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Anyone got some good recipes for the Bernstein diet?

42K views 49 replies 22 participants last post by  french fries 
#1 ·
Anyone got some good recipes for the Bernstein diet?

In short on the Bernstein diet you:
Can't have:
  • Oils
  • Butter
  • Cream
  • Carbs (pasta, rice, bread, etc)
  • No sugar, syrup, honey
Can have:
  • 3.5 oz of beef, chicken, shrimp or fish
  • 4 melba toast
  • 16oz veggies
  • vinegar
  • lemoms, limes, oranges
  • other fruits
  • Pam spray
  • Splenda (I think)
Basically the idea is to keep yourself in ketoses.

TIA
 
#3 ·
At this point no, but I am cooking for someone on it.

Also, I know several people on that, and it works. They have lost a lot of weight.

I know most of the diets out there are gimmicks, but this one seems pretty good, so I am considering trying it myself.
 
#4 ·
So would a debilitating illness "work" in that it would make you lose weight? This has been going around since i was a kid (and that;s a long time ago) - the "grapefruit diet" that my mother followed in the 60s, the atkins diet, and now they give it another name. Why not call it just the Ketosis diet. That's an illness, right? Tuberculosis, cancer and other diseases also make you lose weight, too. It "works" if you only consider one parameter - losing weight. Does it, i don;t say make you healthy, but at least not make you sick? No, it works because it makes you sick.

Also you can see the quackery in it, because "no carbohydrates" but 4 (count em, four) melba toasts. So if you ate the same amount of bread as there is carbohydrates in four (count em, 4) melba toasts, it would be different? And aren't there carbohydrates in fruit?

Sorry, don;t mean to be offensive, but this sort of thing makes me so mad. If they;re stupid enough to follow it and you are being paid for cooking it, it's not your fault. But i would like to meet this Bernstein person somewhere...
 
#6 ·
abefroman;276217 said:
Anyone got some good recipes for the Bernstein diet?

In short on the Bernstein diet you:
Can't have:
  • Oils
  • Butter
  • Cream
  • Carbs (pasta, rice, bread, etc)
  • No sugar, syrup, honey
Can have:
  • 3.5 oz of beef, chicken, shrimp or fish
  • 4 melba toast
  • 16oz veggies
  • vinegar
  • lemoms, limes, oranges
  • other fruits
  • Pam spray
  • Splenda (I think)
Basically the idea is to keep yourself in ketoses.

QUACKERY.!! If you go to a GOOD Doctor and ask him how to loose weight, he or she will tell you "Cut down on what you eat
 
#13 ·
Given the circumstances of the person you are cooking for, if it helps with the immediate necessary weight loss, all the better. Re-education later for lifestyle changes must follow.

I agree on the soups - heaps of variety there. Asian style soups utilising what's allowable on the diet Also stir fries. Although oil is out, you can lube the pan with some Pam, get the vegies frying, then add some non-fat, low salt chicken stock, or use veg stock. Poach the lean meat portion in the liquid, or cook the meat first on Pam, brown, remove from pan, do vegies, add your stock, re-add the meat to cook thru. You could use potato starch to thicken, if that's allowed.

Skewers of meat and veg flavoured with lemon juice, spray with Pam, broil or grill on bbq. Serve on bed of steamed veg (cabbage is a good "eye" substitute for pasta).

Lots of spices - paprika, pepper (is salt allowed? if not use lemon/lime juice), cumin, curry powder etc.

Dips like tzatziki, or salsas, along with crudite for dipping. Keeps the hands busy, fills you up, lots of crunch to replace that cracker crunch :)

Is cheese allowed? I would imagine probably not, but a little grated parmesan on baked vegies for variety should be ok. Parmesan is very strong tasting so you need nowhere near as much as say mozarella or cheddar. Baked jacket potatoes with plain low fat yoghurt, chives. All sorts of stuffings....grilled red peppers, olives...

Are eggs allowed? Or is it only the yolk which could be an issue? There's various threads here which deal with using excess egg whites, and if you can use splenda, then there are a number of deserts you can make, incorporating fruit too.

