Product Description
The official US edition of the international bestseller—containing US measurements and a month's worth of meals in color.Is it possible to eat normally, five days a week, and become slimmer and healthier as a result?
Simple answer: yes. You just limit your calorie intake for two nonconsecutive days each week—500 calories for women, 600 for men. You’ll lose weight quickly and effortlessly with the FastDiet.
Scientific trials of intermittent fasters have shown that it will not only help the pounds fly off, but also reduce your risk of a range of diseases from diabetes to cardiovascular disease and even cancer. “The scientific evidence is strong that intermittent fasting can improve health,” says Dr. Mark Mattson, Chief of the Laboratory of Neurosciences, National Institute on Aging, and Professor of Neuroscience, Johns Hopkins University.
This book brings together the results of new, groundbreaking research to create a dietary program that can be incorporated into your busy daily life, featuring:
• Forty 500- and 600-calorie meals that are quick and easy to make
• 8 pages of photos that show you what a typical “fasting meal” looks like
• The cutting-edge science behind the program
• A calorie counter that makes dieting easy
• And much more.
Far from being just another fad, the FastDiet is a radical new way of thinking about food, a lifestyle choice that could transform your health. This is your indispensable guide to simple and effective weight loss, without fuss or the need to endlessly deprive yourself.
Editorial Reviews
Review
About the Author
Dr. Michael Mosley is a British journalist, producer, and TV presenter.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
So is there a different evidence-based approach? One that relies on science, not opinion? Well, we think there is: intermittent fasting.
There is nothing else you can do to your body that is as powerful as fasting.
When we first read about the alleged benefits of intermittent fasting, we, like many, were skeptical. Fasting seemed drastic, difficult—and we both knew that dieting of any description is generally doomed to fail. But now that we’ve looked at it in depth and tried it ourselves, we are convinced of its remarkable potential. As one of the medical experts interviewed for this book puts it: “There is nothing else you can do to your body that is as powerful as fasting.”
Fasting, of course, remains an article of faith for many. The fasts of Lent, Yom Kippur, and Ramadan are just some of the better-known examples. Greek Orthodox Christians are encouraged to fast for 180 days of the year (according to Saint Nikolai of Zicha, “Gluttony makes a man gloomy and fearful, but fasting makes him joyful and courageous”), while Buddhist monks fast on the new moon and full moon of each lunar month.
Many more of us, however, seem to be eating most of the time. We’re rarely ever hungry. But we are dissatisfied. With our weight, our bodies, our health.
Intermittent fasting can put us back in touch with our human selves. It is a route not only to weight loss, but also to long-term health and well-being. Scientists are only just beginning to discover and prove how powerful a tool it can be.
This book is a product of those scientists’ cutting-edge investigations and their impact on our current thinking about weight loss, disease resistance, and longevity. But it is also the result of our personal experiences.
Both are relevant here—the lab and the lifestyle—so we investigate intermittent fasting from two complementary perspectives. First, Michael, who used his body and medical training to test its potential, explains the scientific foundations of intermittent fasting (IF) and the 5:2 diet—something he brought to the world’s attention during the summer of 2012.
Then Mimi offers a practical guide on how to do it safely, effectively, and in a sustainable way, a way that will fit easily into your normal everyday life. She looks in detail at how fasting feels, what you can expect from day to day, what to eat, and when to eat, and provides a host of tips and strategies to help you gain the greatest benefit from the diet’s simple precepts.
As you’ll see below, the FastDiet has changed both of our lives. We hope it will do the same for you.
While making a documentary for the BBC, I was fortunate enough to have an MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) scan done. This revealed that I am a TOFI—thin on the outside, fat inside. This visceral fat is the most dangerous sort of fat, because it wraps itself around your internal organs and puts you at risk for heart disease and diabetes. I later had blood tests that showed I was heading toward diabetes, and had a cholesterol score that was also way too high. Obviously, I was going to have to do something about this. I tried following standard advice, except it made little difference. My weight and blood profile remained stuck in the “danger ahead” zone.
I had never tried dieting before because I’d never found a diet that I thought would work. I’d watched my father try every form of diet, from Scarsdale through Atkins, from the Cambridge Diet to the Drinking Man’s Diet. He’d lost weight on each one of them, and then within a few months put it all back on, and more.
Then, at the beginning of 2012, I was approached by Aidan Laverty, editor of the BBC science series Horizon, who asked if I would like to put myself forward as a guinea pig to explore the science behind life extension. I wasn’t sure what we would find, but along with producer Kate Dart and researcher Roshan Samarasinghe, we quickly focused on calorie restriction and fasting as a fruitful area to explore.
