat-burning enzyme or that it controls insulin levels, affecting the metabolism. This has not been proved by research so far.

Any Negatives?

Being a short term diet, it is not so useful for people who want to lose a lot of weight. It could start you off with good weight loss but when the 12-18 days are over, you will need another type of diet to move on to. At this point there is a risk you could go back to your old eating habits and put the weight right back on.

There is also a danger for people who just wanted to lose those few pounds, that they will celebrate with high carbohydrate meals when they reach the goal. Yoyo dieting could be the result. Yoyo dieting is strict dieting followed by weight gain, so the weight goes up and down very quickly. This is bad for the health.

The high saturated fat content may be dangerous for some people even in the short term.

See your doctor before starting any weight loss diet such as the grapefruit diet.

Technorati Tags: grapefruit diet, weight loss