Deserts - "no sugar" jellies with allowable fruits. Fruit smoothies with greek yoghurt (is that allowed?)

Good luck with it - its not an ideal long term solution, but I do hope it works, and I hope this helps a bit.

DC
 
#15 ·
how do you remain active (as active as you NEED to be) without carbs?

pam spray? but no oils?

I always get flack for saying it. ALWAYS, but it's pretty simple math, burn more calories than you take in. create a deficit. Sure there are RARE cases where it's harder to burn calories, but....

sh*t...I gotta run marathons and like 40 miles per week to maintain my weight the way I eat!!
 
#19 ·
Brother, I woke up at 4:45am this morning to get a run in! and at work, thats my problem, I'm stuck behind a computer, with no movement, all day, very sedentary job. the only time I get up is to pee pee or go get food!

I'm going to italy for like 23 days on friday, I estimated that I'll run at least 24 hours while I'm there running. granted I love running as much as I love food.
 
#20 ·
Hm.... we're a bit off-track. Abe needs to cook for someone else who's on this diet- he's not on it. He wants recipes and ideas.

This looks not unlike the very low fat diets I was on/off/on for many years, with a low carb (low simple carb, to be more precise) element thrown in. Here are some things I used to do to make this way of eating more palatable, and also to scratch my itch to cook:
  • Warm salads topped with sauteed protein (shrimp, etc.) that has been marinated for extra flavor
  • Wraps using egg white for the wrap
  • Soups- as someone else noted- a great, filling and satisfying meal
  • Steamed vegetable casserole with bok choy (stems and leaves), mushrooms and tomato. I put the bok choy on the bottom of a Pyrex casserole, then added sliced fresh mushrooms and diced tomato. I poured over it a low sodium broth and a few dashes of low sodium soy sauce, covered and nuked it. Since bok choy is all of 10 calories per cup, you can eat a lot of it and stay on plan.
  • Make a cooked fruit sauce (rhubarb and strawberries, for instance) for a dessert, or cook it further to make a jam. I'll bet Splenda and/or stevia are allowed in measured amounts.
  • If eggs are allowed, I make mushroom fritters: chop mushrooms finely. Add chopped parsley (garlic, whatever else is allowed and preferred). Make crumbs from the melba toast. Beat one egg and add to the veggies and crumbs. Stir to combine. Fry in non-stick skilled with buttery-flavor pan spray (Pam or other).
That's all I can think of off-hand, but I used to make my diet coach nuts asking questions about what veggies I could use and in what ways! I was on NutriSystem many years ago, so I also had their products to work with and experiment with. That's where the mushroom fritter recipe came from.
Have a look at the South Beach Diet Phase 1 recipes. That's pretty similar, and it could also give you some ideas. Good luck!

Mezz
 
#21 ·
Yes it is cooking for another person but she also mentioned that she was considering it herself.
As a nurse/chef , I strongly recommend that IF ANYONE wishes to lose weight it should be discussed with a dietician as they have the knowlegde to properly guide someone on a regular basis while taking into conderation a person's medical history, weight, etc.
Forget the word DIET. Losing weight is all about changing a lifestyle. We do not go on a diet UNTIL we lose 20 pounds then go back to eating the same stuff that got those extra 20 pounds on in the first place but we make changes to WHAT we put in our mouth and HOW much.
With exercise added to the lifestyle change, the pounds will melt off faster.

This is my humble opinion.......
 
#24 ·
I think this is RIDICULOUS that most of you have jumped down this persons throat because they have asked for help with recipes to help someone who is trying to do something about a weight issue! Until you have walked a mile in an overweight person's shoes I think that you should NOT judge. Where are your manners people?? If you have nothing nice to say dont say it all! Sometimes all people are looking for is support because they can not find it anywhere else. To anyone out there doing any type of diet GOOD FOR YOU FOR MAKING AN EFFORT TO TRY TO BECOME HEALTHIER. The word diet means short term so if any of you are going to give advice why not give good advice...... During dieting on any type look forward to your future, re-plan how you will eat and healthier ways to cook food, try more fruit, veggies, fish, whole grains, look at taken your old favorite recipes and making them healthy. Keep a food journal to make sure you are eating enough of the right foods and drinking enough, join any type of excerise and be proud of your accomplishments. Its ok to treat yourself, just not everyday... pick one day a week:)

