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The 5 major problems with severe dieting are:

• a loss of muscle mass;
  
• reduced vitamins and minerals;
  
• a decrease in body water rather than body fat;
  
• reduced energy and increased fatigue; and
  
• constant hunger.
  

When it comes to belly fat and dieting, studies have shown that belly fat is easier to lose than subcutaneous fat. However, if you only cut the amount of calories you consume and don’t exercise, you will lose some belly fat in the first 2–3 weeks but after that your belly fat loss will plateau.
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The diets used in these studies have typically been starvation diets. Thus, the majority of diets, irrespective of their nature, are not sustainable in the long term, either because they are nutritionally poor or because they are tedious, difficult to carry out and expensive. What is needed instead is an eating plan that does not involve counting calories or starving your-self. Eating plans should be healthy but at the same time be fun and sustainable. A balanced eating plan should contain little junk food and processed food, small amounts of red meat, good fats and carbohydrates, and lots of plant protein. The eating plan we recommend is the Mediterranean eating plan.

The Mediterranean eating plan to help reduce belly fat

The Mediterranean eating plan is closely tied to areas of olive cultivation and involves eating lots of fruit and vegetables, beans, bread, nuts, whole-grain cereals, fish and seeds. White meat is eaten occasionally and red meat sparingly. Good fats, coconut, olive oil and omega-3s (fish oil) are consumed instead of saturated animal fat. Processed food is rarely eaten. A moderate amount of wine is consumed, usually with meals. A moderate amount of dark chocolate, a good source of antioxidants, is allowed, whereas junk and fried food is eliminated.

The cardioprotective effects of omega-3 fatty acids, polyphenols, oleic acid, natural antioxidants and folic acid, all contained in the Mediterranean eating plan, have been demonstrated.
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Consumption of foods rich in arginine, an amino acid that is contained in nuts and fish, has been associated with decreased inflammation. High-fibre diets have also been associated with lowered inflammation levels. Inflammation is part of the body’s immune response to something that enters or irritates our bodies. Inflammation often occurs when we pick up a bacterium or virus or when a joint gets injured after an accident or sporting injury. Inflammation can also occur by becoming overweight as a result of a lifestyle that involves little exercise and a diet consisting of lots of processed food.

Inflammation is detrimental to our health; it has been found that people with coronary artery disease typically have high levels of inflammation. The high medium-chain fatty acid content in olive oil has been shown to improve blood-fat profiles and reduce cardio-vascular risk by reducing the amount of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol and enhancing the amount of high-density lipoprotein cholesterol found in the blood. Medium-chain fatty acid intake has also been shown to lower concentrations of insulin and glucose. Importantly, the Mediterranean eating plan works to improve health even if you don’t happen to live in the Mediterranean area.
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How the Mediterranean eating plan works is unclear, but the fruit, vegetables and nuts in the program contain lots of phytonutrients that have high antioxidant and folic acid levels. There are also significant health benefits from consuming healthy fats, such as monounsaturated olive oil and the polyunsaturated omega-3s contained in fish oils.

How to calculate your Mediterranean eating score

Some people will have a number of Mediterranean foods already in their current diet, so it is useful to assess how much Mediterranean food you are eating. This can be done by calculating your Mediterranean eating score by answering the questions in the table below.
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To use the table, write a score in the right-hand column that reflects your typical diet. For the beneficial components, if you eat more than the average per day, your score is 1. For example, consuming more than 500 grams of vegetables per day would give you a score of 1. If you eat less than 500 grams of vegetables then your score would be 0. For the detrimental components, if you eat less than the average, your score would be 1. For example, 90 grams or less of meat per day would give you a score of 1. If you eat more than 90 grams of meat then your score would be 0.

Studies have shown that people experience significant health benefits after improving their score from 2 to 4, so health can be enhanced without having to achieve a perfect Mediterranean eating plan score of 8.

Mediterranean food

When cooking the Mediterranean way, grilling and boiling are the preferred methods.

