Zone diet

The main rule here is to combine properly a little carbohydrates, fats and protein that you can find in fiber-rich products like fruits or vegetables. Firstly, you should always include protein in your everyday meal. You should eat Carbohydrates twice as much. You can choose from vegetables or beans. However, you should either avoid raise, bananas, pasta or bagels or choose smaller portions.

Zone diet meals

To put everything more simply, you should reduce the amount of carbohydrates that have the most negative effect on your blood sugar level and insulin level. These forbidden products include sugar, sweets, chocolate, pies, muffins, as well as crisps, cereals for breakfast, bread, pasta, noodles, potatoes, rice, bagels, croissants, pastries or preserves. It is important to note that usually almost all kinds of vegetables and fruits are free to choose to include them into diet. It is also recommended to eat products that contain saturates, monousaturates like olive oil, nuts or avocado.

The other way for you to follow the zone diet is to divide all your meals into three equal parts. What you ought to simply do is to fill it with low-fat protein, (e.g. chicken, which won’t be lager and thicker than the size of your palm) vegetables and fruits. To increase the intake of monousaturates you can choose to add a bit of olive oil, a small number of nuts or avocadoes.

The example of daily plan

This plan is both for men and for women. The average women should eat 11 blocks while men as much as 14. This example excludes snacks.

Zone diet breakfast	Eggs and fruits 8 egg whites, ½ cup pineapple, 4 tbsp of cream cheese, 1 kiwi, ¾ of cantaloupe, 2/3 cup melon.
Zone diet launch	Grilled chicken salad 4 ounces of grilled chicken breast, lemon juice and salad ( 4 tbsp of olive oil, 2 cups lettuce, ¼ cup onion, ¼ mushrooms, ¼ cup green or red pepper, ½ tomatoes)
Zone diet dinner	Vegetables and baked fish 2 apricots, lemon juice, 2 2/3 tsp of olive oil, 2 cups zucchini, 6 ounces of flounder, 2 cup yellow squash, ¾ cups onions.

The zone diet has its name because of the ‘zone’ dieter goes into. It’s a psychological state preserved in the zones that are neither too high nor to low. In this ‘zone’ hormones, which are insulin and eicosanoids, are usually administrated by food. The zone diet results in prevention from cardiovascular diseases and better physical and mental condition. Putting a control on eicosanoids will help you to reduce the risk to get an inflammation and improve blood flow. This will also improve physical and all kinds of the chronic disease condition.

The zone diet was developed by Dr Barry Sears. It is based on the thesis that insulin that makes and keeps us fat. Your body has to start efficiently burning fat for weight loss . You can successfully do it by regulating your blood sugar level and insulin. To complete this goal you have to start strictly regulating the intake of carbohydrates, fats protein. You ought to start reducing the carbohydrates or change them to low-carb food. High-protein and moderate amount of fat will also help you to achieve your goal. This diet actually will sound similar to other diet such as south beach diet or Atkins diet both in methods and in products to enjoy and avoid.

Zone diet program

First of all, it is extremely important to note that dieter should strongly control the intake of insulin combined with the high-dose fish oil to reduce the arachidonic acid synthesis. You can successfully control the insulin by combining and balancing carbohydrates and protein every time you eat. This program can be called reduce-carbohydrates, reduce-protein and reduce-fat for short. No meal you consume should contain more than four ounces for men and three ounces for women of low-fat protein. The carbohydrates should be taken from products like potatoes, pasta, rise or bread, also fruits and vegetables. Low-fat products, eventually, ought to contain heart healthy monounsaturated fat. This insulin-control diet is based on the idea that all meal you take in should be balanced, therefore it is different form high-carbohydrates or high-protein diets that cause either elevate insulin lever or induce ketosis.

The other component of the zone diet was mention as well – high-dose fish oil. The only way to use huge amounts of this kind of oil without causing gastric diseases is to use pharmaceutical-grade fish oil.

Not as easy as it seems

After reading the chapter before you might have got the impression that this diet is easy to follow. However, in a real process will have to find a lot of determination, patience and self-control in you. First, you have to divide you everyday intake by the following percentage: 40 per cent of meal of carbohydrates, 30 percent of protein and 30 per cent of fat. Some of the faithful dieters call it 40:30:30 ratios.

So called ‘blocks’ have been built up at this point; also every block contains certain amount of carbohydrates, protein and fat.

The amount of blocks per day computed according to your weight. The bigger you are the more you can intake them per day. For example, it is allowed to eat 12 blocks a day (4 for breakfast, 1 for a snack, 3 for lunch and dinner, 1 for evening snack) if your weight is 10 stones, 5 feet and 2 inches, you have 28 inches of waist and 37 inches of hips. Another example would be for the woman whose weight is 12 stones, 5 feet and 10 inches, who has 30 inches of waits and 40 inches of hips. She should eat 14 blocks a day (4 for every main meal, but 1 for a snack during the day and 1 for an evening snack).

However, every woman or man is different so you should count the blocks and carbohydrates, protein and fat and add it to yourself according to your weight, height, habits, size of portions, food you like of dislike, etc.