A diet rich in vegetables is a healthy alternative

The Volumetrics Diet was created because of our desire to eat - a lot. For most, we equate diet with deprivation and tiny amounts of food spread out over the course of the day.  With the Volumetrics Diet, created by nutritionist Barbara Rolls, PhD, you can eat large quantities of the right foods, so that you don’t scarf your dinner before the rest of your dining guests have finished swallowing their first bite. The ins and outs of her diet are outlined in the book “ Volumetrics Eating Plan.” Rolls’ premise of her diet rests on the notion that we do love to eat and when we are deprived of certain foods for too long, we’ll eventually go back to our maladaptive ways. Her plan is built around the concept of satiety or feeling full: If we feel full by eating the rights kinds of foods, we won’t feel so deprived and lose weight. The Volumetrics Diet has two categories of food: The good and the not-so-good. No food is off limits, but each food comes with its own consequences. The dieter will judge each food by its energy or by how many calories per serving. Fats and dense carbohydrates pack a serious caloric punch per serving whereas eating the same number of calories in a broth-based soup that is full of low-carb vegetables might take some effort. By eating foods that have a lower caloric density, your plate will look a lot fuller, you’ll be able to eat a lot and best of all, you’ll consume fewer calories which should eventually equal to a looser pair of jeans.   The Volumetrics Diet relies on fruits and certain low-glycemic veggies as its backbone since these foods have a high water content, full of nutrients and fiber. Small portions of lean protein and fats are also included in the plan. Rolls doesn’t require that you count calories, but her book does include many recipes and sample meal plans that have about 1,600 calories per day. Exercise is also a primary component of the Volumetrics Plan. The author encourages you to engage in moderate exercise for 30 – 60 minutes of most days of the week to ensure that you are expending energy and increasing your metabolism. The Volumetrics Plan gets the thumbs up from some nutrition experts. It reliance on fruits, vegetables, and exercise is welcomed with open arms from dieticians and health experts. This kind of eating style contains wiggle room for the occasional indulgence as long as it’s measured against what you eat throughout the rest of the day. Critics of the Volumetrics Plan point out that eating water-based foods will only temporarily give you a sense of fullness. Others argue that many people eat out of emotions and not just because they are hungry. The Volumetrics Plan may therefore not be beneficial to someone who continues to eat even though they are no longer hungry.  The diet doesn’t try to pull any tricks over or make any promises that you’ll lose 10 pounds in five days.