Help!!! Phase one questions

[ireyesmiami]

Hey everyone,

I am new to this south beach diet, i belonged to the Atkins and did lose 8 pounds but did not think it was very healthy.

Now i have question, out of the acceptable veggie list. Can i have all the veggies i want or just the amount of cups list on the daily menues of the book.

Also how many artificial sweetners are you allowed to have daily. This is very different from atkins they are very specific although more difficult they tell you exactly how much is allowed and in the south beach it's not very clear to me. Also how much cheese is allowed daily? It also says you can have yogurt and milk, i would be beleive it has to be one or the other but t doesn't say what the daily allowance is. It states you can have whole eggs but in the menues it lists substitute eggs why? Lastly, what are the different snacks that you may have if you don't want peanuts or celery. All the help that you all offer is appreciated, i want to start phase one but want to do it correctly and the book is not so clear, or i am just plain stupid.lol don't comment on that.
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Thanks! I am looking foward to start this journey with all of you.

[RedRox]

Well you are correct, the book is not that clear! And SB is more of a general set of guidelines that gives you a starting point and you adapt as you learn about what foods work well for you and which ones don't and which guidelines you need to be more strict with and which ones you can flex a bit more. It's more of a long term process to help you find the dietary mix that is best for your body and your situation, rather than a strict, you must eat this and this and only so much of this kind of thing. (although there is some of that in SB too!)

To me the best way to understand it is to look at both the food lists and the meal model templates for each phase. Luckily there are sticky topics in the respective P1 and P2 forums here with exactly that information available to you!! I think those help a lot in terms of answering a lot of your questions.

But here's my take on them as well, although I encourage you to do your own research and temper my thoughts with others responses and your own experiences as you go through the process.

veggies: To me veggies are the only truly completely unlimited food group on the food lists. The meal model only gives "minimums", not maximums. You can certainly eat more than the minimums. Veggies are low in caloric density and high in nutritional value, so the more you fill up on veggies the less you need other components and your overall caloric intake will stay pretty low.
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artificial sweeteners: no real set limit. you can have up to 75-100 calories from sweet treats as a whole. See the food list for what that applies to. Some people are more sensitive to polyols/sugar alcohols (they all end in -ol on an ingredient list like malitol, sorbitol, mannitol, etc.) in terms of causing gas, bloating and other not nice forms of "gastric distress". So those are common in a lot of SF "treats" so just watch for any unpleasant symptoms from those if you choose to use them. And as an aside, there is no requirement to use artificial sweeteners or sweet treats at all. You can do just fine without them too!

Cheese: cheese (under 6 gms of fat per 1 oz serving) is counted as a protein for SB purposes, not dairy. As such it is technically unlimited, but most find that there is a practical limit relative to weight loss and constipation in P1! I've never seen any specific limits. 3-4 servings a day seems like a good starting point to me, but that's just my own spin. You won't find any official SB literature that says that.

Dairy: You are allowed 2 cups in P1 from any combination of the allowed types listed in the food lists. It could be 2 cups of milk or 2 cups of plain yogurt or 1 cup of each or any combo thereof.

Eggs: Just my own theory, but I think it has to do with Dr. Agatston being a cardiologist. While the linkages between dietary and serum cholesterol are relatively weak, the only long term observational studies between and eggs and serum cholesterol found that eating 1 egg a day had virtually no effect on serum cholesterol unless there was diabetes involved and then it was slightly higher. It did not test for higher levels. If your cholesterol is in good shape and you have never been told by your doctor to limit egg consumption, then you should be fine eating whole eggs. BTW, the menus also use only decaf coffee but caffeinated beverages are allowed too, so just another of those discrepancies! And his menus don't make enough use of beans/legumes on a daily basis for adequate carb and fiber intake either in my opinion. Which is why I think the food lists and the meal models are a better way to go than the menus in the book.
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Snacks: Can be anything on the food lists relative to any mentioned limits. Snacks are intended to be nutritional in nature though, not just the sweet treats. Some LF cottage cheese with tomatoes might be a possibility, or a cup of homemade chili or really just about anything on the lists. The meal model gives more specifics about what components are recommended. (protein and veggies I think.)

Good questions! Keep asking and learning!! And for what it's worth, doing it consistently and for a long time is often a better goal than doing it "Right" but only for a short time. It's a pretty flexible eating program and you learn from going through the process itself. I agree it's better to do it correctly esp. in phase 1, but it is not a perfection based program! Best wishes on your journey!

[heatherann]

Great reply Red!

[Jilly_Bean]

I wouldn't change a thing in Red's response...

[ireyesmiami]

THANK YOU VERY MUCH!

ALSO WHERE DID YOU GET THAT CHILI IDEA FROM, AM I IN THE WRONG WEBSITE? I GUESS I STILL HAVE LOTS TO LEARN.WHERE DO YOU GET THESE RECIPEIS FROM?

i ALSO HAD ONE MORE QUESTION ABOUT THE SB TV DINNERS, WHEN ARE YOU ALLOWED TO HAVE THEM?????

[RedRox]

I'll tell you if you stop typing in ALL CAPITALS!! (typing in all caps is the net equivalent of shouting very loudly at someone!)

Well the recipe I use for chili is one I found online and muddled around with to suit my personal preferences, but any chili recipe that uses beans, lean meats, tomatoes, stock, peppers, onions, any other veggies you like, and appropriate spices will work. I just happen to think it is a great P1 food because it has a lot of carb rich foods, is filling, tasty and you can make a ton of it at once and it freezes well for a second meal or you can freeze into individual servings and micro quickly for a snack or lunch when its one of those days when everything else falls apart around you! Paired with a side salad to make sure you get your 2 cups of veggies in for a complete meal, it's a pretty ideal P1 meal really. I guess I would flip your question around and ask why after reviewing the food lists would you not think chili is appropriate and why are you so surprised that it is?

And I would skip the SBL frozen meals altogether and frankly skip all of the SBL products as you can typically find better tasting and better products nutritionally in almost all categories for less money than their products. I've never used a SB branded product in the 5 years I've been eating this way. You are better off cooking up multiple meals on the weekends and freezing them yourself. The program wasn't really built around convenience foods, regardless of whose label is on them.