Anyone tried the sirtfood diet?

[Miloarmadillo1]

www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/magazine/article4647459.ece

Very sympathetic for beige carpet and toddler ....my juicer exploded mid-cycle spewing green stuff everywhere and the worst, knocking over the tiny amount of juice produced by a pillow of kale onto the floor and thus preventing any juice consumption that day! I agree with what some others have said about the calorie content although I have to say I'm now into the third week and I did not think i'd lost weight last week, however weighed in on scales at work and had lost 2 lb during last week which followed about 4 lb in week 1. Also included big Italian meal out at the weekend - non sirt food. Quite happy with that and will continue for week 3, another 2 lb loss would be good. I do find though that the meal sizes are huge. I quite often only eat a half portion for the evening meal and keep the other half in the fridge for lunch. Also I did not have the pizza and pancakes with chocolate sauce that were recommended last weekend but stuck to salads and chicken based meals. A good tip for work is make the dip - easy to pack up with celery sticks and oatcakes - and very nice and filling too. Also have done the odd mini-fast - i.e. after having huge meal out on Sunday lunch time did not eat at all in the evening. So my message is keep at it - I think it does work - in terms of digestion I noticed I had bright green wee but otherwise it was OK :) As for the lovage - I bought a grow your own kit off Amazon (about £6.00) and have planted the seeds on my windowsill- nothing has appeared yet !!! good luck everyone... is anyone else in their second or third week?

Bright green wee, chickenlips?! I haven't noticed that yet! I was very sad to lose my juice yesterday. Fortunately I had made 3 days supply in one go as our fridge isn't big enough for tonnes of kale, so I've just had to have smaller portions.
Day 3. Bit hungry this morning but feel pretty good. Quite relaxed and energised and less grumpy than usual around this point in the month.

I had the baked cod with miso today. It's on the wrong day but I had all the ingredients. I tipped away the extremely salty liquid from the stir fry and the fish, tipped off by H3l3na upthread, which made it acceptably salty. It would have been too salty for me otherwise, I think! Thanks H3l3na

I've been doing week 1 of the diet for 2 weeks and lost 9 pounds. It's been tough because making the juices requires planning, preparation and it is messy. I have not been very adventurous with my meals rotating three meals during the week. I don't think I have ever lost so much in two weeks so there must be something in the science of eating sirt foods.

I did wonder if moving to week 2 would result in weight loss, but thanks to Joany i now know that only week one works. I would recommend the diet, because I do not feel hungry or cranky, but shopping for green veg and preparing meals for me and then cooking for the family meal is exhausting. This forum has been invaluable and has motivated me after 7pm.

I aim to be on this diet for 4 weeks because I would like to loose a stone, and then to continue with 1 juice per day and a wider range of sirt foods in my diet.

My goodness, 9lbs, what a great result BlueHisqmt, I have lost just over 1lb in week 1 despite trying really hard, the only naughty extras I've had have been a strawberry & a date. Week 2 starts tomorrow, but I am going to just do 2 meals a day & a juice as am getting desperate. Am even toying with doing week 1 again like you have. There's been another lady on the thread who didn't lose anything either. Perhaps my skinny gene has emigrated!! My fridge is tiny too Chickenlips, I've been keeping my kale in a carrier bag out in the garden on a chair....

Most of the weight loss seems to occur in the first 3 days of 3 juices and 1 meal a day. I did wonder if the second week would be as effective, a kind of diminishing return, but so far so good. I'm bound to hit a plateau and then it is going to be a case of keeping my nerve like you H313naGraham, and continuing with the diet.

Im on my third week of SIRT-ing and wonder if any of you know whether after the initial phase 1 week it is ok to then just alternate those meals as evening meals on different days whilst still juicing once a day. So what I'm doing is having two meals a day - one lunchtime sirt salad or sirt muesli, followed by one of the Phase 1 evening meals. Logically I can't see that this would be a problem but wonder if the science backs it up? ie. is there any reason you have to eat the way they prescribe for Phase 2? I did have the book but lent it to a friend who has still got it...

Hi Purplepants5, after an interminable wait, my book finlly arrived this morning. A quick glance at the maintenance phase ie weeks 2 & 3 illustrates 2 choices for breakfast, lunch & dinner, with some exceptions ie no choice on some days. There is a finite number of recipes. As to swapping around, many people who are losing weight well on this thread have been swapping meals, in an effort to either use up food or to get the diet to tie in with their lifestyles. Am still reading it, will let you know if I find out anything substantially different.

thanks for your thoughts H3l3naGraham. Im just not sure whether I'm losing weight through calorie restriction or whether this combination of food is what is encouraging weight off. I guess you could say who cares as long as you lose weight but Im curious and need to understand the reason in order to continue...

Purplepants5, the diet is a reasonably generous 1,000 calories on the 1st 3 days or thereabouts & 1,500 and more thereafter, so it's not that low in calories in comparison to many diets. Mind you as a doctor once told me, 1 x crispbread a day(ie c35 calories) = adding 1 stone a year if not worked off through exercise.........I have no idea if there is a really sound rationale to this diet, is there a magic formula they have discovered.....? At least it does recommend healthy foods. Only wish I could shift some weight!!!

didnt realise the calories were so high to be honest, although seeing the size of the portions I should have realised. Guess I was so taken with eating healthy food and all that kale that I didnt stop to wonder what the calorie intake was. I just thought my sirtuin activators would be activating and I would be losing weight despite eating quite a bit of food. No such thing as a free lunch I guess. thanks for pointing it out H3l3naGraham

don't despair Purplepants5, it seems that many people are really shifting weight despite the large portions, so perhaps there is something in this so-called "skinny/lean-gene" except mine seems to have vanished.....The journalist in the Times shifted 2 stone in just under 3 months.

