Friday, January 7, 2011

UnDiet...Week Two

Hello UnDieters! 


It's week two...still eating your apples? Good. Now it's time to build another healthy habit into your diet. The strategy this week: switch to skim!


I am all about cutting out calories and fat where they don't really matter so you can indulge when they do ( Hello, cheese plate! ). So this week, if you aren't already drinking skim milk, it's time to make the switch! If skim seems too drastic a change, take a single step down on the milk fat going from homo to 2%, 2% to 1% and then 1% to skim. Why bother? Each glass of skim milk saves you 41 calories and 5 grams of fat. Doesn't seem impressive until you do that for a full year and save yourself 14,965 calories which equals a potential weight loss of 4.2 pounds. Without cutting back on portions! In addition, milk fat is a source of dioxins, which is a major dietary toxin. Skim the fat, remove the dioxins. And all you did was switch your milks. 


Already drink skim milk or a vegetarian alternative? Make sure you get a glass a day, you healthy vixen you. 


Keep with it, UnDieters...although it may feel like you aren't doing anything, that's the point! The weeks will build and you are making over your diet for good. And since rewards are always fun, look for giveaways for UnDieters...coming soon!!

3 comments:

Melissa said...

Hi Desiree,

I am a big advocate of the un-diet, great idea for the new year.

Just wondering when you talk about dioxins in milk fat. Would this still be the case with organic milk?

It was my understanding that having some fat with dairy is a good idea to absorb the fat soluble vitamins?

Thanks!

Unknown said...

Organic milk will have a far lower risk of contamination from animal feed and therefore be a "cleaner" option but as animal fat is an efficient storage site for environmental toxins the risk for dioxin exposure is still there. You are absolutely correct that the fat soluble vitamins need a little fat to aid in their absorption. There is trace fat still in skim milk (about 200mg per cup) but anything you consume along with or soon before or after drinking the milk will help too!
Of course, the more fat contained, the greater the chance of dioxin exposure so switching to organic meats, cheeses and butter will have a large impact but the cost of these can get incredibly prohibitive.
There is a great link from WHO here to learn more about dioxin exposure...
http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs225/en/

Melissa said...

Thanks Desiree. That is great information. I look forward to keeping up with the un-diet!