I’m a huge fan of Mark Bittman’s cookbooks. I use HOW TO COOK EVERYTHING constantly. In VB6: Eat Vegan Before 6:00 Bittman shows how he lost 35 pounds by adopting a vegan life-style during the day and then eating anything he wanted after 6 P.M. Bittman provides 60 recipes for breakfast, lunch, and dinner to demonstrate how changing your diet to a more plant-based one pays off in better health and weight-loss. After reading VB6, I’ve decided to give Bittman’s strategy a try. If it works, you’ll see the results at the Albany BOUCHERCON! Check out Bittma’s video below.
Is pizza OK?
😉
Jeff, after 6 P.M. anything goes.
I agree with you on Bittman’s How to Cook Everything, which, along with The Joy of Cooking, is generally my go-to book for basic recipes and ingredient preparation, but he’s losing me with this “eat anything you want after 6:00 pm” business. Certainly, eating more plant-based food has been shown to lower weight, cholesterol, blood sugar, etc., but way destroy that by eating anything you want later in the day? I wish you success following Bittman’s plan, but I just don’t see how it can work–unless you go to bed at 6:05!
Deb, part of Bittman’s strategy is that by eating vegan before 6 P.M. your appetite is less. You’ll tend to eat less after 6.
way=why
/Stupid autocorrect!
I agree with Deb. We try and eat the main meal of the day at lunch, have a light dinner and are (generally) done eating for the day by 6:00.
Jeff, we usually eat dinner around 5 o’clock. After 6 o’clock our favorite snack is microwave popcorn.
It seems backward to me too. I’ve always heard that calories eaten early get burned up; those eaten late stay with you.
Patti, Bittman claims that’s a myth. A calorie is a calorie…unless it’s a fat calorie.
George–if eating was just a matter of feeling hunger, eating to satisfy that hunger, and then stopping as soon as one feels full/satisfied, I’d agree that Bittman’s theory might be valid. But we know that the desire to eat (and overeat) is made up of a complex system of physical and psychological factors. I would think that if you spent all day eating brown rice, lentils, and tofu (not that there’s anything wrong with that–I incorporate all three ingredients into my cooking) and feeling “deprived” in the process, I can only imagine it would be a meat-and-dairy fat-fest come 6:00 pm!
Deb, Mark Bittman spends a whole chapter on the biochemistry of hunger. The triggers for hunger can be modified by eating whole grains and fruits and vegetables. By the time 6 P.M. rolls around, most people will not be that hungry. Of course, people who binge on a bag of potato chips or eat a bowl of Peanut M&Ms defeat the whole approach. Moderate “cheating” is okay–in fact, expected–after 6 o’clock.
George- I read a piece on how bad microwave popcorn is for you-all the chemicals in the bag. You can just pop it in brown paperbag with the top folder over twice. No chemicals.