I want to start the BSD diet. I stopped eating sugar and sweet fruits 3 months ago and I already eat a Mediterranean style diet since I live in Greece. I do eat (sometimes) rice, potatoes, glutenfree pasta and glutenfree homemade bread (made of oat, amaranth, linseed flour and buckwheat flour). Should I stop eating potatoes, rice and all kind of gluten free products???

Ingela

Hi Ingela

You don’t mention whether or not you are diabetic or just looking to lose weight or eat healthier. If you’re after weight loss, then a lot of people on here have found keeping carbs low (less than 50g per day) can help. A diet with potatoes and bread as a key constituent is going to make maintaining that level difficult. I’m a believer in all things in moderation, but I think that breads (even gluten free) would be a challenge.

I actually think that the term “Mediterranean Diet” is actually unhelpful as most of the Mediterranen countries eat a fair slab of refined carbs (Rice in Spain, Bread in France, Rice and Pasta in Italy, Semolina/Couscous in North Africa, flatbreads in the Levant etc.)

One of the first principles of this diet, and I think the most important, is to stop eating any simple or refined carbohydrates. This includes any breads, cereals (especially breakfast types), rice, pasta, potatoes, pastries and the obvious cakes or biscuits, including crackers. The exceptions to this are a little brown rice (around 20 grams) porridge made from real oats (25 grams) and some bread made from gram flour or chickpea flour (same thing), coconut flour. If you are following the 800 calorie diet you will struggle to fit in any of those products in your calorie allowance. If you are allowing more calories you could maybe have the porridge now and then or a little brown rice. If you are diabetic and want this diet to have an improving effect on your blood sugars then you should avoid these products completely (except for the odd slip up, we are only human). If you are following 5:2 or the Med diet you could have a little, again keeping them very low in your diet. However, you do say you want to do the BSD, which means avoiding these carbs if at all possible.

If you have any further questions or are finding it difficult, just ask, there is always some know it all to help (like me). There are so many wonderful things to eat that you don’t even feel like it is a diet. It has changed my life.

Thanks to both of you for your comments!

I don’t have diabetes but need to loose weight and control my blood sugar levels. It got so much better after I stopped using sugar but of course I know that potatoes, rice, pasta and flour also has hidden sugar.

When I mention Mediterranean Diet, I mean that I eat a lot of veg dishes but also fresh fish, some poultry and less red meat which I generally eat together with vegetables (fresh or cooked/stirfried) like wild greens, spinach, artichokes, green beans, beetroots, tomatoes, peppers, a lot of onion and garlic plus always virgin olive oil that is produced from our own olives.

3 months ago I stopped sugar and eat 1 egg, mixed berries with a bit of oat for breakfast. Sometimes I eat homemade chiapudding with berries. It’s just that sometimes I DIE for my own made glutenfree bread and I know that I can be without for 8 weeks but how about later..??

Anyway, I will do the 8 week diet without these products.

Thnaks a lot!

Ingela, how are you getting on. Remember, if you do have a bowl of porridge or a slice of bread it is not the end of the world and not the end of the diet, you just have to keep on keeping on…..