Welp, so I’ve thought it up. A new diet that promises weight-loss for those who are on the heavier side struggling to lose weight. A diet that I think will really work wonders for most of America. And the premise of the diet does not rely on ingredients or organic produce or additives in the form of powders and things. In fact, the diet does not even tell you what you should and should not eat. Revolutionary, I know. The diet only has one requirement, and it is this: No food that you purchase may come in plastic packaging.
That’s it.
The true secret to how Mike and I stay skinnier than a pair of ski poles.
I get what you’re probably thinking. Another promised cure-all solution, with a side of a rolling of the eyes. No. Not a cure-all. It’s not going to make skinny people more skinny. It’s not going to cure diabetes. It’s not going to make scrawny men buff, or short children grow tall. But, it is going to be a healthy lifestyle shift that may help those who are considered overweight and are having difficulty losing a few pounds.
How does the zero plastic diet work?
Committing to eating only foods sans plastic requires you to eliminate a lot of the unhealthy substances that many Americans consume.
For example,
- Frozen foods and all their preservatives
- Chips, snacks, cookies, candies, candy bars and other junk foods that are store bought and laden with even more hidden unhealthy ingredients, most of which are non-naturally occurring
- Jams, Condiments, pre-concocted sauces filled with sugars and preservatives
- Fruit juices and sodas, full of added sugars
- Meats that have been pre-frozen and thawed
- Cereals, pre-made pastas, and white bread, none of which are actually healthy
- Low fat yogurts, ice creams, et cetera
- Most fast food restaurants or quick dine-in options
- Processed foods such as bagged spinach, cut vegetables, roasted nuts
- Pre-made soups and stock, usually swimming in sodium
These are just a few of the worst foods to eat, and all are packaged in plastic. The zero plastic diet works because if you want to eat cereal, you have to buy granola in the bulk section of the store. If you want to eat bread, it’s better to buy grain and make it fresh yourself. If you want to drink juice, you squeeze fresh oranges. If you want to eat meat, you’d have to opt for fresher cuts rather than the pre-packaged (likely pre-frozen) ones. If you want to eat fruit and veggie, you’ll need to grab fresher produce from a Farmer’s market (you know, the kind that goes bad in a few days?) rather than plastic packaged ones at Trader Joe’s that mysteriously last forever. If you want pizza, you’ll have to use the fresh produce and bread dough that you just made instead of heating up frozen pies. You learn to make chili from fresh beans and spices, and hummus is healthier made from chickpea, olive oil, lemon and garlic (ONLY!). And although there are non-plastic to-go places that we STILL go to, that one extra step makes fast food less accessible, which also translates to less frequently eaten.
This diet works because it cuts out all the hidden chemicals and preservatives and sugars and sodium and god-knows-what-else that we don’t even know exist in the food that others pre-package and pre-prepare for us.
This diet works because we are in control of what we eat.
This diet works because maybe we have to forego the cheese occasionally when we can’t find a way to get it without plastic packaging. Sometimes we have to forgo dairy, or meat. Sometimes, the only plastic free option until the next Farmer’s market or trip to the butcher is, well, veggie.
So this diet requires one to eat healthy. Why is it better than other diets?
Well, in my mind, the reason why other diets don’t work, is because it promises new solutions to weight loss. Innovative ones that we are putting our bodies through, albeit haphazardly, in a game of trial-and-error. Keto, paleo, organic, sugar-free… and the food industry plays on all of these new diets and creates NEW products that promise alternatives to all the things we are trying to cut out. The problem is, all of these new alternatives have been un-tested by any length of time. But what the zero plastic diet gives you is a diet that forces you back to the olden ways, of yore. The foods that our species have had plenty of time to adapt to. The one our bodies actually embrace. See also: Perhaps Gluten Isn’t to Blame. Our bodies, they don’t evolve overnight. They don’t even evolve over a few decades. We are not THAT adaptable. And we are introducing new alternatives at a fast clip ever since the Industrial Era, which frankly, wasn’t too long ago. Our bodies will not cannot change as fast. In fact, they will become intolerable to the changes.
At the end of all this raving, I guess I’m not hear to say that this is for everybody. I am only here recording what has worked for us. In an effort to reduce plastic, I’ve discovered that we’ve lost the extra weight that has been following us around since our beer-filled college nights, and then maintained a consistent number on the scale for the past year and a half. We don’t exercise although we really should as I’m sure our muscles are wasting away. We eat a good amount of food and don’t count calories or ration out portions. We aren’t gluttonous by any means, but we never leave the table hungry. The only thing we’ve done is to eliminate plastic packaging. So maybe it’s worth a try for those who are sick of substituting sugars, cutting out starches, calculating calories and rationing out portions. It’s a very simple approach to dieting, and one that your body (and the planet) will thank you for.
