My Typical Meals

My typical meals for Quick Loss Phase (first phase): The food in this phase includes all the non-starchy vegetables, fruits, lean meat, low-fat dairy and soy products. Simply for me, beside all the non-starchy vegetables, I prefer fish, skinless poultry, skim milk, low fat cheese, eggs, soy foods and a lot of soups, especially vegetable soups. They comprise more than 90% of all our food. We like to make fruits as part of the meal on dinner table. Soup will be heavily weighted in my diet advice, but avoid most of commercial soups. Make your own soup with vegetables, eggs, tofu, tomato, bean, miso, olive oil, a little pepper and salt (use potassium salt if you are hypertensive). Put a lot of vegetables, and some meat or fish in the soup if it will be the main meal. You can have as much soup as you like. They make you full but not too many calories, and supply adequate daily fluid intake. Recipes are not important for me, just watch what were used to cook the foods. Supplemental antioxidants (vitamins), 1000 mg fish oil once or twice a day and using olive oil for light cooking and salad dressing are highly recommended.

Breakfast:
one egg, low fat cheese or turkey bacon, skim milk, coffee, tea, or vegetable juice. People with elevated cholesterol can avoid egg yolk. Whole grain cereal with skim milk will be just fine for the second phase. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, and should be taken within one hour after getting up or after morning exercise. It will ease hunger, avoid overeating afterwards, increase energy level, increase metabolism and trigger more calorie burning. You burn a little muscle as fuel in the morning by skipping breakfast if waiting too long before next snack or lunch. You then build it back as fat by having big lunch and/or dinner. Worst thing you can do is replacing breakfast with midnight snack. You might be having the same calorie intake, but you will have more fat than muscles. You might weight the same, but the size will increase because fats take up more space than muscles.

Lunch:
Chicken (tuna, cheese, egg) salad with 2 tablespoon apple cider vinegar dressing (including lot of olive oil, lemon juice and pepper powder), fruits, unsweetened drinks, skim milk or vegetable/tofu/egg drop soups. Sandwich with two thin slices of whole grain bread, chicken or turkey, and a lot of vegetables will be ideal lunch for the second phase.

Dinner:
Tossed salad, fruits, lean meats includes fish, beef, pork or skinless poultry, very large bowl of stir-fried cabbage, napa, spinach, bean sprout and/or green bean, tofu with a little soy source, and a large bowl of soup with a lot of vegetables.

Snacks:
Handful of mixed nuts and seeds, fruits, low fat yogurt, cheese, or cottage cheese, vegetables, or skim milk are ideal snacks for the first phase. Small amount of snack should be taken between each meal. If you have late breakfast, you don't need to snack before lunch. The second snack can be between dinner and bedtime for late sleepers as long as you don't eat within 3 hours before bedtime.