Calorie restriction (CR) is pretty brutal; it involves eating an awful lot less than a normal person would expect to eat, and doing so every day of your (hopefully) long life. The reason people put themselves through this is because it is the only intervention that has been shown to extend lifespan, at least in animals. There are at least 10,000 CRONies (Calorie Restriction with Optimum Nutrition) worldwide, and I have met quite a number of them. Despite their generally fabulous biochemical profile, I have never been seriously tempted to join their skinny ranks. I simply don’t have the willpower or desire to live permanently on an extreme low-calorie diet.
So I was delighted to discover intermittent fasting (IF), which involves eating fewer calories, but only some of the time. If the science was right, it offered the benefits of CR but without the pain.
I set off around the United States, meeting leading scientists who generously shared their research and ideas with me. It became clear that IF was no fad. But it wouldn’t be as easy as I’d originally hoped. As you’ll see later in the book, there are many different forms of intermittent fasting. Some involve eating nothing for twenty-four hours or longer. Others involve eating a single, low-calorie meal once a day, every other day. I tried both but couldn’t imagine doing either on a regular basis. I found it was simply too hard.
Instead I decided to create and test my own modified version. Five days a week, I would eat normally; on the remaining two I would eat a quarter of my usual calorie intake (that is, 600 calories).
I split the 600 calories in two—around 250 calories for breakfast and 350 calories for supper—effectively fasting for around twelve hours at a stretch. I also decided to split my fasting days: I would fast on Mondays and Thursdays. I became my own experiment.
The program, Eat, Fast, Live Longer, which detailed my adventures with what we were now calling the 5:2 diet, appeared on the BBC during the London Olympics in August 2012. I expected it to be lost in the media frenzy that surrounded the Games, but instead it generated a frenzy of its own. The program was watched by more than 2.5 million people—a huge audience for Horizon—and hundreds of thousands more on YouTube. My Twitter account went into overdrive, my followers tripled; everyone wanted to try my version of intermittent fasting, and they were all asking me what they should do.
The newspapers took up the story. Articles appeared in The Times (London), the Daily Telegraph, the Daily Mail, and the Mail on Sunday. Before long, it was picked up by newspapers all over the world—in New York, Los Angeles, Paris, Madrid, Montreal, Islamabad, and New Delhi. Online groups were created, menus and experiences swapped, chat rooms started buzzing about fasting. People began to stop me on the street and tell me how well they were doing on the 5:2 diet. They also e-mailed details of their experiences. Among those e-mails, a surprisingly large number were from doctors. Like me, they had initially been skeptical, but they had tried it for themselves, found that it worked, and had begun suggesting it to their patients. They wanted information, menus, details of the scientific research to scrutinize. They wanted me to write a book. I hedged, procrastinated, then finally found a collaborator, Mimi Spencer, whom I liked and trusted and who has an in-depth knowledge of food. Which is how what you are reading came about.
As a presenter I have made a dozen series for ...
About the Author
Dr. Michael Mosley is a British journalist, producer, and TV presenter.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Introduction
OVER THE LAST FEW DECADES, FOOD FADS HAVE come and gone, but the standard medical advice on what constitutes a healthy lifestyle has stayed much the same: eat low-fat foods, exercise more . . . and never, ever skip meals. Over that same period, levels of obesity worldwide have soared.So is there a different evidence-based approach? One that relies on science, not opinion? Well, we think there is: intermittent fasting.
There is nothing else you can do to your body that is as powerful as fasting.
When we first read about the alleged benefits of intermittent fasting, we, like many, were skeptical. Fasting seemed drastic, difficult—and we both knew that dieting of any description is generally doomed to fail. But now that we’ve looked at it in depth and tried it ourselves, we are convinced of its remarkable potential. As one of the medical experts interviewed for this book puts it: “There is nothing else you can do to your body that is as powerful as fasting.”
Fasting: An Ancient Idea, a Modern Method
Fasting is nothing new. As we’ll discover in the next chapter, your body is designed to fast. We evolved at a time when food was scarce; we are the product of millennia of feast or famine. The reason we respond so well to intermittent fasting may be because it mimics, far more accurately than three meals a day, the environment in which modern humans were shaped.Fasting, of course, remains an article of faith for many. The fasts of Lent, Yom Kippur, and Ramadan are just some of the better-known examples. Greek Orthodox Christians are encouraged to fast for 180 days of the year (according to Saint Nikolai of Zicha, “Gluttony makes a man gloomy and fearful, but fasting makes him joyful and courageous”), while Buddhist monks fast on the new moon and full moon of each lunar month.
