The South Beach Diet Super Charged

by Joseph Signorile PhD

  Missing Our Nutrients

  Our unhealthy lifestyle is made even worse by our poor diet. Since we began growing fields of grain about 10,000 years ago and developed the ability to cultivate fruits and vegetables, the nutritional content of our foods has seriously deteriorated. This is because we tend to breed plants for hardiness, taste, and aesthetics, not nutrients. Today, the fruits and vegetables we find in most supermarkets are larger, sweeter, and better-looking than those our ancestors gathered. The problem is that they also have less fiber and fewer vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients than is optimal for our general health—not to mention our waistlines. Luckily, more and more Americans are embracing organic foods, heirloom fruits and vegetables, and sustainable farming methods, all trends that are bringing food back to its more natural and nutritious state. In Chapter 7, “Supercharged Foods for Better Health,” I recommend some foods with powerful nutritional benefits that can help you stay healthy and avoid the host of chronic and degenerative diseases currently affecting so many of us.

  A Nation Overprocessed

  Beyond our desire to cultivate and produce food almost exclusively to please our tastebuds, other social and technological trends have affected our food supply for the worse. A few generations ago, our great grandparents walked to local markets on a daily basis to buy whatever produce they didn’t grow themselves as well as fresh bread and other food for their families’ next meals. They could only travel to local markets and take home what they were able to carry. With the advent of the automobile and the home refrigerator, however, it became possible to travel farther to shop, and people could take home enough food to feed their families for a week or two. But for that to be possible, foods had to have longer shelf lives. This led to supermarkets and to food processing, which, unfortunately, removed important nutrients while adding substances like sodium and trans fats to prevent spoilage. In a sense, we began digesting our food in factories instead of in our intestines.

  It’s only now that we are appreciating the deleterious effects these technological “advances” have had on our weight and on our health. In Chapter 3, “A Diet You Can Live With…For Life,” I discuss the health and character of a Mediterranean society that thrived without many of our modern advances, and I show you how we can learn from this remarkable example.

  We Must Act Now

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  5 YEARS of SUCCESS

  Deborah M., age 43: We Are Healthier People because of the Way We Live

  It was 2003, and my husband had very high blood pressure that wasn’t being controlled, even with medication. I was very overweight and knew that we both needed to make a change. The South Beach Diet had just come out, and I went to the bookstore to look over a copy. The first thing I turned to was the recipe section. It was great. I love to cook and was thrilled that I didn’t have to give it up.

  After reading the book, I realized that I ate way too many bad carbs all day, like crackers and cookies. Once I stopped eating enriched white flour, I noticed a complete change in everything about me, including my mood and energy level, and I started losing weight. Within a year, I lost 45 pounds, and my husband lost 20. Although he still takes medication for high blood pressure, it’s now under control.

  Now I’m the go-to girl at work for healthy-food questions. When we have luncheons, everyone knows they can count on me to bring in something healthy. I have learned how to take bad carbs out of a recipe and replace them with good carbs. I am passionate about telling people to read food labels! Don’t be fooled; buy only whole-grain products. If it says “enriched white flour,” find something else.

  In 2005, we had an 11-year-old foster youth come to live with us. He was overweight and already taking medication for high blood pressure. He lived on junk food. We took him to a doctor, who told us that he shouldn’t go on a diet—he should start living a healthy lifestyle. I decided to give him the same healthy food my husband and I were eating, but I told him he could eat as much as he wanted. He also started exercising. Simply by eating the right foods and being more active, he started losing weight fairly quickly. By the end of 4 months, he was off the blood pressure medication, and by the time he left us 18 months later, he had lost 30 pounds. While living with us, he learned how to read food labels and make good food choices. I hope he continues to live a healthy life. My husband often jokes that I should open my home to people who want to lose weight.

  I am happy with my weight loss but even happier that my husband and I are healthier people because of the way we live and eat. I am a true believer in the South Beach Diet way of life.

