DR. PIERRE DUKAN is a French medical doctor with 35 years of experience in clinical nutrition. While he began his medical career specializing in neurology, Dr. Dukan discovered and refined his successful weight loss formula while working with his patients to adjust their diets. Since then, he has spent his career helping people lose weight and keep it off forever.
The Dukan Diet: 2 Steps to Lose the Weight, 2 Steps to Keep It Off Forever
by Pierre Dukan Pierre Dukan
Hardcover
Temporarily Out of Stock Online
- ISBN-13: 9780307887962
- Publisher: Potter/TenSpeed/Harmony
- Publication date: 04/19/2011
- Pages: 304
- Sales rank: 87,855
- Product dimensions: 6.40(w) x 9.74(h) x 1.06(d)
Read an Excerpt
The Dukan Diet
Thirty-five years have passed since my life-changing encounter with the obese gentleman. Since then, I have devoted my work to helping thousands of men and women lose pounds and stabilize their weight.
Like all my French medical colleagues, I was trained that calories counted and low-calorie diets were the way to lose weight. Every type of food was allowed in moderate quantities. Nowadays, what I know and practice I have learned through direct daily contact with flesh-and- blood human beings who have constant cravings to eat.
I very quickly realized that it was not by accident that an individual was overweight. Their appetite and their apparent lack of restraint were a camouflage concealing a need to find comfort in food. This need is all the more overwhelming as it is connected to our survival mechanisms, which are as archaic as they are instinctive. It soon became obvious to me that I could not make an overweight person lose weight and stay slim simply by giving sound advice, even if that advice was based on common sense and scientific research.
Support is what overweight people determined to lose weight really want and is what they need from a counselor or a method-support so that they are not left alone to face the ordeal of dieting, which deliberately goes against their own instinct for survival.
What overweight individuals are looking for is an outside will, a decision maker who walks ahead of them offering guidance and specific instructions, because what overweight people most hate and simply cannot do is decide for themselves when and how they are going to deprive themselves of food.
As for managing their weight, overweight individuals will admit without shame-and why should there be any-that they are powerless when it comes to controlling what they eat. People from every social and economic background have all sat in front of me and described themselves as being astonishingly weak when it comes to food.
Obviously, most of them have found in food an easy "escape valve" through which they can release excess tension, stress, and life's all too frequent disappointments. Any logical, reasonable, and rational instructions just cannot stand up to those pressures-at least not for long.
During my years of practice, I have seen many diets come and go. From analyzing these diets and the reasons behind their various successes, as well as the efforts of my own patients, I am convinced of the following: Overweight people who want to lose weight need a fast- acting diet that brings immediate results, fast enough to strengthen and maintain their motivation. They also need precise goals, set by an outside instructor, with a series of levels to aim for so that they can see their efforts and compare them with the results expected. However, I have also observed the strength of my patients' resolve at certain times in their lives and then seen how easily they lose heart when the results do not match their efforts.
Most of the spectacular diets that rocketed to success in recent years did in fact have that fast-off-the-mark effect and delivered the promised results. Unfortunately, their instructions and guidance faded away once the book was closed, leaving the overweight individual once again all alone on the slippery slope of temptations, and the cycle would start all over again. Once the goal was reached, all these diets, even the most original and inventive, abandoned their followers with the same old commonsense advice about moderation and balance that a formerly overweight person will never manage to follow.
None of these famous diets managed to find a way of protecting and guiding individuals during the period that follows their weight loss, giving advice and precise, simple, and effective landmarks like those that made their initial program so successful.
People who have lost weight know instinctively that on their own, and without any support, they will not be able to preserve this victory. They also know that left to their own devices, the pounds will creep back on. They need instructions that are simple, specific, effective, and not too frustrating-guidelines that can be followed for the rest of their life.
Dissatisfied with the majority of the diets in vogue, which are only concerned with a dazzling but short-lived victory, and aware of the ineffectiveness of low-calorie diets and the kind of commonsense advice that despite all the evidence hopes to reform overeaters into careful eaters, I developed my own weight loss diet. Years of medical practice allow me to consider it both the most effective and easy-to- follow diet available today.
