The Parisian Diet - First Couple Days of the Cafe Stage

11:08 PM AirplaneFoodCritic 2 Comments

I thought this diet would not work for me because of all the dairy and soups but it is working quite well so far! I like it! I have changed a few things about the given diet but that is ok because there is actually a section in the book about foods you can switch out for others in the given diet menu and recipes. I admit that I have not read that part too carefully but I should. I just made some substitutions because of the food I already had in my house needs eaten. I think you should get the book for the exact recipes and menus they provide. It is a good read and a fun book to have. I love the size of it because I can carry it around with me either to the grocery store or just to the kitchen and back to my couch where I write these blogs. I think  you may be interested in checking out the book after you read that I have lost FOUR pounds in two days so far.

The Parisian Diet suggests you follow the Cafe Phase for ten days and no longer. If you are not feeling well or if it is just too much (not enough, I should say) they say you should stop and go to the Bistro Phase for a little while. Then try it again. The book goes over the time spreads for you. I am going to share my first two days with you along with MY recipes. Some are the exact Parisian recipes but most are modified to my tastes and available food.


Cafe Phase
Day 1

Breakfast:
They have you eating a pear, banana and milk shake. I normally do not like seeing the word 'shake' or 'smoothie' but this book changed all that. I don't know what I was doing wrong in the past but these shakes and smoothies are much smoother, thinner than what I make and I LOVE that. I can't stand a thick, gloppy breakfast. What I did was take a super ripe pear, peeled and diced it then added it to my Vita Mix with a pear and some really cold nonfat milk. I then added a splash of vanilla extract and a half tablespoon of local honey and blended it up. It tasted like cake batter with that vanilla in it. I drank that in no time because it was so tasty. Next time I will omit the honey because the pear was ripe enough to add sweetness.

Lunch:
I am not even sure what they say to eat for lunch this day but I noticed that most lunches were a protein with a veggie. I had leftover flank steak from a dinner party so I had 3oz steak (fatty parts cut off and fed to my dog) and about 3oz fresh salsa. The salsa is the kind that is so fresh you can see that the ingredients is only tomatoes, peppers, onion and some lemon or lime juice. That counts as a veggie in my book any day!

Dinner:
I followed the book's recipe for this one. I wasn't sure it would come out tasty as it was only broth and leeks. I pictured myself starving like it was a potato famine eating in rags. I did! Boy was I wrong. I love it and I don't even like soup! I took some fresh, farmer's market leeks and boiled them down in some low sodium vegetable broth. The twist I put on their recipe is that I added a whoop load of ground pepper. The pepper added a crazy tasty kick. Leeks are one of my favorite veggies and that is saying a lot since I don't have many veggies I like or even tolerate. The leeks cooked down into the broth so it looked like a hearty French onion soup! I really enjoyed eating this as hot a temperature as my tongue would allow. I even had enough leftover for Day 2. Good Job, Parisian Diet!!!

Fruit: The book said I should have a fruit. It put that after the dinner so I am assuming that it was to be like a dessert. I had an apple but not just any apple. I wanted to try something a little fancy. I cut the apple up into 1/2 inch discs and removed the core and seeds. I put them in a ziplock baggy with a squeeze of lemon and a dash from a jar labeled Pumpkin Pie Spices. I marinated it in the refrigerator all day. That evening I dumped the slices into a pan with a light spray of coconut oil. I seared the apples so the sugars caramelized on the outside yet it held it's crisp on the inside. These were good and more fun than just munching on an apple. It didn't take much of my time up. A plus was that my house smelled wonderful the rest of the night. Like I baked an apple pie!

I woke up after Day 1 and I was 2 pounds lighter. I am not completely surprised since I had eaten so many leeks the day prior and they are a diuretic. I lost water weight mostly. I do not care. I love losing weight!! Thank you Thank you Parisian Diet!

