The Skinny Rules: The Simple, Nonnegotiable Principles for Getting to Thin

by Bob Harper, Greg Critser

Overview

THE LAST DIET BOOK YOU’LL EVER NEED
 
With so much conflicting weight-loss advice out there to confuse your efforts, it’s no wonder you haven’t been successful losing weight and keeping it off. But with Bob Harper, superstar trainer and co-host of NBC’s hit show The Biggest Loser as your personal authority and coach, you can and will finally shed the pounds—whether you want to lose two or two hundred!
 
Distilling Bob’s vast knowledge of nutrition, weight-loss strategy, and human nature down to twenty simple, nonnegotiable principles, The Skinny Rules will help you step away from a reliance on processed foods and the need for so much sweet and salt and step into a newly thin lifestyle. And Bob’s methods couldn’t be more straightforward.
 
Taking the guesswork out of implementing the Skinny Rules, Bob offers a month’s worth of menu plans and more than 90 delicious, rule-abiding recipes for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks to keep you cooking and eating skinny for life. You’ll be happily astounded to see the variety and volume of the tasty food on your plate! He also includes terrific tips for what to stock in your fridge and what to prepare every weekend in order to set yourself up for success during your too-busy-to-cook weekdays.
 
A virtual GPS to your weight-loss goals, The Skinny Rules takes the mystery out of the process, offering the fastest route to your skinny destination.
 
LOSING WEIGHT IS NOW AS SIMPLE AS 1-2-3 . . . AND 3-15-18-20 TOO!
 
Rule #3: Eat protein at every meal, making some kind of fish your go-to protein as often as you can. Take your weight and divide it by two—that’s more or less how much protein you should be eating in grams every day.
 
Rule #15: Eat at least ten meals a week at home (and cook them yourself). Restaurant portions are usually 40 to 50 percent bigger than what you’d serve at home—the more you eat out, the more you overeat. Set yourself up for success by preparing my turkey meatballs, hummus, and roasted vegetables on the weekend so that you will have go-to staples and no excuses!
 
Rule #18: Go to bed slightly hungry. Denied fuel for more than five hours, your body will start burning its own fat and sugar. Make a point not to eat after dinner and you’ll be burning fat while you’re sleeping.
 
Rule #20: Enjoy a splurge meal once a week. Unlike episodic bingeing, splurge meals are an ingredient in your diet. When you plan something, you are in control.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780345533128
Publisher:	Random House Publishing Group
Publication date:	05/15/2012
Series:	Skinny Rules Series
Pages:	304
Sales rank:	121,207
Product dimensions:	5.70(w) x 8.30(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Bob Harper is a world-renowned fitness trainer and star of the NBC reality series The Biggest Loser, which finished thirteenth season in 2012. With several bestselling fitness DVDs, his own line of supplements, an online fitness club, as well as the inspirational book Are You Ready? to his credit, Harper still teaches a local spin class where he resides in Los Angeles with his dog Karl.
 
Greg Critser is a longtime science and medical journalist. The author of the international bestseller Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World, he lives in Pasadena, California.

Read an Excerpt

RULE 1

DRINK A LARGE GLASS OF WATER BEFORE EVERY MEAL—­NO EXCUSES!

This has got to be the easiest rule there is. Which is a good place to start. But it’s also one of the most important rules there is. You simply must stay hydrated. At a minimum I want you to drink a large glass of water before every meal. But I’d prefer that you drink at least five glasses of water a day, the first one within fifteen minutes of waking.

Now, do I really need to harass you about this? I do. Because during the process of losing weight, nothing is so crucial to your success. Water keeps your organs healthy while you’re sweating, keeps food moving through the system, and makes you feel full.

Let me put this plainly: drinking water helps you lose weight. You can see this most vividly in very overweight children. Recently, a group of Israeli researchers examined the resting energy expenditure (REE) of twenty-­one obese children. REE refers to the rate at which you burn calories when you are sleeping, watching TV, or just simply sitting there and staring into space. The researchers gave the kids a large serving of cold water, then began measuring the REE every 10 minutes. The reaction was more robust than anticipated. Within 24 minutes, REE began increasing. By 57 minutes, REE had increased by 25 percent, and this effect lasted 40 minutes.

Did you get that? Just by drinking water, your body increases its burning of calories. The scientists estimated that, if you just do this, you’ll burn off an extra three pounds over the next year.

That doesn’t sound like a lot, but I’ll take it. Won’t you?