I realize that the preceding statement may make me appear immodest. But I will take that risk because it is my most heartfelt conviction, and not saying so in the face of the growing scourge of weight control problems would amount to a failure to assist people in danger.
The Dukan Diet takes into account everything that is essential for the success of any weight loss program:
It offers overweight people trying to lose weight a system with specific instructions that get them on track, with stages and objectives, leaving no room for ambiguity or deviation. The initial weight loss is substantial and sufficiently rapid to launch the diet and instill lasting motivation. It is a low-frustration diet. Weighing food portions and calorie counting are banned, and it allows you total freedom to eat a certain number of popular foods. It is a comprehensive weight loss program, an integrated whole that you either take or leave. The diet can be broken down into four successive phases:
1. The Attack phase. The initial Attack phase is a pure protein diet that creates a stunning kick start, almost as quick as fasting or powdered protein diets but without their drawbacks. 2. The Cruise phase. In the Cruise phase, pure protein days alternate with days in which you eat pure proteins plus certain allowed vegetables. This phase lets you reach your chosen weight. 3. The Consolidation phase. The Consolidation phase is designed to prevent the rebound effect that occurs after any rapid weight loss. This is a period of high vulnerability when the body has a tendency to very easily regain those lost pounds. The duration of this phase is based on a precise formula: 5 days for every pound lost. 4. The Permanent Stabilization phase. Permanent weight stabilization is based on three simple safety measures that are easy to follow but which are indispensable if the weight loss is to be maintained: The pure protein phase of the diet must be followed 1 set day per week-for example, every Thursday-for the rest of your life; do not use elevators or escalators; and take 3 tablespoons of oat bran a day. These three rules are non-negotiable, but they are sufficiently specific and effective for you to stick to them over a long period of time.
The Theory Behind the Dukan Diet
Before discussing the diet in detail and explaining exactly how it works and why it is so effective, I want first to give you an outline of the whole four-phase program to make clear from the outset precisely for whom the diet is intended, along with any possible contraindications.
One of the major merits of the Dukan Diet is its educational value. It allows you to learn in real life and with your own body the relative importance of each food group from the order in which they are integrated into the diet. That is, the diet starts with vital foods, then introduces, in succession, indispensable foods, essential foods, and important foods, finishing off with unnecessary but pleasurable foods.
The Dukan Diet provides a system of perfectly interwoven instructions that will clearly and directly set you on the right track, avoiding the need for that never-ending effort of willpower that can slowly undermine your determination.
I will be giving these instructions to you in four successive diet plans. The first two make up the actual weight loss stage, and the second two ensure that the weight loss you achieve is consolidated and then permanently stabilized.
1. The Attack Phase: The Pure Protein Diet
The Attack phase is the conquest phase. Here dieters are always extremely motivated. They are looking for a diet plan that, however arduous it might be, meets their expectations in terms of effectiveness and quick results and that allows them to tackle their weight problem head-on. The length of this phase depends on how much weight one wants to lose. The Attack phase can last as little as 1 day or as many as 10, with most people falling in the 2- to 7-day range.
The diet plan for this initial phase of the Dukan Diet, great for a fast-track approach, limits food to just one of the three food groups- namely, proteins.
Except for egg whites, no food is 100 percent protein. The pure protein diet of the Attack phase selects and groups together foods whose composition is as close as possible to pure protein, such as certain kinds of meat, fish, seafood, poultry, whole eggs, and nonfat dairy products.
Compared with low-calorie diets, the pure protein diet is a real war machine, a bulldozer that, if followed without fail, crushes all resistance. It is effective in the most difficult cases, in particular for premenopausal women suffering from water retention and bloating and for menopausal women. It is just as effective with dieters deemed to be resistant because they have tried and given up on too many diets or aggressive courses of treatment in the past.
2. The Cruise Phase: The Alternating Protein Diet
As its name indicates, this phase works by alternating two diets: the pure protein diet followed by the same diet to which any nonstarchy vegetable, raw or cooked, is added (see "100 Natural Foods That Keep You Slim," page 168). Each alternate cycle works like the injection- combustion cycle of a two-speed engine burning up its calorie quota.
