Cabbage Soup Diet
This diet has many names. The friend who introduced me to it knew it by the "Cancer Patient" diet, others have called it the "Fat Burning Soup" diet, or the "Cabbage Soup" or the "Vegtable Soup" diet. Me, I think I'd like to call it the "As Much As You Want" diet...
This is my third-favourite diet; it was the first diet I ever managed to lose weight on... but I didn't manage to keep it off. I still keep this page here, because this can be a helpful short-term diet to sort of kick-start weight-loss.
But, back to the soup diet.
The Soup
The heart of the diet is the vegetable soup. It's a very nice vegetable soup. Though part of the reason why I wouldn't suggest this as a long term diet is that one gets awfully tired of the soup if one tries to stay on this diet for weeks on end. One also gets tired of making the soup. But it's a good soup.
What I tend to do is eat the soup straight when I first cook it, let it cool and then puree the whole thing with a food processor or a stick-blender. Then I put it in little containers and freeze it.
Make up a batch of soup on the weekend, and use it for the rest of the week.
The Plan
The way this diet goes is that it is planned out in seven days. Each day has a particular set of foods that you can eat for that day. You also eat the soup every day, as much of it as you want. And for breakfast you can have low-fat, high-fibre cereal and skim milk.
| Day One | All fruits except bananas, as much as you want. (and the soup, as much as you want) | |
|---|---|---|
| Day Two | All vegetables, particularly leafy green ones rather than starchy ones. You can eat one baked potato (without butter). (and the soup, as much as you want) | |
| Day Three | Fruit and Vegetables. No potato today, but otherwise as much fruit and vegetables as you want. (and the soup, as much as you want) | |
| Day Four | Bananas and Skim Milk. Up to eight bananas, and as much skim milk as you want. This is to give you protein and carbohydrates and calcium and potassium to lessen your cravings for sweets and fatty foods. (and the soup, as much as you want) | |
| Day Five | Meat and tomatoes. Not too much meat, and try to make it red meat for the iron. Drink plenty of water to wash out the acid from the tomatoes. (and the soup, as much as you want) | |
| Day Six | (my favourite day) Meat and vegetables -- as much as you want. Again, don't forget red meat for the iron. (and the soup, as much as you want) | |
| Day Seven | Vegetables and Brown Rice -- as much as you want. (and the soup, as much as you want) |
Things to avoid:
- don't drink alcohol (that puts on weight anyway!) Fizzy drinks are not good either. Drink unsweetened tea, black coffee, unsweetened juice and lots of water. No fried foods.
If in doubt, eat soup. Since it is full of fibre, it will fill you up. You may find that your bowel movements change on this diet (especially if you weren't eating a lot of fibre before!) Some people find the change too dramatic and hate this diet. I didn't have any problems.
Helpful Nibbling
My personal downfall in the diet stakes is snack food. Those packets of potato chips send out their siren song and I succumb. So to help resist temptation, I grab other snacky foods to have instead. I don't have much time to prepare my food, being a working girl, so this stuff is easy. I also am not averse to indulging myself in really nice fruit and vegetables -- after all, how much do they compare with the price of a packet of chips or a block of chocolate? Not to mention how much better they are for you.
Vegetables:
- raw snow peas (aka Mange Tout)
- Lebanese cucumber. Take a bite, sprinkle a little salt or pepper, take another bite
- cherry tomatoes
- pre-cut carrots (if you can find them at your supermarket)
- freeze-dried peas (yes, that's what I said. Think of it as a kind of nut)
Fruit:
- apples
- a punnet of strawberries, eaten straight
- mandarines