The contestants on The Biggest Loser are usually chronically dehydrated, and their collective experience shows another reason to drink lots of water. They are usually pretty big consumers of salt before they come on the show. They eat it unknowingly—­in the fried and highly processed foods that are their usual mealtime fare and that helped make them so overweight in the first place—­and knowingly; too many of them often add salt to whatever they are served. They are usually eating so much salt that they have begun to mess up the delicate mechanisms of chemical balance so vital to our bodies. When the kidneys are swamped with salt and without adequate liquids, you don’t get enough potassium. That and other minerals are absolutely key to weight loss.

And as my private fitness clients have shown me, drinking more water helps in other physical ways as well. When they start conscientiously drinking lots of water, their workouts improve. They get less muscle fatigue, they recuperate faster, and they don’t feel groggy in the afternoon.

Simple Hydration Tips

Make it your premeal policy: drink a large glass of water before every meal. No excuses.

End the day with preparation for a good start to the next: put a large, full glass of water on your bedstand every night and drink it when you wake up, every morning.

Get a little extra bang for your effort: mix a pitcher of water with a noncaloric vitamin and mineral supplement. I like ElectroMix (one little packet makes a quart), and having the pitcher all mixed and right in front of you will make it that much easier to pour yourself a glass when you open the fridge at every meal; I usually drink mine when I work out.

RULE 2

DON’T DRINK YOUR CALORIES

Caloric beverages steal your health and they steal great food from you. That’s right. They steal it because they are so heavily caloric themselves and will fill you up with all the wrong stuff. Think of the kinds of caloric beverages all around you.

Soft drinks: As you heft one of those cans or buckets of sugar water to your mouth, consider that you are actually eating the equivalent of what should be your entire lunch.

I came to this rule while working on TBL. When I reviewed their pre-­TBL meal plans I saw that most contestants were drinking Big Gulps or other massive jugs of soda that had 500 calories. Some people would nurse several of them during the day (that’s upwards of 1,500 calories of soda a day!). Think of it this way: all that corn syrup? It’s a bushel of corn! And remember, when factory farms want to fatten their cattle, what do they do? They feed them corn. So if you are drinking things with corn syrup, think about that. Are you a cow? No you are not.

Moreover, when you drink soda, you are ingesting what just about every legitimate medical authority in the world has named as suspect number one in today’s sprawling diabetes epidemic. A friend of mine tells me that his teenage kids really got the message a few years ago when their father was diagnosed. Now, when a family member asks for a soda, they cheerily reply: “Sure. What kind of diabetes do you want?”

Out of the mouths of babes.

If, like most Americans, you are used to drinking lots of liquid calories, cutting out soda might be a tough adjustment. But it’s essential that you kick your soda habit ASAP. If you’re a full-­calorie soda drinker, you’re guzzling empty and unsatisfying calories. If you’re a diet/zero-­calorie soda drinker, you haven’t dodged the problem. Hello?! You’re guzzling artificial sweeteners and, as you’ll hear again and again in this book, I don’t think highly of these at all. They only serve to whet your appetite for more sweet! Stop the madness. Kick the habit.

To help wean yourself from your soda habit, start experimenting with other flavored, noncaloric drinks that you can make yourself. Try seltzer water with lime or lemon juice. Stock up on unsweetened, naturally flavored herb teas. Make a quart or so at a time and keep it in the refrigerator to go with your afternoon snack. And there is my tried-­and-­true alternative—­the “soda eliminator” described in Rule 15. Check it out.

Juices and juice drinks: Most juices have exactly the same number of calories—­and the same amount of simple sugars—­as a cola. Oh, you’ll protest, but doesn’t the fiber in a “natural” juice obviate that problem? No. That’s just what you’ve been told. It is the same as drinking a soft drink. You want fruit? Eat fruit. The whole piece of fruit. Not the extracted and manipulated juice.

Yeah, well, juice smoothies are healthy, right? Maybe “healthy” if you order one with no preservatives or added sugar, but regardless, fruit smoothies that you haven’t made yourself (i.e., you have controlled the portions and know exactly what’s gone in it) will make you as fat as a Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade float—­just like a 32-ounce soda.

Energy replacement drinks: Well, yeah—­if you’re training for a marathon. Otherwise, look at the label! A 20-­ounce sports drink—­let’s face it, that’s how much you’ll “need” to quench that big thirst—­weighs in at 130 calories. Like a 12-­ounce cola, but without the nifty zing of bubbles and caffeine. I’ve always seen drinks like these as particularly insidious, because they are, in our heads at least, deeply associated with sports, which are deeply associated with health and fitness. You have to break that connection.

