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The Zone Diet

This diet is suited for persons who are detailed oriented, have time to eat six times a day and who like the convenience of boxed meals.

 

What is The Zone Diet

The Zone Diet was created by Barry Sears, PhD. This diet is made up of 40% carbohydrates, 30% proteins, and 30% fats. He is very scientific about how to come up with the 40-30-30 that each individual person will need. Then, he explains that all the foods we eat are in "blocks." Once you figure out your unique combination of blocks, you eat those blocks at each meal. Snacks are half of the meal blocks.

On the Zone Diet, timing is everything. You should eat at least six times a day, eat frequent small meals, with no more than 4-5 hours in between meals and 2.5 hours after a snack (whether hungry or not) your body is programming its insulin levels. Eating the same time every day trains your body's insulin balance.

 

 

 

How does it work

The Zone Diet's eating plan is a combination of a small amount of low-fat protein at every meal, fats, and carbohydrates in the form of fiber-rich vegetables and fruits. The plan establishes a ratio for which Sears contends the body is genetically programmed (that 40-30-30 figure).

Sears claims that the diet is based on his 15 years of research in bio nutrition. Sears bases his theory on using diet to control the body's production of the hormone insulin. Among insulin's many roles, it helps regulate storage of excess energy as fat.

The goal is to keep a balance between fat-storing insulin and the hormone glucagon, insulin's opposite, whose job it is to release the stored glucose from the liver when it is needed. Maintaining the correct balance between the two is accomplished by watching the size and specific content of your meals. In other words, you must be mindful of what you put on your plate. Sears suggests that we think of food not as "a source of calories but as a control system for hormones."

 

What you can eat

The Zone Diet does not recommend that you eat fewer calories than you're currently consuming, just different ones. Although the book has a more complicated and exacting measurement of what to eat, it can be simplified as:

• A small amount of protein at every meal (approximately the size of your palm or one small chicken breast) and at every snack (one in the late afternoon, one in the late evening)
• "Favorable" carbohydrates twice the size of the protein portion -- these include most vegetables and lentils, beans, whole grains, and most fruits

• A smaller amount of carbohydrates if you have chosen "unfavorable" ones -- these include brown rice, pasta, papaya, mango, banana, dry breakfast cereal, bread, bagel, tortilla, carrots, and all fruit juices.

• The Zone Diet devotes little time dairyn products. Sears prefers egg whites and egg substitutes to whole eggs, and low-fat or no-fat cheeses and milk.

  The diet keeps saturated fats to a minimum but includes olive, canola, macadamia nuts, and avocados. Certain unfavorable carbohydrates are restricted because they release glucose quickly: grains, breads, pasta, rice, and other similar starches, a deviation from conventional definitions of a good diet.

• The Zone Diet has pre-packaged foods, including bars, shakes, and boxed meals. You can also incorporate store bought foods and dining out into the Zone Diet. Fruits and vegetables are considered good carbohydrates. Bad carbohydrates are white flour products, white rice, potatoes, pasta, sugar, popcorn, corn, carrots, bananas, and raisins.

What health experts say

The Zone Diet draws mixed reviews from nutrition experts. Some say the diet restricts carbohydrates more than necessary. Others say The Zone takes one of the several known controllers of energy, blood glucose, and blows it up into a whole book.

Advocates for the Zone Diet include celebrities and also some health experts who say that the Zone’s recommendations don’t stray far from the USDA’s (United States Dietary Association) dietary guidelines.

The AHA (American Heart Association) classifies the Zone Diet as high protein and does not recommend the Zone Diet for weight loss. They assert that the Zone Diet has not been proven effective in the long term for weight loss. They believe that the Zone Diet is hazardous as it restricts the intake of essential vitamins and minerals present in certain foods.

 

 

 

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