Weight Loss Goals: How the Miami Mediterranean Diet Works
If you have weight loss goals, you may want to learn how the Miami Mediterranean Diet works! In researching the top diets in America, I’ve learned that the Mediterranean Diet is easily the diet most favored by nutritionists, dieticians, and researchers. But, I’ve also discovered that there’s actually a Miami Mediterranean Diet - which is slightly different than the Mediterranean Diet.
So, I did a Q & A with cardiologist Dr Michael Ozner, author of The Miami Mediterranean Diet, to discover the differences between the two diets. Before we go there, check out what he says about fitness and Americans:
“Americans have a skewed vision of fitness,” says Dr Ozner. “They think they have to join expensive gyms, sign up for classes, or take precious hours out of their already jam-packed schedules to lose weight. Once again, misinformation has gotten in the way of motivation and good sense.”
Simply changing the way you think about your fitness and weight loss goals can increase your motivation and healthy habits. Here, Dr Ozner describes three effective ways to lose weight. Plus he answers all my questions about the Miami Mediterranean Diet - including whether he and his family takes his own advice! For more info about his diet, click on the book cover of The Miami Mediterranean Diet. And, read on for our Q & A…
Weight Loss Goals: Weight Loss Tips from Dr Michael Ozner
Dr Ozner, what are three practical, effective ways to lose weight?
1. Enjoy your food. I like to remind my heart patients and readers that one of the best ways to lose weight is to really love to eat. Surprised? Look at the Mediterranean cultures, such as Italy and Greece, where the entire family and social culture centers around meals. They savor their meals, enjoy a glass or two of red wine, have long conversations around the table with family and friends. That’s how to lose weight. Make eating well a celebration and a part of your life. When eating and life in general become stressful, your body produces stress hormones that impede digestion and slow down your metabolism.
2. Use strong flavors. Another practical way to lose weight is to eat foods that are strong-flavored. Make sure your healthy mixed green and raw vegetable salad has some “prizes” in it–a cube of snappy feta cheese, a couple of pungent Greek olives, a sardine. Spread roasted garlic and minced sun-dried tomatoes on crusty whole grain bread for a punch of flavor. Strong-flavored foods create variety and increase satisfaction, which helps you achieve your weight loss goals.
3. Eat dinner early. Have your last meal by 6 pm if you can swing it. The earlier you eat, the longer your body has to digest it and start burning excess fat. If you eat late at night, your body will be digesting during your sleeping hours, which is not an efficient way to use up calories.
Weight Loss Goals: How the Miami Mediterranean Diet Works
Dr Ozner, what’s this diet all about - and how will it help us lose weight, stay slim, and get healthy?
The Miami Mediterranean Diet is a Mediterranean-style diet that is adapted to North American tastes, lifestyle, and foods. It produces an average of 4 to 6 pounds of sustainable weight loss per month (which is a worthy weight loss goal!), and features delicious, satisfying meals that help people stay on the diet for life–because they don’t feel deprived in any way. It helps people learn the right way to eat for maximum health–whole grains, lean protein and fish, fresh vegetables and fruits, nuts, beans and legumes, red wine, and lots of spices and flavorings. It is more than a diet. It is a lifestyle based on stress reduction, quality sleep and rest, laughter with family and friends, and regular physical activity that’s easy to fit in.
The Mediterranean Diet is the only diet that has undergone decades-long clinical studies and has been consistently rated as the world’s healthiest diet. It has been shown to increase longevity and prevent heart disease, obesity, diabetes, many cancers, and Alzheimer’s, among other health conditions.
What’s the difference between the Miami diet and the more traditional Mediterranean Diet?
The Miami Mediterranean Diet has been adapted to meet North American cooking and shopping habits, and new developments in food science. For example, newly developed non-hydrogenated buttery spreads are a great, healthier replacement for butter. Pomegranate juice, which has only recently become widely available, has been shown to lower blood pressure and help reverse the build-up of fatty deposits (atherosclerosis) in our arteries, so we use it as an ingredient in glazes and desserts. We have also adapted some of the ingredients to be more consumer friendly, featuring seafood, for example, that’s readily available on our shores. Overall, the Miami Mediterranean diet is designed for the North American palate and lifestyle–easy, filling, family-friendly dishes such as pasta and pizza that everyone loves (which will help you stick to your weight loss goals).
Do you and your family follow this diet?
Not only do my wife and I follow this diet, but I’ve been following it myself for more than thirty years. I was one of the first cardiologists in the field called Preventive Cardiology, where we helped heart patients avoid costly and dangerous heart surgery through making dietary and lifestyle changes, using stress management, and taking advantage of the judicious use of medications, when necessary. We found that our heart patients could halt the progression and actually reverse their heart disease by following a Mediterranean-style diet. The fact that they lost 50-plus pounds a year was, frankly, a happy side benefit. My wife and I both eat this way, and are quite fit and extremely healthy.
What would surprise readers to learn about the Miami Mediterranean Diet, or dieting in general?
What might surprise most people who “diet” is that dieting causes weight gain. People who start the Miami Mediterranean diet are always shocked that they are allowed to eat fat (olive oil, for example) and that they are allowed to eat so much. That’s because scientists now know that certain foods help with fat metabolism, and other foods–such as diet sodas–will impede your blood sugar levels and actually cause your body to produce more fat. Losing weight is not about starving yourself. It’s about feeding yourself well! The Miami Mediterranean diet is based on the best scientific studies available, and also a very long track record that no other diet out there can lay claim to.
More about this cardiologist: Dr. Michael Ozner is medical director for the Center for Prevention and Wellness at Baptist Health South Florida, and medical director for the Cardiovascular Prevention Institute of South Florida. Author of The Miami Mediterranean Diet (BenBella Books, 2008) and the forthcoming The Great American Heart Hoax (BenBella Books, Dec. 2008), he is recipient of the 2008 American Heart Association Humanitarian Award, and has been recognized by the Consumer Council of America as one of the top physicians in America.
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Comment by Laurie Pawlik-Kienlen on 1 January 2009:
Women on the Mediterranean Diet eat twice as many fruits and veggies as women not on it, says new research from the University of Michigan Health System. These women were also counseled by dietitians - which shows how effective nutritional counseling can be! The more fruits and veggies you eat, the more likely you’ll achieve your weight loss goals…but remember to balance your meals with protein and healthy fats.