Day 2

Breakfast:
The recipe for this meal also sounded a little weird to me. Apples blended with yogurt. Again, I was afraid of the thickness. Also, apples are not really all that flavorful and they are pretty fiber-y. It sounded like a blah diet breakfast. Again, WRONG. I took two apples off the counter, peeled and cut them up into small cubes. I then put them in the freezer for an hour. They were frozen through at that point. This solved my issue with not liking room temperature smoothies. I put a little honey, maybe a half tablespoon and then they called for a splash of vanilla extract. It is this recipe that I got the idea to put it in the day 1 breakfast by the way. Then I added some non-fat Greek yogurt. Then...I had an idea. On my last trip to Hawaii I came home with five or six vanilla beans. They have been sitting with my spices for 5 months now while I try to figure out what to do with them. I cut about 1/5th of a bean off, sliced it down the middle and scraped out the yumminess inside into my Vita Mix with the rest of the foods. Then I just tossed the bean in because after all, it IS a Vita Mix. I love my Vita Mix, these things are great. If you can afford one. Get it. They pulverize everything. I find it incredibly useful in the kitchen for all kinds of things. The result was so punch-you-in-the-face-may-I-have-another good I wish I could have that for all three meals of the day! It was frosty cold but again, not gloppy or too thick. The flavor was just perfect, apples, sweetness, and my favorite, vanilla-y. I am sure it would be similarly good with just the extract but I say get a GOOD extract. I got the Madagascar one. I truly believe that is the best flavor vanilla out there. Now I am thinking about all kinds of other extracts out there that I am not using; Banana, Almond, Rum....Time for me to get creative!! Thank you, Parisian Diet!!


Lunch:
For lunch I totally went off on my own again. I have a blog post that is very popular. A few years back I was on a diet that I made up. I called it "The Experiment".  It was a might good diet. I lost about 30 pounds in a very short time and with no exercise. While on the diet, I ate a lot of lean meats as my protein. I went to Costco a lot and got those $5 whole roasted chickens. I felt bad though because I only eat chicken breasts. I don't like all the sinew, dark meat and bones. I ended up throwing out lots of perfectly good food or soup stock or chicken legs. I set to finding a way to make boneless, skinless chicken breasts taste like rotisserie chicken. I think I did VERY well. This time, I thought I would try a variation on that recipe. I took some chicken tenders, placed them in a ziplock bag with a bit of lemon, dried herbs, some rosemary from the garden and my secret ingredient, honey. I marinated that for a day, so I did this on Day 1 for Day 2. I took them out the next day and they seemed pretty tender (well, they ARE chicken tenders!) from the marinade. In my blog recipe I have to bake and baste the breasts. This time I fried them. That did not work QUITE the way I had hoped because the honey burned. That aside, they tasted pretty flavorful all by themselves. I had 3oz of the chicken with 1 cup green beans. Green beans are another of my favorite vegetables. I am sure it isn't on the Parisian Diet but I lightly coated the beans with extra virgin olive oil and a pinch of sel de mer that I picked up in Étretat last time I visited (because I am fancy that way). The oil and salt is my healthier way of having butter.

Dinner:
Dinner was best of all. I had the leftover soup from Day 1. It was possibly even better the second time around, as soups often are. When you let a soup set, it has time to let the flavors meld into one which makes the soup more complex with layers of flavors rather than a bunch of flavors in separate components of the soup. Know what I mean? I hope you do, sometimes the winemaker in me comes out. When I reheated the soup I put in some more water, a dash more of the bouillon and more of the all important pepper.

Dessert: I certainly was not told to have dessert in the book but I went off on my own...again! In my freezer I have these ice pops that look like the old Otter Pops. I think we all know what those are. These are made by Motts and are pure juice pops. I had two because they are relatively small. I had a scrumptious White Grape Apple and a Apple. I ate these while trying to cool off from the near 90F degree weather we are having lately.

I woke up after Day 2 and I had lost another two pounds. This means I lost a total of four pounds in two days. I am down below a number I have not dipped below since I gained all this weight from medication two years ago! (with the exception of when I juiced for those 10 days) So, Thank You! Thank You! Thank You Parisian Diet.

I mentioned exercise a moment ago. I am not an exerciser to begin with. I do little things but because I have had Rheumatoid Arthritis since I was 10 years which keeps me from moving around too much. Now, my illness medically restricts me from exercising at all. My doctor insists I do not do any extraneous work. I even suggested I do some pool exercising and she said "No, your body has been though so much that it can not take that kind of impact." Not even in a pool. You don't see me crying though. The only exercise I get is a 40 minute slow walk with my dog in the morning and again in the afternoon.


I will be back to report on how the next few days go. Please feel free to comment anything you might want to know below. If you are interested in getting The Parisian Diet book just go here. If you want more info go to this link. For those of you who like a community while you diet you can go to that link where you can sign up and be part of a forum. I am a loner so I choose to cuddle up with my book and go at it alone.

4 pounds down!