In the wake of Mireille Guiliano's runaway best selling lifestylememoir, "French Women Don't Get Fat,"French dieting guru Michel Montignac reformats his popular "Montignac Method" for an American audience and renames it "The French Diet: The Secrets of Why French Women Don't Get Fat."His secret?Eat real food with a low average glycemic index.
Anyone familiar with Montignac's theories which were rather flagrantly adapted over ten years ago by the creators of the Sugarbusters regime and Suzanne Somers' Somersizing system and worked over to create million dollar dieting empires replete with how-to books, recipes, web sites, food products and a variety of other spin-offs including teeth whitening agents,will appreciate this compact volume that spits out the dieting principles in a minimum of pages, succinctly explains why the diet will work for life and facilitates even the most unimaginative dieter with complete menus for breakfast, lunch and dinner with accompanying recipes.
In the mid-eighties, Montignac wrote "Dine Out and Lose Weight," in sympathy for business people everywhere like himself that had gained too much weight from heavy business dinners and couldn't see a way to remain polite without the need of going up a waist size.Simply stated, he forbid the consumption of high glycemic carbohydrates with fats and proteins, explaining that the insulin release from increased blood sugar levels stores the fats ingested rather than burns them for energy.Montignac Method meals then, were either carbohydrate based or protein/fat based.Only on the maintenance phase of the diet were some lower glycemic carbohydrates allowed to ride side-car with their fattier macronutritional counterparts.Strictly forbidden on any phase were the usual suspect high-glycemic demons of sugar, white flour and other processed foods.
In "The French Diet," Montignac no longer seems caught up with adhering to his former strict dichotomy between carbs and fats.Now refreshingly, he turns his attention on the concept of GO or glycemic outcome as an explanation of the so-called French Paradox.Roughly speaking, GO takes an "average" look at the glycemic index of the entire meal, rather than its individual components.For example, eating a potato (admittedly a bad example as potatoes are forbidden on phase 1) with a high GI should be balanced with the consumption of really low glycemic, high fiber vegetables, keeping the entire GO to a level of 50 or less.For Montignac, keeping a meal at a GO level of less than 35 will result in weight loss.Anything above 50 will start packing that fat back into its favorite storage location -- your abdomen.
In addition, he throws out standard nutritional definitions categorizing carbs as either slow of fast burning, refuses to believe that caloric input and output (in the form of exercise) monitors weight loss or gain and adheres strictly to the premise that selecting foods based on their nutritional value and the effects they have on metabolism is the secret to maintaining one's weight for life.Under Montignac's plan, carbs are no longer public enemy number one and fats, the bad boys of the AHA regime are, no surprise, great if they are either omega 3 or monounsaturated fatty acids-saturated fats are used sparingly and trans fats are a no-no.As expected, proteins should be selected by origin - the best choices, of course, being fish, chicken, turkey, etc.Foods labeled as `funky'(combinations of carbs and fats like nuts and tofu) by similar food combining plans are thankfully no longer `funky' on this one.
If you thought "French Women Don't Get Fat," fun to read, but contained little dieting tenets, you will like Montignac's "The French Diet".His easy-to-understand format feeds into the American need for empiricism withjust enough layman friendly science backed by hard facts and medical studies.The bottom line? Following a balanced diet of real food while tweaking the glycemic index to your best interest puts all current dietary fads to shame.
Product DescriptionThe French have the lowest average body weight per capita in the western world, and yet they eat famously well.Montignac explains in
The French Diet that this not only has to do with which foods the French choose to eat, but their quality, freshness, and most importantly, the way that they are combined.Although the book is based on the concept of glycemic index (GI), which other diet books discuss,
The French Diet is the only book that provides the net GI values of combined foods.Already a phenomenon for years in Europe, Montignac's dieting methods have been helpful to tens of thousands of people around the world who have achieved impressive and long-lasting results and reduced their risk of developing cardiovascular disease.The diet has also found a celebrity following among devotees like singer Kylie Minogue and fashion designer Christian Lacroix.
Written for a range of readers, from those who dine out frequently, to yo-yo dieters, to those who don¹t want to give up wine or "the good life" but who do want to lose weight,
The French Diet reveals the secret to living, eating, and looking like the French with this delicious, deprivation-free diet.
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The French Diet: Why French Women Don't Get Fat (Hardcover)
Was recommended through my physician's hospital. Something simple that provides the basic information I needed. I am a consumer and not in the health industry so I really only needed something to give me a heads-up. Easy to read and understand and wriiten by a qualified professional.
