Lost 8 kgs in a month from “unhealthy” pies

Stuff reports:

A Christchurch man lost eight kilograms in a month living on pies and beer.

Julian Lee, a reporter for Newshub, became slimmer after four weeks pioneering the pie and pint diet.

Lee ate three to four pies (depending on meat content) every day. Once a week he was allowed to swap one pie for three beers.

When he stepped on the scales live on Wednesday's Story, he found that he'd lost 8kg. On top of that, his blood pressure had dropped from an unhealthy to a normal level.

Lee modelled his diet on US nutrition professor Mark Haub, whose “convenience store diet” – Doritos, cereal and sugary snacks – made headlines back in 2010.

Like Haub, Lee was aiming to prove that it didn't matter what you ate when trying to lose weight – what's important is limiting your calorie intake.

This blows apart all the claims of the activists that some foods are “bad” and must be banned from tuck shops and the like.

It is your overall calorie intake that will determine if you gain or lose weight.

“It used to be that fat was the bad guy, then carbs were the bad guy, now 's the bad guy. Some people, including myself, don't have any idea about what's what. I just wanted to prove that all it is is energy in, energy out when it comes to weight management.”

Yes, which is why sugar taxes are a nonsense when it comes to weight and obesity. They are just one source of calories.

At 1.83 metres tall, it is estimated Lee needs 2500 calories per day to maintain his body weight. On the pie and pint diet, his daily intake was 1600 calories.

Although Lee's low calorie count seemed to be helping his body, he said the lack of nutrients wasn't doing his mind any favours.

“Mentally I'm slowing down quite a bit. My body's loving it but my mind's really not loving it at all,” he said.

“I'm definitely getting scratchy, like grumpy, scratchy. I've taken a multi-vitamin every day, but it's not enough.”

An all pie and beer diet is not a great idea in terms of overall vitamin intake. But purely for weight loss it shows that it is all about portion sizes.

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