The Pound a Day Diet

December 16, 2013
Celebrity chef DiSpirito (Now Eat This!) offers a rapid weight-loss regimen designed to re-educate palates and perspectives about dropping pounds quickly and keeping them off. Based on the most current nutrition research, this approach dispels the belief that a slow, steady loss is the best way to lose weight and avoid regaining. There are three keys to his plan: 1) veggies are a secret weapon; 2) lean protein “rocks your body”; and 3) “nutritional balance is paramount.” Eating “calorie-corrected” and “carb-corrected” foods revs up metabolism, and adopting a Mediterranean diet helps maintain it, so that this method of eating becomes a way of life. Phase 1 of the plan lasts four weeks: three meals and two snacks for a total of 850 calories for each of five days, followed by two days of three meals and two snacks for1200 calories per day, then repeated for three more weeks. Phase 2, maintenance, begins when a goal weight is achieved; calories increase but guidelines remain. Sixty new healthy recipes, with low-calorie, low-carb, high-fiber, lean protein “Diet Booster” foods, plus a 28-day meal plan, and a detailed, week-by-week shopping list, along with the author’s infectious encouragement, guide dieters in cooking and enjoying filling, delicious meals—sure to be a hit with his fans.

November 15, 2013

DiSpirito (Now Eat This! 150 of America's Favorite Comfort Foods, All Under 350 Calories) is the chef at the high-end New York restaurant Union Pacific, a TV personality on the Food Network and on reality shows, and the New York Times best-selling author of nine titles that feature his healthy makeovers of favorite comfort foods. His new book provides a program that he guarantees will quickly melt off the pounds using nutritionally dense, whole, unprocessed foods and creating a new lifestyle of eating based on Mediterranean diet patterns. DiSpirito includes 60 new recipes as well as a 28-day menu plan with companion shopping lists to help facilitate the new eating guidelines. His weight-loss phase alternates a five-day diet with a weekend plan that is more flexible. The recipes contain nutritional breakdowns, and the author offers suggestions for no-prep alternatives for those who do not have time to cook. The book also has a chapter on exercise with helpful charts of the calories burned by various exercises, as well as a 13-plus-week walking or jogging program. VERDICT DiSpirito is an engaging author, and fans of his previous books will enjoy this one.--Crystal Renfro, Georgia Inst. of Technology Lib. & Information Ctr., Atlanta

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