CUT OUT THE WHITE!!!!

Hi everyone, here is a small topic of interest.

Several years ago my doctor gave me an awsome eating plan (and refused to give me weightloss pills)  It was quite simple. Cut out everything white. If its white, dont eat it.  For example, Milk (lowfat or no fat is ok), egg whites, white breads, pastas, sugars, icecreams, white rice, and sweets.  Step 2 was to cut out PORK AND BEEF.   I was allowed to eat Fish, Turkey and Chicken.  Step 3 I was allowed all the fruits vegetables, and salads I wanted.  Step 4 was to add a little exercise into the mix and he said the pounds would FALL off like magic.   Well guess what IT WORKED!   I lost 20 pounds in 1 month, without starving!  I wished i had stuck to it but i gave into my fast food cravings. I will admit im not perfect, but this plan really works!  

Has anyone ever tried this plan before?  If so did it work for you?  Would anyone be interested in forming a group to try it along with the calorie counting?  Please post a reply of your thoughts.  

Egg whites are actually really good for you.. Lots of protein for only 17 cals per egg white.. and being allowed all the fruits you want isnt neccesarily okay.. it contains a lot of sugar (yes natural sugars) but too much of it is bad for the body, just like anything else

congarts on the weight loss tho! :)

So if you put green food coloring into your rice, you can eat it?

too radical, too fast of weight loss, and to likely to lead to binging...so no thanks.

amazing, i think we should all do what works best for ourselves, congrats on your loss.

I agree with queenofhearts... there's nothing wrong with egg whites, it's the yolks you should avoid... and they're, uh, yellow.

I will agree that it's a good rule to avoid white starches,though--like white bread and rice. But what about onions, and mushrooms, and lowfat cottage cheese, and...?

so coconut ice-cream is bad, but chocolate is okay? cool :D

No disrespect for your doctor and apparently his advice had worked, so congrats. :) However, it's evident that if you cut out ANY food your choices are more limited which means less calories and of course weight loss. Pretty much why people that go on Atkins lost weight so fast and the such, they could only eat non carbs, pretty much everything but meat has them, so of course you're going to lose weight because you cant prepare a steak to take out. :P

I honestly always believed you can eat what you want and lose weight if you work it into your caloric needs. Yes, some options are overall healthier for you, but what it all ends up to is a calorie is a calorie.

Aren't chicken and fish white?

haha I thought this was going to be a speech about not wearing white after labor day..........I was way off.

this sounds like the south beach plan. I always decided against these "no whites" because they wouldn't let me have my yogurt and mini wheat bagel for breakfast. I gotta start off the day right! Maybe if I get really desperate I will try this lol.

are whole grains allowed?

Pfft.  No way, I like my seared beef.  Mmm, practically raw meat...  And there's no way I'm switching permanently to brown rice.

Besides, I've been stuffing my face with pizza, McDonalds, Burger King, and the like.  I'm down, what, 11.5 pounds?  In three weeks, I believe?  Without adding exercise to the mix because I work too much.

So I'm sorry, I think that plan blows.  You may lose weight, and I congratulate you on that, but you're restricting yourself from all that is yummy.  And healthy.

Like cottage cheese.  With diced tomatoes.

And if my comment seems to have a grumpy e-tone to it, I just woke up and have to start studying in about eight mintues or so.

I'd want to check the nutritional balance of what you were eating.

 But it's really just a mnemonic device - and really that's what most fad diets are too.

Low-Carb, often works for some people because it's harder to eat (and/or afford to eat) 5000 Cals of protein than Carbohydrates. 

Paleo, in some of it's more feasible forms is just what doctors have been telling you to eat for years.

Negative-Calorie,  again it's difficult to eat your caloric requirement in vegetables.  For example IIRC if I was to eat my maintenance allowance in Spinach.  It would be something like 8Kgs.

As long as you are making sure you're getting a good nutritional balance.  I don't see the problem with said devices.  It's of course better to recognize them as such.  Since chocolate is, in most forms not white and I can't see the all-chocolate diet really doing much for our health. :)

too radical, too fast of weight loss, and to likely to lead to binging...so no thanks.

I just wanted to comment about "too radical". Eating lots of fruits and vegetables and no processed foods is radical??? Well I must just be living on the edge of sanity over here.

its not the eating fruits and vegetables part, its the NO NO YOU CANT HAVE THESE PART. 

You guys are funny!  Thanks for all the opinions.  The eating plan he gave me was before all the adkins, southbeach and all the fad diets came into existance.    As far as the chocolate icecream comment, no go. It counts as a sweet.  LOL.  Basically instead of white rice or white bread, I was allowed brown rice, wheat bread.  Im pretty sure whole grains were allowed.   I think the fish and chicken was allowed due to the fact of it had less fat content than pork and beef.   I dont recall this eating plan having any specific name, I was just a printout of what i could and could not eat.  He explained it to me in simple terms like I wrote in the first post.   I was just wondering if anyone else had been told the same or tried it. ;) 

just the fact that you couldn't stick with it and reverted to eating food off of the plan indicates to me that this is a flawed approach. that's not an attack on you, it's evidence that this is a short-sighted approach to weight loss; it's just a diet & once a person comes off of it the weight could come back.

while this may work in the short term (which has some merit since it seems a reasonably well-balanced eating plan), it doesn't amount to a lifestyle change sufficient to teach a person to make healthy eating decisions and maintain weight loss in the long term.

its not the eating fruits and vegetables part, its the NO NO YOU CANT HAVE THESE PART.

Isn't that the essence of healthy eating? Not having certain things?

If the essence of healthy eating is not having certain things, then kill me tomorrow with a double cheeseburger in my hands.

Healthy eating doesn't require you to create a "can't have" list.  All things in moderation.

Isn't that the essence of healthy eating? Not having certain things?

No. The essence of healthy eating is moderation, and good desicion making. (Finding lower fat/ccal alternitaves when possible, limiting how often you eat certain things.) In my view, healthy eating is the preference of fruits and vegetables, but definately not the exclusion of everything else. Exclusion is short term; fad; unstable.

Healthy eating is a life long permanent change, and it is virtually impossible to keep up the 'no white rule' or 'no carb' or any of that other nonsense for the rest of your life.