Zero Belly Diet: Lose Up to 16 lbs. in 14 Days!

I bought both Zero Belly Diet and Zero Belly Smoothies in the Kindle versions. What intrigued me was the author claims you can lose weight quickly and that this is actually good for you (unlike what was previously thought). Anyway, I am not a big fan of the scale but I recently had a physical at the doc's office and the number scared me. My weight plus high cholestrol, joint pain from inflammation, lack of focus and energy, skin problems all caused by emotional eating due to grieving over my husband's death 2.5 years ago. I realized I had to do something and I finally got serious. I figured I would try the ZB method and tweak it to my own convenience. By tweaking, I mean I am adding things like spirulina, gohji berries, moringa powder, organic collagen peptides to my smoothies in addition to ingredients suggested in the books; a splash of organic cranberry juice to my water, etc. Little things that keep in the spirit of the books but are not mentioned by them.ONE WEEK RESULTS: I decided to take my measurements instead of keeping track of weight loss. It's been one week exactly today and I have lost 1.5" off my waist, my hips, my thighs, and my knees and 3" off my bust (mostly back fat I think). Wow! If that is not motivating, I don't know what is!I went off coffee completely and replaced it with organic matcha green tea powder form to make tea or to add in smoothies. Yes, I had fatigue and mild headaches for about 24 hours. I had to go off coffee since I only like it with half and half and the ZB says no dairy. Anyway I felt like I was detoxing the first 3 or 4 days and fell asleep at 8PM two nights in a row (unusual for me). Then midweek I began to notice that my energy levels shifted way way up and I could stay up til midnight if I wanted to. My joints stopped hurting so much and I have been able to do a lot more physically without pain than I have in a few years. Day 6, I did several hours of yard work plus swam half a mile in a lake and still had energy to walk my dog for a mile! The past couple of years I have barely had the energy to walk my dog let alone all the rest. I'm psyched! This is exactly what I wanted to happen and I was skeptical that it would happen so quickly.The author lays out menu schedules in various forms of detail. You can either follow the recipes to the letter, or, you can figure out your own meal plan and go by the charts as to how many smoothie drinks you want to have. IE some mornings I have oatmeal, some mornings I have eggs, some mornings I have a ZB smoothie of my choice. I knew I wouldn't stick to the plan unless I had variety. These two books make it easy to go shop and plan in advance with a "Prep day". I have several different fresh fruits I bought and cut up and put in freezer ready to go into smoothies. I cook lentils and put them in an airtight container in the fridge. Same with oatmeal--- I make 4 servings of steel cut Irish oats and take out only what I need each day to mix with almond milk and fruit and nut butter or spices. I make the dressing in advance, too. I live alone so I put single portions of fish, chicken, turkey burgers in ziplocs and freeze them to take out when needed. In Zero Belly Smoothies, the author recommended Carlson's Fish Oil which comes in lemon flavor---- wow! It's expensive but so worth it! Adds a lemon zing to a green smoothie and has absolutely no fish taste at all.Anyway, I found the kindle cloud edition maybe not so easy to jump back and forth or copy recipes to print out. So I agree with the reviewer who said buying a hardcopy might be better as a handbook to guide you and keep in the kitchen.I will try to post back again in a month or so to give you more results. I'm hoping I can drop 50 lb total by end of year. For me that would be going from a size 16 to a size 8 or 10. Thanks David Zinczenko for giving me the tools I need to get this done!WEEK TWO:Weather here in Maine has been raining a lot this week so I was not able to swim or hike EVERY day (my primary exercise) but still here are my results:Waist-- 1.25" off (bringing my two week total to 2.75" off on ZB program!)Hips-- down 3/4" (total loss of 2.25" in two weeks)Bust-- down 1" (total loss of 4" back fat so far)Thighs-- down half inch (total loss of 2" )Knees-- down half inch (total loss of 2")I'm thinking these are still good results even without working out daily. I'm also thinking that I'm probably taking in too many calories as I when I make a smoothie there is always more left in the blender (and of course, I drink it). In addition I must confess I took advantage of the one cheat meal this week and had 3 glasses of wine (not on the same night!) overall for the week. However my "cheat" was to have a filet mignon and some red potatoes cooked in butter not olive oil, and a tiny scoop of key lime coconut ice cream. All else was ZB.End of Week 33/4" off my waist (for a total of 3.5" in 3 weeks...)1" off my bust1/4" off my hips0 off my arm3/4" off my thigh1/2" off my kneeThis appears to be a slow down or a reminder to up the exercise portion of my program. My review is getting too long. I'll check back in at the end of another month and let you know how I'm doing.UPDATE WEEK 10:I admit to some boredom creeping in. I had some serious cheating the past week but kept the smoothies and overall diet plan going and was surprised that my progress to lose inches continued. I suspect that it's true that if you are on a stricter diet your body goes into "starvation mode" and holds onto fat but on the ZBD plan you're never really deprived so even if you overindulge a couple of meals of non-plan-approved food your metabolism at this point is on high rev and will burn it off quicker. So in a way, cheating is good for you. I'm working in a 1-2.5 mile hike on forest trail at least 5 days per week. Haven't stepped up my exercise plan yet. I'm really pleased with the results so far.Here are my numbers (total inches lost so far):5" Waist6.5" Bust4" Hips1.75" Arm4.5" Thigh3" Knee