Many more of us, however, seem to be eating most of the time. We’re rarely ever hungry. But we are dissatisfied. With our weight, our bodies, our health.
Intermittent fasting can put us back in touch with our human selves. It is a route not only to weight loss, but also to long-term health and well-being. Scientists are only just beginning to discover and prove how powerful a tool it can be.
This book is a product of those scientists’ cutting-edge investigations and their impact on our current thinking about weight loss, disease resistance, and longevity. But it is also the result of our personal experiences.
Both are relevant here—the lab and the lifestyle—so we investigate intermittent fasting from two complementary perspectives. First, Michael, who used his body and medical training to test its potential, explains the scientific foundations of intermittent fasting (IF) and the 5:2 diet—something he brought to the world’s attention during the summer of 2012.
Then Mimi offers a practical guide on how to do it safely, effectively, and in a sustainable way, a way that will fit easily into your normal everyday life. She looks in detail at how fasting feels, what you can expect from day to day, what to eat, and when to eat, and provides a host of tips and strategies to help you gain the greatest benefit from the diet’s simple precepts.
As you’ll see below, the FastDiet has changed both of our lives. We hope it will do the same for you.
Michael’s Motivation: A Male Perspective
I am a 55-year-old male, and before I embarked on my exploration of intermittent fasting, I was mildly overweight: at five feet, eleven inches, I weighed around 187 pounds and had a body mass index of 26, which put me into the overweight category. Until my midthirties, I had been slim, but like many people I then gradually put on weight, around one pound a year. This doesn’t sound like much, but over a couple of decades it pushed me up and up. Slowly I realized that I was starting to resemble my father, a man who struggled with weight all his life and died in his early seventies of complications associated with diabetes. At his funeral many of his friends commented on how like him I had become.While making a documentary for the BBC, I was fortunate enough to have an MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) scan done. This revealed that I am a TOFI—thin on the outside, fat inside. This visceral fat is the most dangerous sort of fat, because it wraps itself around your internal organs and puts you at risk for heart disease and diabetes. I later had blood tests that showed I was heading toward diabetes, and had a cholesterol score that was also way too high. Obviously, I was going to have to do something about this. I tried following standard advice, except it made little difference. My weight and blood profile remained stuck in the “danger ahead” zone.
I had never tried dieting before because I’d never found a diet that I thought would work. I’d watched my father try every form of diet, from Scarsdale through Atkins, from the Cambridge Diet to the Drinking Man’s Diet. He’d lost weight on each one of them, and then within a few months put it all back on, and more.
Then, at the beginning of 2012, I was approached by Aidan Laverty, editor of the BBC science series Horizon, who asked if I would like to put myself forward as a guinea pig to explore the science behind life extension. I wasn’t sure what we would find, but along with producer Kate Dart and researcher Roshan Samarasinghe, we quickly focused on calorie restriction and fasting as a fruitful area to explore.
Calorie restriction (CR) is pretty brutal; it involves eating an awful lot less than a normal person would expect to eat, and doing so every day of your (hopefully) long life. The reason people put themselves through this is because it is the only intervention that has been shown to extend lifespan, at least in animals. There are at least 10,000 CRONies (Calorie Restriction with Optimum Nutrition) worldwide, and I have met quite a number of them. Despite their generally fabulous biochemical profile, I have never been seriously tempted to join their skinny ranks. I simply don’t have the willpower or desire to live permanently on an extreme low-calorie diet.
So I was delighted to discover intermittent fasting (IF), which involves eating fewer calories, but only some of the time. If the science was right, it offered the benefits of CR but without the pain.
I set off around the United States, meeting leading scientists who generously shared their research and ideas with me. It became clear that IF was no fad. But it wouldn’t be as easy as I’d originally hoped. As you’ll see later in the book, there are many different forms of intermittent fasting. Some involve eating nothing for twenty-four hours or longer. Others involve eating a single, low-calorie meal once a day, every other day. I tried both but couldn’t imagine doing either on a regular basis. I found it was simply too hard.
Instead I decided to create and test my own modified version. Five days a week, I would eat normally; on the remaining two I would eat a quarter of my usual calorie intake (that is, 600 calories).
I split the 600 calories in two—around 250 calories for breakfast and 350 calories for supper—effectively fasting for around twelve hours at a stretch. I also decided to split my fasting days: I would fast on Mondays and Thursdays. I became my own experiment.