Artificial Sweeteners

Though the scientific jury is still out on whether there is a direct relationship between consuming artificial sweeteners and the urge to eat more sweet-­tasting things, I know this from experience with clients, with The Biggest Loser contestants, and with myself: the more “sweet” you eat, the more you want it. Another way to put it: when you taste sweet (even the tiny-­calorie, artificial kind), you are conditioning yourself to continue wanting and even craving that same sweetness. That continued craving isn’t going to help you lose weight—­ever. The biggest favor you can do yourself is to leave your sweet consumption to your splurge meal and learn to keep sweet indulgences in perspective: they are treats, not everyday affairs.

A latte on the way to the gym? Sorry. Milk also has a tanker-­full of calories. True, coffee itself—­which most of the world drinks without milk, by the way—­is turning out to be a positive dietary element, although it’s still unclear why and how much. I’ll get back to that later, but for now, no lattes or chais, frappes, or mochas. If you must get something Euro, get a cappuccino, which contains very little milk (if made the right way), or even an Americano, in which you can better control the amount of milk. And if you must add milk, opt for the low-­ or no-­fat varieties. No cream. No half and half. Whole milk? No again.

Alcohol: Although it might sound odd, if there’s one source of liquid calories that warrants some leeway in my no-­sweetened-­beverage world, it’s booze. Wine, particularly red wine, deserves a place on your shelf—­and on your table. But not when you are trying to lose weight! Until you are at your goal weight, it’s best to view alcohol the same way you would a Big Gulp. When you get to your goal, red wine is the thing. When you’ve kept to your goal, we’ll talk beer.

In the same way I want you to step down from soda, I want you to immediately lay off the cream or half-­and-­half in your coffee. Don’t even go for the whole milk. Step down, step away! Start putting 2% milk or nonfat (skim) milk in your coffee and ordering any coffee-­based drink that way too. Today.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Eat What I Tweet! xi

Part I The Skinny Rules

Rule 1 Drink a Large Glass of Water Before Every Meal-No Excusesl 5

Rule 2 Don't Drink Your Calories 8

Rule 3 Eat Protein at Every Meal-or Stay Hungry and Grouchy 14

Rule 4 Slash Your Intake of Refined Flours and Grains 25

Rule 5 Eat 30 to 50 Grams of Fiber a Day 31

Rule 6 Eat Apples and Berries Every Single Day. Every. Single. Day! 35

Rule 7 No Carbs After Lunch 40

Rule 8 Learn to Read Food Labels So You Know What You Are Eating 42

Rule 9 Stop Guessing About Portion Size and Get It Right-for Good 50

Rule 10 No More Added Sweeteners, Including Artificial Ones 53

Rule 11 Get Rid of Those White Potatoes 56

Rule 12 Make One Day a Week Meatless 59

Rule 13 Get Rid of Fast Foods and Fried Foods 63

Rule 14 Eat a Real Breakfast 67

Rule 15 Make Your Own Food and Eat at Least Ten Meals a Week at Home 71

Rule 16 Banish High-Salt Foods 76

Rule 17 Eat Your Vegetables-Just Do It! 79

Rule 18 Go to Bed Hungry 83

Rule 19 Sleep Right 86

Rule 20 Plan One Splurge Meal a Week 89

Part II The Skinny Way

Set Yourself Up for Success 100

The Menus

Week 1 Menus 111

Week 2 Menus 123

Week 3 Menus 133

Week 4 Menus 144

Part III The Skinny Tools

The Core Recipes

Proteins 161

Eggs 162

Fish 164

Poultry 167

Red Meat 169

Beans 170

Vegetables 171

Dressings/Sauces 182

Three Core Extras 187

More Skinny Way Recipes

Breakfast Options 191

Lots of Lunch 213

Delicious Dinners 239

Notes 261

Acknowledgements 265

Index 267

Editorial Reviews

So what recommends this diet book? The numbers. Host of NBC's The Biggest Loser, which draws nine million viewers per episode, Harper boasts 350,000 Facebook friends, 160,000 Twitter followers, and 80,000 unique visitors per month at mytrainerbob.com; more than 850,000 viewers have seen his YouTube videos. And his face will be appearing on 130 million Quaker Oats boxes in the months to come. Harper condenses the usual recipes, menus, tips, and techniques into 20 (dare I say) bite-sized pieces. In demand, no matter how many diet books there are.

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