David Zinczenko is the former editor-in-chief of Men's Health and a regular contributor to ABC News. He is the author of the New York Times bestsellers, Cook This, Not That! and The New Abs Diet and has written The 8 Hour Diet as well as a number of cookbooks. In the Zero Belly Diet, Zinczenko sets forth an approach to weight loss and more importantly overall health, that is based on the cutting edge science of the epigenetics of metabolism and the microbiome.To put my review in context...I am an avid reader of nutrition books, have a background in molecular biology, and usually enjoy in-depth discussions of the science behind different approaches to health. I'm often perturbed by books that make a lot of claims and don't back them up with sufficient explanations of the underlying science. The unsatisfied curiosity and/or skepticism is like having an itch that you can't scratch. Fortunately, I've already read quite a bit about the theory and am now looking for additional information on the application of the theory. So for my purposes, this book was fantastic. Zinczenko provides a comprehensive "how to" guide that is simple and entertaining.And of course there are those of us who aren't science nerds and are super busy and simply looking for a solution to their weight and health issues. After all, not everyone wants to be knee-deep in mitochondria and cytokines. If this describes you, you're in luck.Diving into the content...Scientific studies in the past few years have emerged demonstrating that your waistline and chances of developing a chronic, degenerative disease (e.g., diabetes, cardiovascular disease) are largely determined by the expression of certain genes. Therefore, it matters not that you have the genes that make you susceptible to a certain disease, but that they are *expressed*. You could go a lifetime housing genes for all kinds of diseases that simply lie dormant and never, ever make themselves known. This expression is controlled by epigenetic factors, primarily diet and lifestyle. Pro-inflammatory diets are probably the biggest culprit when it comes to switching on bad genes, including fat genes. So this book goes about explaining what the latest research concludes about which foods to eat to calm inflammation, turn off fat genes, and lose weight while gaining metabolism-boosting muscle.This approach is revolutionary for the reader who believes, as many of us do, that weight loss or gain is determined by the calorie balance equation (calories in versus calories out). Spoiler alert: the whole calories-in-calories-out thing is outdated and bunk!The Table of Contents is as follows.Part One: Target the Fat that Matters Most1. Chapter One: Why Beating Belly Fat is Health Goal #12. Chapter Two: Turn Off Your Fat Genes!3. Chapter Three: Win the Battle Inside Your Belly4. Chapter Four: How Real is Your Risk?Part Two: The Zero Belly Diet5. Chapter Five: The Power of the Zero Belly Foods6. Chapter Six: The Zero Belly Meal Plan7. Chapter Seven: The Zero Belly Drinks8. Chapter Eight: The Zero Belly Recipes9. Chapter Nine: The Zero Belly Workouts10. Chapter Ten: Zero Belly in Seven Minutes a Day11. Chapter Eleven: The Zero Belly Seven-Day CleanseWith this book, you will find LOTS of practical strategies for how to implement the necessary changes into your life. And, as with many nutrition and diet books, this one begins by proposing an idea and explaining it and ends with action plans, such as daily menus. With some diet books, the recipe section looks more like an afterthought than a carefully crafted menu that will aid you in achieving success. The Zero Belly menus look more like the latter: great flavor combinations, practical ingredients with specific product recommendations at times, and clear instructions. The workout plan section is EXTENSIVE. He provides workouts that can be done in the gym with equipment or at home with a kettle bell, medicine ball, or simply body weight. He even provides a workout that can be done while you're at the park with your kids.Overall, I'm giving Zero Belly Diet four stars for its meaningful content based on cutting-edge science, easy reading, and comprehensiveness in terms of all the tools and strategies Zinczenko provides. You won't learn the exact mechanisms at play physiologically. But you will be armed with the tools needed to significantly improve your health.(Note that I bought the kindle edition. As is the case with kindles, some charts were illegible. So if you do decide to follow the plan and want to use the book as your workbook, you'll probably need to invest in a physical copy.)

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THE WHOLE BOOK IS BASED AROUND THE OLD BASIC DIET TIPS: EAT LEAN PTOTEIN, LOW CARB, HIGH FIBER AND FOOD RICH IN OMEGA 3 FATTY ACIDS. I DID NOT LEARN ANYTHING NEW REGARDING WHAT TO EAT BUT THE BOOK HAS SOME EXCELLENT DELICIOUS HEALTHY RECEIPES WHICH WILL HELP ME LOOSE WEIGHT HENCE THE 4 STARS.

This book brought back to the forerunner of my brain what I should be eating to feel my very best. It reenergized me to look after my health so that I can be at my best all of the time.

Excellent. I have tried all sorts of diets, with more or less success, but this one not only worked, it made me feel a lot better, with much more energy and it allowed me to discover a new way of approaching my dietary habits that have continued till now, almost a year after I read the book. Oh, and I'm vegan, which kind of made the protein issue slightly trickier :-).

Yes Still reading. Got busy but going chapter to chapter. Starting plan this Sun. It will work, great recipes. May buy that book nest