Negative Calorie Dieting: Losing Weight with Negative Calories

A negative calorie diet basically involves the intake of specific beverages and food that offer you a negative calorie impact or effect. What this means is that the foods you consume when engaging in negative calorie dieting are foods that offer you fewer calories due to the fact that they use a lot of energy to chew, to process in your digestive system, to metabolize in your body, and to remove from the body via the process of elimination. Negative calorie dieting allows you to enjoy foods that use up more calories to process than you actually gain from eating the foods you select.

The entire idea of negative calorie dieting was formulated roughly ten years ago and was promoted by Dr. Neal D. Barnard, the president and founder of the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, in his book Foods that Cause You to Lose Weight: the Negative Calorie Effect. Dr. Barnard encourages the consumption of a vegan diet consisting of low-fat food selections that are absent of animal food selections. The main food selections promoted by Dr. Barnard allow you to consume fruits and vegetables that are fibrous and high in water content, and there is no limitation placed on how many of the foods that you consume in the negative calorie dieting plan provided that they are foods offered on the negative calorie diet list of acceptable foods.

Fruits identified as fibrous and offering you a negative calorie dieting impact include things like all types of apples, blueberries, cantaloupe, cranberries, pink grapefruit, yellow grapefruit, honey dew melon, mangos, oranges, peaches, raspberries, strawberries, and watermelon. You can also consume papaya and pineapples, as well as tangerines. These fruits are high in water content and use a lot of caloric energy to digest and process in the body. A variety of vegetables are approved for consumption when negative calorie dieting. Vegetable selections include things like asparagus, beet root, broccoli, green cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, celery, chicory, chili peppers, cucumbers, endives, garden cress, garlic, green beans, lettuce, onions, radishes, spinach, turnips, and zucchini. Vegetables and fruits can be consumed raw, cooked, or juiced.

When you are negative calorie dieting, you need to realize that the diet is fairly restrictive and it limits your intake of foods considerably. Your diet will cause you to lose weight, because your caloric intake is significantly reduced. The diet does not allow you to consume fish, lean meats, dairy products, and nuts, and it also eliminates the use of unsaturated fats like fish oil and olive oil that are actually good for your body. While it is true that you can easily fill yourself up and satiate your hunger by consuming large amounts of negative calorie food selections, with the elimination of several food groups from your diet, you run the risk of not getting adequate minerals, vitamins, and nutrients. If you decide to use negative calorie dieting to lose weight, you should talk to your physician first. It might be a good idea to get a full physical examination to make sure you are in good physical condition before you begin the diet.

You should have your blood sugar levels tested to make sure you have no issues with diabetes since consuming a lot of sugary fruits may alter your blood sugar levels. You should also consider taking vitamin supplements when negative calorie dieting to make sure your nutritional needs are met. Finally, since you are consuming foods that are highly fibrous, you may run the risk of developing bowel movement irregularities and constipation. You may want to consume a fiber supplement to help keep bowel movements regular.

Diet Channel for information on Negative Calorie Diets at:

http://www.thedietchannel.com/Negative-calorie-diet.htm

Answer Fitness® for information on the Negative Calorie Diet at:

http://www.answerfitness.com/269/negative-calorie-foods-fact-fiction/

Women’s Health for information on the Negative Calorie Diet at:

http://www.womens-health-questions.com/negative-calorie-foods.html

A 2 Z of Health and Beauty Fitness for information on the Negative Calorie Diet at:

http://health.learninginfo.org/negative-calorie-foods.htm