Beans, peas and pastas

Beans contain lots of fibre, protein, healthy carbohydrates and iron. Most beans are also good sources of magnesium, which is important for heart health, and calcium, which is important for bone health. Healthy beans and peas include black-eyed peas, chick peas, green peas, lentils, snow peas and black, kidney, lima, pinto and navy beans.

Beans contain almost no fat and are low in calories. Sometimes called legumes, beans are one of the best plant sources of protein, fibre and iron. Because beans contain high levels of protein, a single serving can suppress your appetite for hours. Beans can also contribute to your daily fibre requirements. For example, there are approximately 8 grams of fibre in half a cup of cooked lentils, which amounts to about 25% of daily fibre needs. Unfortunately, most canned beans contain high levels of salt in the form of sodium. Check the nutrition label to make sure you only buy unsalted beans. Alternatively, buy dried beans and soak them according to packet instructions before cooking them.

Most pastas and noodles are full of simple carbohydrates and have little nutritional value. Processed pasta and noodles are also treated with a chlorine dioxide bleaching process, which destroys most nutrients. Over-processed noodles and pasta should be replaced with pasta and noodles like wholemeal pasta, spelt pasta, rice pasta, kamut pasta, quinoa pasta, ramen noodles, soba noodles and udon noodles.

Beverages

One glass for women and 2 for men of alcohol per day is permitted on the Mediterranean eating plan. All alcohol appears to have health benefits if taken in moderation.
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Avoid sugary soft drinks and fruit juices as they contain refined sources of sugars, especially fructose. Replace soft drinks with water, green tea or coffee, which all have proven health benefits.

Chocolate

Dark chocolate and cocoa powder contains numerous antioxidants and high amounts of iron. One cup of cocoa powder provides about two-thirds of daily iron requirements. In contrast, a typical chocolate bar contains about 6% cocoa, so it is important to buy quality dark chocolate that consists of at least 70% cocoa if you need to satisfy a chocolate craving.

Dairy products

Low to moderate amounts of dairy foods, such as cheese, milk and yoghurt, are allowed on the Mediterranean eating plan. Low-fat or fat-free dairy foods should be used instead of full-fat versions.

Fats

The main fat used in the Mediterranean eating plan is olive oil, which has been shown to lower LDL (bad) cholesterol and increase HDL (good) cholesterol. Make sure to buy virgin or extra-virgin olive oil. Olive oil undergoes minimal processing so it retains its healthy plant antioxidants. In contrast, most other polyunsaturated oils, such as canola, safflower and corn oil, are heated and treated with solvents to improve their shelf life and appearance, which decreases their healthy plant compounds.

Fruits

Fruits are healthy and taste delicious. They contain lots of vitamins A and C and other health-supporting nutrients. People who consume 4–5 portions of fruit each day have low levels of heart disease, stroke and hypertension. Although the vitamins in fruit promote health, taking these exact vitamins in the form of supplements does not appear to enhance health as much. Fruit also contains fibre, minerals and antioxidants that, together with vitamins, work synergistically to protect against lifestyle diseases. All fruits are healthy but the following are nutrient-dense and appear to have the most disease-fighting potential: apples, bananas, blueberries, grapes, kiwis, oranges, papayas and strawberries. Other healthy fruits typically consumed on the Mediterranean eating plan are: cherries, dates, peaches, grapefruit and melon; most of these fruits contain high levels of vitamin C.

The majority of fruits have similar amounts of glucose and fructose. Apples and pears, however, contain more fructose than glucose. Fructose needs glucose to help it get out of the small intestine, therefore those people who eat a lot of apples and pears end up with fructose remaining in their small intestine. For some this situation causes colonisation of bacteria that cause problems such as abdominal pain and discomfort – these people are fructose-intolerant. To test if you are fructose-intolerant, stop eating apples and pears and drinking fruit juice or soft drink for 2 weeks and see if the discomfort goes away. If it does, then you are likely to be fructose-intolerant.