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  If you’re like me, you find how we got into this sad state not only depressing but scary. But there is hope if we take action today. Because we finally understand so much of what has gone wrong, we can use our advanced technologies to turn things around. We now know that our increasing waistlines, poor physical fitness, and worsening health are not different problems but, rather, part of the same problem. We now know that what’s good for our waistlines is also good for our hearts, our brains, and our general health.

  We must ask the food industry, including traditional and fast-food restaurants, to help make healthy food more convenient and convenient food healthier. We must supply our schoolchildren with nutrient-rich meals and make nutrition education and physical education integral parts of our schools’ curricula. We must reinstate the family table and, despite our busy schedules, try to provide fresh foods for our children on a regular basis. We must also create communities and workplaces where good food and exercise opportunities are readily available. These steps will make for a healthier, happier, more motivated, and more productive America. I guarantee it.

  In the chapters that follow, I explain the lifelong benefits of adopting a healthy diet and fitness program. And in Parts II and III, I offer the specifics on how to get there. Whether you have 10 pounds, 100 pounds, or no weight to lose, whether you are active or inactive, helping you to become healthy and fit—for life—is the mission of this book. So read on and learn more. We can beat the epidemic of obesity in this country. And we can all become part of the solution.

  2

  The Basics of the South Beach Diet

  Recently, an Associated Press story about the New York City subway system caught my eye. According to subway officials, a leading cause of subway delays is crash dieters who faint on the platform or on the train. That’s right—crash dieters who pass out and require medical help are a top cause of transit delays. Clearly, these folks are not eating properly, and they’re certainly not following the South Beach Diet!

  On the three phases of the South Beach Diet, you will eat three meals a day and at least two snacks. You will eat until you are pleasantly full, and you will not walk around feeling dizzy or hungry. We don’t want you to skip meals or snacks. You’ll be eating satisfying portions of real food, including nutrient-rich, high-fiber carbohydrates (vegetables, fruits, and whole grains); lean sources of protein; good unsaturated fats; and low-fat dairy. You can eat dessert on even the strictest phase of the diet (in fact, we recommend it) and enjoy an occasional glass or two of wine with a meal after the first 2 weeks. South Beach dieters do not faint from lack of food on the subway, on the street, or anywhere else.

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  THE SOUTH BEACH DIET PHASES IN A NUTSHELL

  In Part III of this book, “Supercharged Eating on the South Beach Diet,” beginning on “Getting Started on the South Beach Diet” Section, you’ll find all the tools you need to get started and proceed through the diet’s three phases. But I want to give you a quick overview right here, so you’ll understand its foundation.

  Phase 1: This is the shortest and strictest phase of the diet, lasting only 2 weeks. Phase 1 is for people who have a substantial amount of weight to lose or experience significant cravings for sugary foods and refined starches. During this phase, you’ll jump-start your weight loss and stabilize your blood sugar levels to minimize cravings by eating a diet based on healt
hy lean protein (fish and shellfish, chicken and turkey, lean cuts of meat, and soy); loads of vegetables and plenty of salads; beans and other legumes; nuts; reduced-fat cheeses; eggs; low-fat dairy; and good unsaturated fats, such as extra-virgin olive oil and canola oil. You’ll enjoy three satisfying meals a day plus two snacks, and you’ll even be able to have some dessert. What you won’t be eating are starches (bread, pasta, and rice) or sugars (including fruits and fruit juices). While this may seem hard at first, your cravings will soon disappear, and you won’t feel hungry all the time. Remember that in just 2 weeks, you’ll be adding many of these foods back into your life. Also keep in mind that exercise during this and all of the phases of the diet is important to your overall health and will improve your results.

  Phase 1 gives positive reinforcement because you lose weight fairly rapidly over the 2-week period, but the main purpose of this phase is to stabilize blood sugar and eliminate cravings. You then have much better control over what you eat. And while the rapid weight loss is exciting and gives you the incentive to keep on losing, it’s important to move on to Phase 2 to begin more gradual weight loss and the evolution from diet to lifestyle.