Learn from my mistake. I bought the Tesco Soba noodles(3 packs) and then read the SIRT book that said the noodles should be 100% buckwheat and not the ones mixed with wheat flour. Sure enough, the ones I bought contain wheat flour. Sigh ...........

I'm on day 5 today. I'm down about 2.5kg despite the huge portions, and a bit of cheating on the first couple of days. Incredibly tired today, but that isn't necessarily diet related. I haven't suffered any headaches yet, and I'm really enjoying the food. I haven't been able to find any buckwheat flakes or puffs for the sirt muesli, so I just boiled 30g of buckwheat groats and used those. A bit odd, but tasty!

I do think the sirt foods are making a difference. I am quite capable of losing no weight at all on a calorie controlled diet of 1200 kcal per day for 2 weeks, yet I've dropped at least 2.5kg in 4 days on this diet. Before trying this I really thought I had messed up my metabolism so much with yoyo diets that I would be stuck forever. Weightwatchers and Slimming world did not work at all for me last year, despite working in the past. So I'm inclined to think there is something special about the sirtuin activating foods.

Also, I eat pretty healthily to begin with. Cook from scratch almost every day, plenty of fresh veg, fruit, (gluten and lactose and egg free due to digestive issues), and I was already compressing my meals into an intermittent fasting pattern of 16 hours fasting and 8 hrs eating, meaning I was eating at lunchtime then earlyish dinner. I was eating smaller portions than the sirtfood diet provides. So really, I have included the juices, dropped a meal for 3 days, swapped red onions for white onions, kale and rocket for other green veg, eaten more seafood and less quorn, eaten more capers and dates and walnuts, and swapped buckwheat for rice. We use lots of garlic and ginger and tumeric, and I swapped to bird eye chilli from regular red chillis. I've switched green tea for decaf black tea with almond milk. So really, it's hard to see how that could result in losing 2.5kg in 4 days unless the sirt foods do something different, as the changes haven't been that drastic.

IrritableBitchSyndrome, you have remotivated me! I have still cheated today, making a soup from the Sirt recipe book (now it's finally arrived) instead of the suggested salad meal because I am cold, hopefully that won't have a dire effect on my metabolism. Just need to lose some weight over the 1lb I've lost in 9 days. Am thinking of going back onto week 1 again next week as I seem to be stuck

I could do with Buckwheat groats to make myself some sort of porridge and then chuck in a couple of dates & strawberries. Cold food on cold mornings isn't hugelymotivating although the smoothie & the cereal brekkies are enjoyable.

H3l3na - I wonder how much difference it makes using a juicer instead of a blender, with the green juice. Also I could stand to lose quite a bit of weight, so maybe I have more fat cells to burn up, so I'm seeing more of a difference on the scales, compared to you. Do you think you might have gained muscle? Maybe your body is better at building muscle than mine, especially if you are younger than me? (I'm 41). My weight has really fluctuated over the past 4 days, too... I was actually heavier on days 2 and 3 but then saw a sudden large drop this morning (day 5). I'm planning to stick with it for the 3 weeks, then maintain for a bit, then do it all again, etc. I'd love to lose about 20kg and keep it off.

How much have other posters lost, over how long?

Hi IrritableBitchSyndrome, I need to lose 4 stone.....am way too heavy. Have gained no muscle, trousers are still too tight around my middle. Yep, I have a fast blender/smoothie maker, but I am straining the results through a nut milk bag as recommended by another helpful poster and it does give the requisite c250mls of clear juice. That lady originally consumed the smoothie like me, but still lost weight and then switched to the sieved juice. There was another lady who a week on, had lost zilch. Am sticking at it, although tomorrow will be hard as on trains all day, visiting sick friend in hospital miles away. Will buy an M&S endamame salad & hope for the best; mind you many posters have had a 'bad day' and still lost weight. Was prepared to go into this for the long haul, wanted to kick start with a good 1 stone off, perhaps 2, for a big birthday do later in the year, then I knew it would be harder for the next 2, but it is a bit dispiriting to be honest. I also am a 'healthy eater' my weakness is wine, but I have cut that out apart from 'key' days since the start of Dec.....I thought that alone would shift a lb or 2....

H3l3na - when you say 'clear' juice, do you mean literally clear? The juice I make with my juicer is very dark green, and in no way clear or see through.

Sorry, I mean lump free, it's dark green, but a juice - thinner consistency, not a smoothie which is thicker. It's like a smoothie if I don't strain it!

You are not alone H3l3na Graham in the amount of weight you want to lose -I would like to lose three stone. I've lost half a stone in just over 2 weeks on this diet but not sure if I need to switch back to Alternate Day Fasting which is what I have had success with in the past. However I think I feel leaner and am finding the recipes from the first week enjoyable so am going to stick with it. I can see why 1lb in 9 days is disheartening but maybe you feel leaner too???

Hi Purplepants5, am pleased I'm not alone in needing to shift bulk. I like the recipes too, most of them that is, I have decided not to cook the buckwheat in turmeric, but mix the turmeric into the main dish, if that makes sense, much tastier! I don't feel any leaner but am going to stick with it, perhaps I might try 5:2 with Sirtfoods. In 1st instance am going to do week 1 again nxt week to see if it works better 2nd time around.