In the alternating cycles of the Cruise phase you can eat the authorized "as much as you like" foods at any time of day and in the combination and quantity that best suits you. This gives you both complete freedom and an effective way of neutralizing your hunger by eating. Satisfaction through quantity makes up for any lack of variety.
Later I will discuss the precise timing for the alternating pattern of the Cruise phase, which will depend on how much weight you want to lose, how many diets you have already attempted, your age, and your level of motivation.
The Cruise phase must be followed without a break until your target weight is reached. Although influenced in part by previous bad experiences, the alternating protein diet is still one of the diets least affected by resistance induced by previous attempts at weight loss.
3. The Consolidation Phase: The Transition
Diet-5 Days for Every Pound Lost
After you have achieved your goal weight comes the soothing phase of the Dukan Diet. Its purpose is to get you eating a wider variety of foods again, while avoiding the traditional rebound effect that occurs after losing a lot of weight. When you lose weight, your body tries to put up resistance. It reacts to its reserves being plundered by gradually reducing its energy output and, above all, by assimilating and getting as much energy as possible from any food that is eaten.
The successful dieter is therefore sitting on a volcano: Your body is just waiting for the right moment to win back its lost reserves. A large meal that before you reached this phase of the Dukan Diet would have had little effect will now, toward the end of the diet, have far- reaching consequences.
This is why the Consolidation phase opens up to include foods that are richer and more gratifying, but their variety and quantity will be limited so your body's metabolism can adjust to your new weight. Think of it as the first step in stabilizing your weight loss.
In the Consolidation phase, you will be adding 2 slices of bread and
1 portion of fruit and cheese into your daily diet, along with 2 servings of carbohydrates and 2 "celebration" meals a week.
The purpose of the Consolidation phase is to avoid the explosive rebound that is the most immediate and one of the most frequent reasons for failure in weight loss diets. It is now necessary to introduce foods as significant as bread, fruit, cheese, and some starches as well as certain unnecessary but extremely pleasurable dishes or foods. These added foods must, however, be introduced in a certain order to avoid the continual risk of slipping backward and to protect your weight loss. How long this phase lasts depends on how much weight has been lost-a very simple calculation based on 5 days for every pound lost.
4. The Permanent Stabilization Phase: Ultimate
Long-Term Weight Control
Having lost weight and avoided any rebound by following the rules of the first three phases of the Dukan Diet, you may sense instinctively that your victory is fragile, and you may fear that, without support, sooner or later-more often sooner rather than later-you will be at the mercy of your old demons. One thing you may be even more certain of is that, when it comes to food, you may never acquire the discipline most nutritionists recommend as the way guaranteed to maintain weight loss. However, the Stabilization phase is designed to give you a way to maintain your hard-won goal: the original pure protein diet of the Attack phase-the most effective and the strictest weapon of my program- once a week, every Thursday, for the rest of your life.
As paradoxical as this might seem, once you have reached your desired weight, you are quite capable of making this effort 1 day a week because it is a very precise rule and because 1 day a week is a very limited amount of time. And, above all, this specific and non- negotiable rule bears immediate fruit, allowing you to eat normally for the other 6 days of the week without putting any weight back on.
THE DUKAN DIET SUMMARIZED
The Attack phase: Pure Proteins
Length: 2 to 7 days, with the average being 5 days
The Cruise phase: 100 Unlimited Foods in Alternation
Average length: 3 days for each pound you want to lose
The Consolidation phase
Average length: 5 days per pound lost
The Permanent Stabilization phase
1 pure protein day every Thursday for life
No more elevators and escalators
3 tablespoons of oat bran a day
Some Useful Information About Nutrition
The CFP Trio:
Carbohydrates-Fats-Proteins
All food is made up of only three nutrients: carbohydrates, fats, and proteins. Every food gets its taste, texture, and nutritional interest from the particular way that these three elements combine.