You should try to eat fresh fruits as much as possible. Unfortunately, the nutritional value of fruit can decrease rapidly if they are left for days in your house or do not arrive fresh to the supermarket. Chemicals such as pesticides are also used in fruit and vegetable farming to increase production, although the levels of these chemicals that are allowed in foods in most developed countries are considered safe. Pesticides are still toxic chemicals that kill agricultural pests, however, and they can cause health problems for humans if consumed in large amounts. If you want to avoid pesticides, buy organic food which is grown without the use of chemicals and pesticides.

Nuts and seeds

Nuts and seeds are another important part of the Mediterranean eating plan. About 80% of the calories in nuts come from fat, although the majority of fat in nuts is unsaturated. Nuts contain high calories, so try not to eat more than a handful per day. Healthy nuts include raw almonds, brazil nuts, cashews, pine nuts, hazelnuts, peanuts, pistachios and macadamias. Pumpkin, sesame, sunflower and flax seeds are also full of iron and other phyonutrients. All nuts and seeds should be unsalted and eaten raw.

Poultry and red meat

Neither poultry nor red meat should be consumed in high amounts when on the Mediterranean eating plan. Ideally, limit red meat to 1 or 2 meals per month. Although poultry appears to be healthier than red meat, it depends whether you are getting your chicken from a free range or a battery farm. Chickens reared on battery farms are abused animals, as they are typically packed by the thousands into massive, crowded sheds. They are fed large amounts of antibiotics and drugs to keep them alive, and these antibiotics make chickens grow large at an extremely fast rate. You only have to go to the supermarket and compare the size of a free-range chicken to a battery farm chicken to realise that something is wrong. A free-range chicken is always much smaller because it is not receiving antibiotics or being fed nutrients that increase its growth; if you want to eat chicken, make sure it is free-range. Chicken is a good source of protein, but when we eat beans, legumes, seeds and grains we can get protein, vitamins and iron in a much healthier form.

Seafood

When on the Mediterranean eating plan you should consume 2 servings of fish or shellfish per week, in place of red meat and poultry. Seafood typically consumed on the Mediterranean eating plan include: flounder, lobster, mackerel, mussels, oysters, prawn, salmon, squid and tuna.

Seasoning and spreads

In the Mediterranean eating plan, spices replace salt for seasoning. Spices typically consumed on the Mediterranean eating plan are: chilli, cinnamon, cloves, garlic, ginger, paprika, parsley, sage, saffron and turmeric. Two herbs that can be used to replace salt are garlic powder and freshly ground black pepper (not pre-ground pepper). Other options include onion powder (not onion salt). Butter and margarine are not used on the Mediterranean eating plan. You can replace them with coconut butter or nut butter.

Vegetables

Vegetables are a good source of protein, fibre, vitamin C, beta carotene, calcium and folate. Vegetables contain small amounts of calories but have high levels of nutrition. All vegetables are cholesterol free and nearly all contain no saturated fat; those that do usually have it in small amounts of healthy unsaturated fat. The energy in vegetables comes from a sugar called complex carbohydrate. Complex carbohydrate takes much more time to digest than simple carbohydrate, and consequently results in much lower levels of sugar (glucose) and insulin in the blood. However, some vegetables have a high glycemic index, which means that, when eaten, they result in high levels of sugar and insulin in the blood. High-glycemic vegetables include beetroot and corn.

When on the Mediterranean eating plan, around 5–7 servings of vegetables should be eaten every day. If you reduce your consumption of red meat then you should eat vegetables that are high in iron and vitamin C to prevent low iron levels, a condition known as anaemia. Vegetables containing high levels of iron are cooked Swiss chard, cooked turnip greens, raw kale and raw beetroot greens, whereas those with high vitamin C are broccoli, red and green chillis, capsicum, fresh thyme and parsley, and dark leafy vegetables such as kale and cress. Other healthy vegetables typically consumed on the Mediterranean eating plan are artichokes, celery, eggplant, lettuce, onions, peas, peppers, mushrooms, sweet potatoes and tomatoes. You should try to eat fresh vegetables whenever possible. Similar to fruit, the nutritional value of vegetables is reduced when they age on the shelf. The good news is that frozen vegetables and canned fruit contain about the same amount of healthy nutrients as when they are fresh.