Chocolate diet
Can you lose weight with it?
© Ala Shauratskaya / Shutterstock
Eating chocolate and losing weight – sounds almost too good to be true. With the chocolate diet, this should actually work!
What is the chocolate diet?
The chocolate diet was made known by the presenter Ruth Moschner, who wrote a corresponding book about the concept. In the chocolate diet, snacking on chocolate is expressly encouraged. On their chocolate diet, two pieces of dark chocolate are eaten 30 minutes before each meal. Two pieces of dark chocolate are also allowed as a snack between lunch and dinner. Otherwise, the chocolate diet relies on low-carbohydrate and protein-rich food and exercise.
Moschner himself is said to have lost around two dress sizes due to the diet with chocolate. But can the method really work when you usually have to do without chocolate and sweets in general when dieting?
How exactly does the chocolate diet work?
The chocolate diet actually starts 72 hours before it is scheduled to begin. Because from this point on you should completely avoid sugar on the chocolate diet. Otherwise, the chocolate diet works like this:
- Three meals are planned per day, each consisting of healthy foods. Whole grain products are on the menu in the morning, B. black coffee, fruit and vegetables with a low sugar content and low-fat quark. For example, whole grain bread with a herb spread and an apple would be allowed. At lunchtime, the chocolate diet relies on fiber. We get them, for example, with whole wheat pasta or Quinoaand vegetables taste like spinach. In the evening you eat a low carb diet – that is, protein products such as eggs or lean meat are on the menu instead of carbohydrates. Fat is now also allowed to be absorbed – ideally in the form of healthy oils such as olive oil or linseed oil. In general, the diet should be balanced.
- Two pieces of dark chocolate are eaten 30 minutes before a meal.
- Two pieces of chocolate are also eaten between lunch and dinner.
- Daily exercise should be at least 20 minutes.
- In between, fruit and vegetables are allowed as snacks.
- Two to three liters of water or herbal tea should be drunk daily.
in the book by Ruth Moschner can be found various recipes that should make it easier for you to stick to the diet with chocolate.
Finally fit and slim: why should chocolate help you lose weight?
But how did Moschner come up with the idea of wanting to lose weight with chocolate? The secret lies in the cocoa content of dark chocolate, so Dark chocolate. At best, it should have at least a 70 percent cocoa content. The bitter substances contained have an effect on our sense of taste. Real sweets taste very sweetened after a short time, which means that the cravings for them quickly subside. They also inhibit our appetite, which means we should eat less.
Above all, the chocolate diet is likely to have a psychological effect: After all, many dieters struggle with cravings for sweets such as chocolate. If you treat yourself to a few small pieces of dark chocolate every day, you can prevent this cravings – and stick to the chocolate diet better that way.
What am I not allowed to eat on the chocolate diet?
The temptation could be great, but you should not eat more than the permitted pieces of chocolate per day in sweets. Apart from that, we should also avoid the following foods on the chocolate diet:
- White flour products
- Fatty Meat
- oily fish
- full-fat dairy products such as cream or butter
Too Much Chocolate? Beware of this error!
When you hear the name chocolate diet, you might at first think that it is a classic mono diet in which you only consume one food – in this case chocolate. That would be a big mistake! Quite apart from the fact that you should of course not eat too much chocolate (and therefore too much fat and sugar), such an unbalanced diet can damage your health.
Because the body receives too few nutrients and usually too little energy. In order to fulfill its basic functions, it could begin to draw the required energy from the muscles. That means: You lose weight quickly through such a diet (e.g. only with chocolate), however, this only occurs primarily through the excretion of water and because the body breaks down muscle mass. As soon as you start eating normally again, the lost weight usually returns quickly. Accordingly, these mono diets are not recommended.
Conclusion of the chocolate diet
Losing weight is quite possible with the chocolate diet. The name is a little misleading – because the success of the diet depends more on the change in diet. The chocolate helps to dispel cravings and is therefore a good extra tip. Thanks to the healthy mixed diet and daily exercise, you could also lose weight without chocolate. The diet is therefore particularly suitable for those with a sweet tooth who cannot stick to a diet without sweets.
Reading tips: Can’t get enough of chocolate? You can get even more tips against cravings here. We also reveal our best weight loss tips and how you can change your diet – even without having to do without chocolate altogether.
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