Table of Contents
A Note from the Author for the North American Edition xiii
Preface: A Decisive Encounter, or the Man Who Only Liked Meat xix
The Birth of a Four-Step Diet: The Dukan Diet 3
The Theory Behind the Dukan Diet 7
Some Useful Information About Nutrition 12
Pure Proteins 24
The Dukan Diet in Practice 39
The Attack Phase: The Pure Protein Diet 42
The Cruise Phase: The Alternating Protein Diet-Protein + Vegetables 67
The Consolidation Phase: The Transition Diet 80
How to Stabilize Your Weight Once and for All 101
Some Exceptional Extra Measures 112
The Program: From Childhood Through to Menopause 127
Being Active: The Essential Catalyst 141
100 Natural Foods That Keep You Slim 168
Recipes and Menus
Sauces, Mayonnaise, and Dressings 176
Recipes for the Pure Protein Attack Phase 190
Recipes for the Cruise Phase: Proteins + Vegetables 212
Desserts for the Consolidation Phase 231
One Week of Menus for the Pure Protein Attack Phase 235
One Week of Menus for Pure Proteins Followed by Pure Proteins + Vegetables 237
Afterword 241
Daily Interactive and Personalized Monitoring on the Internet 245
Index 265
Dukan Diet National Survey on Short-, Medium-, and Long-Term Results 277
Free Shipping
All orders for eligible items amounting to $25 or more qualify for Free Shipping within the U.S.
What do I have to do?
- Place at least $25 of eligible items in your bag.
- Proceed to Checkout; "Standard Delivery" and "Send everything in as few packages as possible" will be pre-selected.
- Complete your Checkout.
What exclusions apply?
All items identified as eligible for Free Shipping will qualify for the Free Shipping program, subject to certain exceptions. There are a number of reasons why your order might not be eligible for Free Shipping.
- Free Shipping applies to orders made at www.bn.com and shipped within the U.S. only.
- The $25 minimum purchase for Non-Members is calculated after all other discounts (including organizational discounts, and/or coupons) are applied. Charges relating to shipping, handling, gift-wrapping, Magazines, downloading Digital Products such as eBooks, SparkNotes, Quamut Charts, Digital Magazines, other PDF files, and Audiobook MP3s, and taxes will not be included to meet the $25 minimum.
- Your order contains items that are ineligible for free shipping - these include: Used & Out of Print Books from our Authorized Sellers, Gift Cards, Gift Certificates, Magazines, Digital Products such as eBooks, SparkNotes, Quamut Charts, Digital Magazines, other PDF files, and Audiobook MP3s, Barnes & Noble Membership, unusually sized or overweight items, or any other item not identified as eligible for Free Shipping.
- You changed your shipping preference to something other than "Send everything in as few packages as possible."
- The Free Shipping offer will not apply to any order where cancellations or returns reduce the amount of qualifying purchases to less than $25; Barnes & Noble.com reserves the right to charge applicable shipping and handling costs to any such orders.
When should I expect to receive my purchase?
We do our best to estimate delivery dates for your purchase. The total delivery time for your BN.com order to arrive is a combination of the shipping availability time and delivery time. The shipping availability time tells you how quickly products are expected to be ready to leave our warehouses; this shipping availability is provided on the BN.com product detail page. The Free Shipping delivery time of 2-6 business days is the time in transit once your package has left our warehouse. For example, when an item is marked "Usually ships within 24 hours," this means the order will leave our warehouse within 24 hours and will arrive within 2-6 business days of leaving our warehouse. Orders containing pre-ordered items will not ship until ALL items are in stock.
Business Days are Monday through Friday, excluding holidays observed by the Post Office and UPS, such as New Year's Day, Presidents' Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.
Delivery times are not guaranteed. Sometimes the availability of the items in your order may change while we are processing your order. In this event, you will receive an email notifying you of a delay, and the remaining eligible items in your order will be shipped as scheduled.
What if I'm a Barnes & Noble Member?
If you purchase a Barnes & Noble Membership, you will enjoy Free Shipping in 1-3 business days with no minimum purchase required. Click here to learn more about becoming a Barnes & Noble Member.
Can the Free Shipping Program be changed or discontinued?
Barnes & Noble.com may change or discontinue Free Shipping at any time in its sole discretion; however you shall receive Free Shipping for any eligible purchases made prior to any change to the Free Shipping Program.
.