The program, Eat, Fast, Live Longer, which detailed my adventures with what we were now calling the 5:2 diet, appeared on the BBC during the London Olympics in August 2012. I expected it to be lost in the media frenzy that surrounded the Games, but instead it generated a frenzy of its own. The program was watched by more than 2.5 million people—a huge audience for Horizon—and hundreds of thousands more on YouTube. My Twitter account went into overdrive, my followers tripled; everyone wanted to try my version of intermittent fasting, and they were all asking me what they should do.
The newspapers took up the story. Articles appeared in The Times (London), the Daily Telegraph, the Daily Mail, and the Mail on Sunday. Before long, it was picked up by newspapers all over the world—in New York, Los Angeles, Paris, Madrid, Montreal, Islamabad, and New Delhi. Online groups were created, menus and experiences swapped, chat rooms started buzzing about fasting. People began to stop me on the street and tell me how well they were doing on the 5:2 diet. They also e-mailed details of their experiences. Among those e-mails, a surprisingly large number were from doctors. Like me, they had initially been skeptical, but they had tried it for themselves, found that it worked, and had begun suggesting it to their patients. They wanted information, menus, details of the scientific research to scrutinize. They wanted me to write a book. I hedged, procrastinated, then finally found a collaborator, Mimi Spencer, whom I liked and trusted and who has an in-depth knowledge of food. Which is how what you are reading came about.
Michael’s Background
I trained as a doctor at the Royal Free Hospital in London, and after passing my medical exams, I joined the BBC as a trainee assistant producer. Over the last twenty-five years, I have made numerous science and history documentaries for the BBC, first behind the camera, more recently in front. I was executive producer of QED; Trust Me, I’m a Doctor; and Superhuman. I worked with John Cleese, Jeremy Clarkson, Professor Robert Winston, Sir David Attenborough, and Professor Alice Roberts. I devised and executive-produced many programs for the BBC and the Discovery Channel, including:Pompeii: The Last Day, Supervolcano, and Krakatoa: Volcano of Destruction.As a presenter I have made a dozen series for ...
Customer Reviews
Most helpful customer reviews404 of 412 people found the following review helpful.
Revolutionary Weight Loss Method!By Lee Mellott
There are many ways to lose weight from counting point to micro-managing carbs. But almost all of them involve eating less calories on a daily basis. The result - you lose weight but let's face it the prospect of eating less every day gets old. And in many cases weight that is shed is quickly put back on.
Enter Dr. Michael Mosley with "The Fast Diet". Dr. Mosley a science researcher, investigated how fasting can result in enormous benefits such as increased longevity, lower blood pressure, improved cholesterol and much more. He presented his findings in the British television BBC special documentary "Horizon: Eat, Fast and Live Longer".
Instead of a pure fast Dr. Mosley found that you could enjoy many benefits from eating a reduced calorie diet just 2 days a week and eating normally the other 5. For women about 500 calories and for men about 600 on the 2 lower calorie days. Based on the documentary thousands of British people tried eating this way and found it to be fast, effective and much easier than a traditional diet.
In the book, "The Fast Diet", Dr. Mosley presents the science behind how and why the diet works. His co-author Mini Spencer shares menu plans and tips to make the plan user friendly. The book also includes color photographs so you get a feel for what a low calorie day looks like. And there are inspirational accounts from people who are using the diet, losing weight and enjoying greater health and renewed vitality.
A typical 500 calorie day on the plan might include a small apple, small mango and small boiled egg (223 calories) for breakfast and a tuna, bean and garlic salad for dinner (267 calories). Or you could spread your calories between lunch and dinner or eat them at one main meal. The plan is very flexible. The days you are not on the plan you eat normally, including high fat foods, without counting calories. You might think that on the feed days people would go crazy but research has shown that people eat only a little more than what they would normally eat. Knowing that you can have pretty much what you like most days of the week makes sticking to the plan so much easier than traditional diets.
Based on the documentary (before the book was released in the U.S.) I decided to try the plan making up simple 500 calorie meals and I was amazed at how much easier it is than traditional dieting. Variations of the plan are easy to do also such as every other day, 4:3 etc. And if you miss a day you simply get back on track the next. On fast days, I like to go as far into the day as possible without eating so I have a cup of espresso in the morning, an egg on sandwich thin with berries around noon, small snack mid-afternoon and a protein with veggies for dinner. It has been surprisingly easy to do. I dropped 5 pounds fast!