  Phase 2: People who have 10 pounds or less to lose, who don’t have problems with cravings, or who simply want to improve their health can start the diet with Phase 2. If you’re moving on to Phase 2 from Phase 1, you’ll find that your weight will continue to drop steadily (although more slowly) and your cravings have subsided. You’ll gradually reintroduce many of the foods that were off-limits on Phase 1, including more good carbohydrates, such as whole fruits, whole-grain breads, whole-wheat pasta, and brown rice, as well as some root vegetables (like sweet potatoes). You’ll even be able to have a glass of red or white wine with lunch or dinner on occasion. Don’t be discouraged by your slower weight loss during this phase. Your goal is to reach a weight that’s healthy for you, achieve permanent weight loss, and develop a healthy lifestyle. Otherwise, it’s just a quick fix.

  Phase 3: This phase begins once you reach your healthy weight. The principles of Phase 3 are guidelines for the way all Americans should be eating, even those who’ve never had a weight problem. At this point in the diet, you’ll fully understand how to make good food choices while maintaining that healthy weight. You’ll have learned the pecking order of foods (from good to not so good). You will know to choose a higher-fiber, nutrient-rich sweet potato over a white baked potato. You’ll know to choose brown or wild rice over white rice and blueberries over watermelon and overall maximize your consumption of healthy fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. You’ll be able to easily monitor your body’s response to particular foods, and you’ll find yourself naturally making the right choices most of the time. Remember, once you reach Phase 3, no food is completely off-limits. You can enjoy a decadent dessert on occasion and will probably find you’ve satisfied that sweet tooth after just a few bites.

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  The goals of the South Beach Diet are to help you lose weight safely and stay healthy and fit for the rest of your life—and never walk around feeling famished and light-headed.

  The South Beach Diet is not a high-protein, low-carbohydrate diet, nor is it a low-fat diet. It is a nutritionally sound diet that consists of a wide variety of wholesome foods and teaches you how to make better food choices for life.

  Choose the Good Carbs

  Do you know the difference between a good carbohydrate and a bad one? Many of my patients didn’t until we published our original diet book 5 years ago. In fact, until fairly recently, even many medical professionals did not know much about how carbohydrates differ. For instance, it turns out that fiber plays a very important role in what makes a carbohydrate good.

  The concept of dietary fiber relating to disease was first introduced by Denis Burkitt, MD, a British army surgeon who served in Africa in the 1960s, but its role in nutrition did not become widely appreciated until the early 1980s. That’s when David Jenkins, MD, of the University of Toronto, introduced the concept of the glycemic index, a method of classifying carbohydrates based on their potential to raise blood sugar levels, which is in part due to the type of starch, sugar, or fiber they contain. (I discuss the glycemic index in more detail in the next chapter.) Additionally, it wasn’t until the last decade that we realized that high-fiber good carbs are also great sources of literally thousands of micronutrients known as phytochemicals, including the antioxidants that are essential for preventing disease and simply keeping us healthy.

  When it comes to fiber, it’s important to know that there are two types—soluble and insoluble—and both will help you achieve your weight loss goals. Soluble fiber is found mainly in vegetables, fruits, legumes, barley, oats, and oat bran. It slows down digestion, so food stays in your stomach longer, making you feel satisfied longer. Insoluble fiber is found mainly in wheat, especially in wheat bran and other whole grains. It speeds up the movement of food through your intestines, thereby helping to prevent constipation.

  Unfortunately, as I noted in the last chapter, fiber is often removed from grains during processing to produce a smoother texture and to extend the shelf life of breads and other baked goods. Without fiber, processed grains become essentially chains of glucose (sugar) molecules known as starches, which are devoid of nutrients. These starches are rapidly digested and converted into the simple sugars that can cause a sudden spike in blood sugar. In fact, a piece of white bread will raise your blood sugar faster than a teaspoon of table sugar will. That’s why highly processed baked goods and sugary low-fiber cereals are among the worst carbs you can eat.