# 1 international bestselling diet book coming to North America
Devised by Dr. Pierre Dukan, a French medical doctor who has spent his career helping people to lose weight, the Dukan Diet rejects counting calories and promises permanent weight loss while allowing adherents to eat as much as they like.
Originally published in 2000, the Dukan Diet swept across France, championed by people who successfully lost weight following its unique four phase regime. The Dukan Diet has helped millions in France, where it has been number one for more than ten years and adopted in twenty countries, including the United Kingdom, Poland, Korea and Brazil. All together, The Dukan Diet has sold more than 3 million copies worldwide.
The Diet: 4 Easy Steps to Permanent Weight Loss
Phase one: Attack
Using Dr. Dukan's True Weight calculator, dieters determine a reasonable and healthy weight loss goal. Then they begin the Dukan Attack phase a two-to-seven-day period during which only unlimited lean protein and a daily Oat bran galette (or pancake) are consumed and dramatic weight loss is achieved.
Phase Two: Cruise
Dieters alternate days of unlimited lean protein with days of protein combined with healthful vegetables until they reach their True Weight.
Phase Three: Consolidation
Dieters stay on this phase for 5 days for every pound lost. At this point the diet allows unlimited protein and vegetables, and other foods (such as cheese and bread) are reintroduced. Dieters are also allowed two weekly celebration meals to stave off boredom.
Phase Four: Stabilization
This is the maintenance portion of the plan, in which followers are allowed to eat whatever they like without regaining weight – provided that they follow 3 unbreakable rules including eating only unlimited lean protein one set day per week.
For each phase, The Dukan Diet offers clear simple guidelines for long term success. The Dukan Diet is the perfect diet for people who want fast weight loss, that can be maintained without counting calories or weighing portions.
Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought
-
- The Dash Diet Weight Loss…
- by Marla Heller
-
Average rating: 4.0 Average rating:
-
- The 100: Count ONLY Sugar…
- by Jorge Cruise
-
Average rating: 3.8 Average rating:
-
- The Skinny Rules: The Simple,…
- by Bob HarperGreg Critser
-
Average rating: 4.4 Average rating:
-
- The 20/20 Diet: Turn Your…
- by Phillip C. McGraw
-
Average rating: 3.2 Average rating:
-
- The New Atkins for a New You:…
- by Dr. Eric C. WestmanDr. Stephen D. PhinneyDr. Jeff S. Volek
-
Average rating: 3.6 Average rating:
-
- It Starts With Food: Discover…
- by Dallas HartwigMelissa Hartwig
-
Average rating: 4.5 Average rating:
-
- The 17 Day Diet Breakthrough…
- by Dr. Mike Moreno
-
Average rating: 4.1 Average rating:
-
- The Dukan Diet Cookbook: The…
- by Pierre Dukan
-
Average rating: 3.4 Average rating:
-
- The Fast Metabolism Diet: Eat…
- by Haylie Pomroy
-
Average rating: 4.1 Average rating:
-
- South Beach Diet: The…
- by Arthur Agatston
-
Average rating: 3.9 Average rating:
-
- Dr. Atkins' New Diet…
- by Robert C. Atkins M.D.
-
Average rating: 3.2 Average rating:
-
- Wheat Belly: Lose the Wheat,…
- by William Davis
-
Average rating: 4.0 Average rating:
-
- The South Beach Diet…
- by Arthur AgatstonJoseph Signorile
-
Average rating: 3.2 Average rating:
-
- The Blood Sugar Solution…
- by Mark Hyman MD
-
Average rating: 3.5 Average rating:
-
- Dr. Atkins' New Diet…
- by Robert C. Atkins M.D.
-
Average rating: 3.2 Average rating:
-
- JJ Virgin's Sugar Impact…
- by J. J. Virgin
-
Average rating: 4.0 Average rating:
-
- South Beach Diet: The…
- by Arthur Agatston
-
Average rating: 3.9 Average rating:
Recently Viewed
-
- The Dukan Diet: 2 Steps to…
-
Average rating: 3.2 Average rating:
Related Subjects
Add to Wish List
Pick up in Store
There was an error finding your current location. Please try again or enter your zip code below.