A Dash for Mediterranean Lifestyle

Maybe you’ve read about the Mediterranean Diet and Dash Diet, the healthiest diets for this year.

Mediterranean Lifestyle, there’s nothing more I would like for my healthy life.
Lots of fish, veggies and fruits, olive oil, yogurt and a good cheese now and them. A nice blue sea to swim, a good wine and more leisure in my life. Sitting with family and friends at lunch….Sounds like a holiday.
But… can you do it like this? Nope, not unless you’re very rich or live on the Mediterranean Seaside. I’m not.
What about the DASH lifestyle? Well, this I can do and actually did.
And…it didn’ t work for me, no lost pounds, not feeling better either.

However I need some diet rules, I need to know the “when and what and how much”.
The diet which I’ve adopted a long time ago and I’m adapting all the time, The South Beach Diet,  has been good enough to stop me from putting on.
But it seems I’m on a plateau, and honestly, a bit tired of dieting..

Most of the days, my diet is nowadays something like this:
Breakfast: 1 portion proteins (including diary), 1 portion carbs, 1 portion veggies, between 400 – 500 kCal
Lunch: a soup (veggies and/ or meat or beans), 1 portion proteins (meat, beans, diary or cheese), 1-2 portion veggies, 1 fruit, 1 portion carbs, between 600 – 800 kcal.
Five o’clock snack:  1 fruit, 1 whole fat diary, 1 portion carbs, around 300 kcal
Dinner: 1 portion protein (meat, beans, cheese, diary), 1 veggie or a fruit, 1 portion carbs maybe. Between 300 – 500 Kcal week.

One fasting day a week (no animal products) and one fish day a week.
At least twice a week a tomato sauce.
Trying hard to exercise more, at least 2 hours, plus 2-3 hours a day standing, doing some house working or walking.

I need fresh ideas, some changes in my lifestyle. I’d take a closer look at what are considered now “the best diets”.

The DASH Diet

There is no meal plan on the DASH Diet, actually. And it’s a lot more than I’ve ever had. This seems to me a fattening diet, honestly.  And one can easily build a most unhealthy menu. Like drinking daily 2-3 cups of fruit juice, eating almost daily 2 tbsps of peanut butter, 1 tbsp sugar, 1 tbsp of mayo, 1 stake, 8 slices of bread,  1 cup of dried fruits, several portions of potatoes (considered ordinary vegetables?!) a.s.o.
No wonder this didn’t work for me. More than 2 carb portions at a meal tend to spike my blood sugar, especially if I start my meal with carbs.
Plus, it seems to me it’s a bit outdated.
Eating low-fat diary? Eating less eggs because they have cholesterol? Nope, I don’t think so.
Anyway, I eat a lot more veggies, a veggie portion for me is 200g, a lot more than DASH veggie portions.
One good idea in this diet is to limit salt, which I already do. Nothing new.

Mediterranean Diet

Let’s take a closer look at the Mediterranean Diet.
Actually what we are being told in so many studies and articles is that it’s high in vegetables, fruits, legumes, nuts, beans, cereals, grains, fish, and unsaturated fats such as olive oil and low on meats and diary.
Is it so?

Here is The Mediterranean {Pyramid of Greece

And you might want to answer the Predimed Questionnaire of adherence to a Spanish Mediterranean Diet:

 

I don’t see any “dont’s” on diary, eggs, cheese in these presentations.  And going to Greece, Spain, France, there are high chances you will eat lots of cheese and whole fat yogurt.

Principles are fine, research is on the Mediterranean side. Still, there’s no meal plan, no calories limit, one can easily get fat with this “diet” too.

Take-Out

Actually these are not diets for weight loss, rather general principles for a healthy life.
So what am I gone do?

For the moment I’ll stick to my diet, which I’ve been building for several years now.
It seems I’ve already adopted most of the Mediterranean Diet principles and I eat less salt than anyone in my friends and family circle.

What I’m going to change a bit is the “what”: the ingredients and the recipes.
Instead of  subtracting, I’ll enrich my diet with recipes of the Mediterranean Cuisine.
Yumi!