Sorry, this is a touchy subject for me after having two misscarriages and two children I have been on a rollar coaster with my weight so I DO UNDERSTAND the frustration of dieting. TO all of you out their trying to make a change, I congradulate you and wish you the best. For some of us putting ourself first is a very difficult thing to do because we are so busy trying to help everyone else..... All i am saying is that people should please mind others feelings and if you have nothing nice to say or nothing to say regarding the question on hand in the forum then just don't say ANYTHING and move on!

Thanks/img/vbsmilies/smilies/peace.gif
 
#25 ·
I know no one has posted on this thread in a while, but just in case someone is looking for Bernstein recipes, I'd like to make a couple of points. 

1) The Bernstein diet is to treat a MEDICAL CONDITION, so unless you suffer from this condition and are familiar with the medical science, you should keep comments about quackery to yourself.  Lots of people are alive today because of Dr. Bernstein.  Not kidding, even a little.

2) The original poster got the information a little wrong.  This diet does not include melba toast, or grain of any kind, but fats and oils are allowed, as is cream in limited quantity.  Fruits are also extremely limited - you could probably get away with a strawberry or two, but that would be about it.  However, within those parameters, there are lots of yummy vegetable or nut dishes that would be perfectly ok.

Good for him for trying to help out his friend. 
 
#26 ·
Actually, I am on the Bernstein diet now, and maybe where you are is different but the most recent list I was given last week says there are a number of choices for grain based carbs---albeit in tiny amounts----like mini Breton crackers---10 of them, but they could be used to coat the 3.5 ounces of chicken or fish for dinner---the first of two proteins a day.

There is available another 3.5 ounces of protein and I usually have egg substitute--- 3/4 cup egg beaters, mixed with some of the 16 oz of allowed vegetables---say 4 oz of tomatoes and 2 oz of spinach. Put veg in a tefflon pan, cook a bit, add egg replacement and you have a nice scrambled breakfast. Another of the carbs allowed, and you get two choices a day, is Finn Crisp rye rusks. I have one with some no fat cream cheese (1 tb allowed a day), and that along with the scramble makes a pretty nice breakfast. 

You dont stay full long, so in mid morning I will have 2 more oz of veg---say cucumber and red pepper, and a cup of strawberries---fruit is allowed and you can have two choices a day. You can also have an 8 oz cup of beef or chicken broth a day, so that makes a nice filling and comforting drink.

Lunch is the hard part because I like to save my last protein carbs for dinner, but a salad with lettuce, spinach, broccoli bits, mushrooms, asparagus, cooked or raw, cauliflower bits, and no fat dressing is ok. Then more fruit, like half an apple. Dinner is the "breaded" chicken or fish, with more of the 16 oz of veg, If you leave the chicken crumb free,  at dinner you can have your second carb. Pretty small amount of grain carbs allowed, but I am so happy to get it! And the other half an apple or whatever.

There is also a cook book that is given when one joins the program. It is also important to take the potassium/calcium vitamins, get the 3X/week B6 and B12 shots, the multi vitamin pill daily. You see a doctor every two weeks, and real nurses, not nurse assistants, three times a week. The most important thing is to drink the 8X8 oz of water or more a day---like decaf tea, coffee, aspartame drinks (yuck, I'd sooner have water) and real water.

Scrambles, stir fries, broiled or baked protein with steamed veg and lemon and fresh basil. It is limited but it is not for life. And yes yes yes I have to get active right now. The lack of activity in my life and the yummy things I can make, like chicken tortiere, are what got me to this state in the first place!  Start with 2 thirty minute walks a day. You might even have to get up extra early to do it before work...

I hope these ideas helped. I know this is a later posting, but weight loss needs good ideas for food, and it is a huge thing to master.
 
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