The benefits of following 5:2 are huge from what we can see visually i.e. weight loss to what we can't i.e. our bodies inner workings. And best of all many find that it is so much easier to diet just a couple days a week than every day. You really do get used to it. Once you have achieved your desired body weight you can adjust the plan to one day a week if desired or eat a few more calories on the diet days.
Side note - I purchased the Kindle version of the book and the formatting is excellent. The menu plan is hyper-linked to the recipes and the color photos are clear.
Overall if you are struggling with traditional diets and want to improve your health, this book, "The Fast Diet" gets my highest recommendation!
290 of 321 people found the following review helpful.
Try the diet, skip the bookBy D. Farina
The 5:2 diet plan is pretty simple, two days a week you keep your calories to a minuscule 500/600 per day and the rest of the week eat normally. The author claims that a) you will lose weight and b) it will dramatically improve your long term health.
Let me address the first part. I have been trying the diet for a couple of weeks and it has been working for me. I am one of those people that has that stubborn last 10-15 pounds to lose and I have made more progress, down about 8 lbs since trying the diet. I find the diet really easy to follow, basically 2 days a week I watch what I eat and keep to the 600 calories. On those days, I drink more coffee and tea then usual to keep myself from eating, but once resigned to a fast day, basically you just have to make it through the day. I pick Mondays because they stink anyhow and one other day. Oddly, once you get used to it, the fasting is really no big deal. I get hungry a couple times a day and it is amazing a cup of green tea and the hunger goes away. While 600 calories is not a lot, it is enough to function, work and workout without any difficulties.
I do truly believe that this plan will work for me long term as I consider it more of a strategy then a diet. (The strategy concept was in the book.) Basically, I need to cut my calories down and was not very good at knocking off 500 calories a day for a week by eating slightly less. So this I think will work for me. (I will circle back in a month with a weight update.)
Moving to the book. I have two issues with the book. The plan is so blazingly simple (which may be part of its appeal) that you really don't need a book. Cut your calories to 500/600 per week twice a week and that is what you do. Once you get your goal weight go to one day a week. If you start gaining weight back go back to 2 days. That is pretty much it, not sure why it takes more than a page or two to explain. Heck I just explained it in 2 sentences. Dieting is not rocket science, people need to eat less and burn more to lose weight. This is one simple strategy for eating less.
My second complaint about the book is that it has all sorts of medical claims. The reality is that the diet is too new and the claims are not supported by hard scientific evidence in my view. The book is full of anecdotal evidence from people who have been on the diet and also from some studies about fasting. Not what I call hard science. I have a lot of trouble believing all the fantastic medical claims that the book put forward. I am not saying that they are not true, but what I am saying is it is too early and there is too little data.
In conclusion, I just don't see any point to the book. There are plenty of articles out there on the diet, and getting started is really simple, the book in my view didn't add enough value for me to justify the price and time I spent reading it.
177 of 199 people found the following review helpful.
This is it!By DAVID J HARROP
I've never written a review before, but after trying the Fast Diet for almost 2 months, I felt compelled to share my experience. I've tried them all, from Atkins to Zone & everything in-between, but I feel like I've finally found an eating plan I'll be following for life.
I didn't have a huge amount of weight to lose. But I felt uncomfortable in my favourite jeans & I didn't need scales to know I was starting to pile it on - again. So I started following Dr Mosley's Fast Diet after watching the BBC documentary 'Eat, Fast & Live Longer'. The Fast Days felt weird at first. I imagined I'd probably collapse in a heap half-way through the day, or start nibbling on my arm; but it's really not so bad. Hunger isn't a death sentence; it's just for today. You don't wake up ravenously hungry, but everything tastes incredible.
Fast Days feel quite normal now. I usually don't eat anything before 3pm, I just drink water & tea/coffee. Then I may have oatmeal & raisins, or fruit. A late dinner may be chicken & vegetables. I even regularly save 100 calories for a drink or two. As I said, I didn't have a lot of weight to lose, but despite going on a long vacation & really enjoying my 'feast days', I'm at least 3kg's lighter, my 501's I've had since the '90's fit like a glove, & it all feels fairly effortless.
The book is well worth buying, even if you've seen the documentary. It answers any questions you may have, & Mimi Spencer's input & advice & Meal Plans are useful. I'm not sure why some other reviewers experienced problems with the Kindle edition; I've got the original cheap model, & the format is excellent.
If even half of Dr Mosley's claims are true, such as lower blood pressure, lower risk of cardiovascular disease, diabetes & some cancers etc, then the Fast Diet is what we've all been waiting for, & weight loss is just the icing on the cake.