  Let’s say you typically start your day with a bowl of sweetened cereal or a Danish pastry. Your breakfast is largely free of fiber and nutrients and is converted into simple sugars very quickly. When your blood sugar rises, your pancreas (a small, flat organ that lies behind your stomach) responds by producing insulin, the hormone that facilitates the movement of blood sugar and fat from the bloodstream into your cells. This is a crucial step that ensures that the energy you consume in the form of food gets into your body’s tissues, where it is burned, stored, or incorporated into hormones in order to keep you functioning and healthy. But when you consume a meal of nearly pure starch or sugar, your pancreas has to produce more insulin than it normally does. Once that additional insulin kicks in, your blood sugar falls abruptly. While you may feel satisfied and energized for a while, relatively soon after your meal, when the sugar is cleared from your bloodstream, your sugar high rapidly becomes a sugar low. And as your blood sugar drops, you feel tired, cranky, and hungry again.

  It’s due to these exaggerated swings in blood sugar that many Americans are walking around much of the time in search of another sugary or starchy snack—a quick fix—to relieve their food cravings. Over time, this cycle will disrupt your metabolism, making you susceptible to a condition called prediabetes, or metabolic syndrome. (I will tell you more about prediabetes in later chapters.) Already some 40 percent of US adults ages 40 to 70 are affected by this condition, which, if left untreated, can cause an increase in heart attacks and strokes and eventually lead to full-blown diabetes.

  Choose the Good Fats

  More than a decade ago, when I first began suggesting to my heart patients that they should eat more good fats, it was tantamount to committing medical heresy. Today, nutrition experts unanimously agree that good fats are important. This is great news, especially for people who have suffered on very low-fat diets that left them feeling unsatisfied. In fact, diets that severely limit fat have proven very difficult to stay on. We need good fats because they’re essential for building cell membranes; for nerve, heart, and brain health (fats compose 60 percent of the brain); and for nearly all of the body’s basic functions. In addition, fats slow the digestion of carbohydrates and make food taste better, helping you feel satisfied. However, you do have to be careful about which fats you consume. Just as all carbohydrates are not the same, all fats are not the same. Some are good, some are bad, and some are
really terrible.

  Good fats are the unsaturated fatty acids our bodies need to survive. Unsaturated fats are either monounsaturated or polyunsaturated. Monounsaturated fats can be found mainly in olive, peanut, avocado, and canola oils. There are two types of polyunsaturated fats—omega-3s and omega-6s. Omega-3s are found in some nuts; flaxseed and other seeds; and all seafood, especially fatty cold-water fish such as salmon, tuna, sardines, and herring. Omega-6 fats are found in corn, safflower, and sesame oils and also in grains. Both omega-3s and omega-6s are called essential fatty acids because they are required by the body and must be obtained through food sources or supplementation.

  Omega-6 fats are dependent on interactions with omega-3s for their optimal health benefits, but omega-6s are considered good fats only when consumed in moderation and in proper proportion with omega-3s. A normal ratio of omega-6s to omega-3s in a healthy diet should be about 2–4:1. Currently, most Americans’ ratios are more like 15–17:1, largely because we eat a lot of omega-6-rich oils and a lot of grain-fed beef in this country, and grains contain omega-6s. (Grass-fed cattle and wild game, which eat a more natural diet, have relatively more omega-3s.) When too many omega-6 fats are consumed, they tend to be proinflammatory, whereas omega-3 fats are anti-inflammatory. Because we are getting too many omega-6s and not enough omega-3s, as a society we have, in a sense, become hyperinflamed. And, as more studies are showing, this constant state of inflammation can cause or exacerbate a range of health problems, from heart attack and cancer to Alzheimer’s disease.