Healthy Intermittent Fasting 20/4 Recipes
Knowing what to eat on the intermittent fasting 20/4 is good, but being able to combine the recommended ingredients into a delicious and healthy meal is even better. There is no need to trawl through the endless rabbit hole of recipes online because this article has got you covered. Here are the best healthy and tasty recipes for your intermittent fasting 20/4 menu:
What Foods Do You Eat On The 3
The 3-Day Diet is a very specific food plan that is meant to be followed exactly as outlined. Portions must be eaten exactly as specified. Eating more than is recommended is not advised and it recommends dieters consume all meals, even if they are not hungry. Dieters are also instructed to drink 4 cups of water or other beverages that do not have any calories each day.
Foods to eat on The 3-Day Diet include:
- Day 1
- Black coffee or tea, with 1-2 packets Sweet & Low or Equal
- ½ grapefruit or juice
- 1 piece toast with 1 tablespoon peanut butter
May Help Lower Blood Pressure
Clinically supervised water fasts lasting up to 2 weeks have been linked to lower blood pressure . This has been further associated with the fact that you are drinking more water and not consuming salt. However, please note that fasting for 3 days is not likely to help lower blood pressure. This is only possible on longer medically supervised fasts.
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How Does Intermittent Fasting Work
There are several different ways to do intermittent fasting, but they are all based on choosing regular time periods to eat and fast. For instance, you might try eating only during an eight-hour period each day and fast for the remainder. Or you might choose to eat only one meal a day two days a week. There are many different intermittent fasting schedules.
Mattson says that after hours without food, the body exhausts its sugar stores and starts burning fat. He refers to this as metabolic switching.
Intermittent fasting contrasts with the normal eating pattern for most Americans, who eat throughout their waking hours, Mattson says. If someone is eating three meals a day, plus snacks, and theyre not exercising, then every time they eat, theyre running on those calories and not burning their fat stores.
Intermittent fasting works by prolonging the period when your body has burned through the calories consumed during your last meal and begins burning fat.
Foods To Eat After The 2
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Protein
Proteins are essential for the proper functioning of your body. That is why your after-fast meal should include a small portion of food that contains this macronutrient. It can be fish, lean meat, poultry, legumes and beans, tofu and eggs since they are packed with protein but dont provide you with tons of unhealthy saturated fat.
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Non-Cruciferous, Less Starchy Vegetables
Choose less-starchy, non-cruciferous vegetables cooked in healthy fats. This will add to your after-fast ketosis and make it easier for your body to digest your food. You can also consume avocados since they are filled with fiber and healthy fats.
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Bone Broth
Bone broth is one of the best meal choices after you finish fasting. It is packed with various micronutrients that promote the proper functioning of your body and especially the gut since it contains plenty of minerals and gelatin, which is super beneficial for your intestinal permeability .
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How To Speed Up Your Weight Loss With Intermittent Fasting
That said, some of us need to lose quite a bit of weight. I go through phases where I try to lose a lot quickly high days and low days as I call them. Coming back from a family vacation I announced: Im going in for another 20! All I mean by this is that I am stepping things up and going through days of cutting my calories for a short period of time. I do this in two ways:
1) I skip a meal I go on a 2-day water fast.2) I eat a calorie-restricted meal in my one meal a day .
Both approaches cut calories. The first is just an extreme version. I dont do either for long, more just to break through a stall or speed things up. I return to eating my bigger 1200 calorie meals. I actually rarely count.
As an aside for how shocking this calorie restriction may appear, I had been approved for bariatric surgery when I launched into this whole diet, leading me onto a path where I no longer qualify for the surgery. Under that plan, I was to eat 800 calories a day for a year and then step it up to a banquet-like 1200 calories. I lose weight now on 1200 calories, diving into some days with fewer calories than that. My maintenance calories are closer to 2000 whereas they would have been 1200. If you are concerned that I am depriving myself of nutrition with such a radical diet, I was on the path to something more restricted and approved of almost completely by the medical community.
The Downside Of Two Weeks Intermittent Fasting 1: 8
- The desire to push it: On many occasions, I feel the pull to see how far I can go. I know some people do extended fasts of several days to several weeks. While this isnt my goal, I do find myself wanting to see when real hunger will set in.
- Feeling like it may be too good to be true: It feels like a dream come true to be free from food addiction, and part of me cant believe it. Im a little afraid that its not real, and something will come along and burst my bubble of bliss.
- Clothes getting too big very rapidly: This is not really a problem, but I can tell it might get expensive! Not complaining though!
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Intermittent Fasting 16/8 Vs 20/: Which One Should You Try
If you are a beginner, the 16/8 method would be better for you than jumping headfirst into the intermittent fasting 20/4 method. Unlike the latter, the former gives you less time to fast, translating into a longer feeding window. Once your body gets used to the 16:8 variation, then you could choose to attempt a 20/4 intermittent fasting meal plan.
My Water Fasting Results
One of the very super sensational feelings Ive experienced after 7 days of drinking water only was that I felt reinvigorated. It was like I came back from holidays LOL
I was more energetic than before, I felt healthier and I was more motivated to exercise. So, after a few days, I started jogging for 1 hour every morning.
I didnt crave for chocolates, pastries, or any of these stuff and was more focused on preparing healthy salads for lunch.
Weight Loss
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Since there was no calorie entering my body, my ketone bodies were getting higher and because of this, my bodys source of energy was not glucose anymore.
Instead, my body looked out for energy directly from my fat storage. Because my body was now in a ketosis state, I was able to burn fat much faster than a typical low carb diet. Thats why I lost 22 pounds in just one week.
Natural Detoxification
During a fasting period, our liver is triggered to pull all toxins out of your body. And I could feel the improvement in my body and health although I have any health issues.
Rejuvenation
When your body is clean of toxins, your organism is like new.
As my body got cleansed during this week of fasting, I could really feel a boost in my energy level. I was more motivated to exercise and I started jogging for 1 hour every day.
Its not something I can explain but I was way more productive, more focused, and more concentrated in my work.
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Read Others Experiences In The Comments
If you have any doubts about your own fasting experience, read through the comments below and in my Water Fasting Tips, and Benefits of Fasting posts. Theyre full of inspiring and entertaining stories, different experiences and opinions, and great questions.
And, of course, feel free to contribute!
It Will Not Lead To Fat Loss
While some people do this diet for the potential health benefits, many are attracted to the fasting for 3 days diet as a way to lose weight. However, as mentioned above most of the weight loss is water weight and not fat loss. Longer fasts could lead to an average of 0.9 kgs weight loss per day in the beginning and about 0.3 kgs by the third week . But again, this weight loss is most likely due to loss of water weight and loss of muscle mass.
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Mushroom Spinach & Potato Pie
This super easy and delicious mushroom, spinach and potato pie is perfect for meal prep or a family dinner. It is also meat-free and vegetarian-friendly.
Ingredients for 4 servings:
- 400g baby spinach
- 500g mushroom
- 300g cooked new potatoes, cut into bite-sized pieces
- 300g each green beans and broccoli, steamed
- 1 cup vegetable stock
- 2 heaped tbsp light crème fraîche
- 1 tsp freshly grated nutmeg
- 3 sheets filo pastry
Directions:
Nutritional value of 1 serving:
Calories: 215, carbs: 29g, fats: 8g, protein: 9g
What Is 20/4 Intermittent Fasting
Successful weight management is based on counting calories. If your goal is to slim down, you need to reduce your caloric intake and create a caloric deficit if you want to bulk up, you need to make sure that you eat a calorie surplus and if you simply want to maintain your current weight, you continue following your regular diet. But what if you dont like counting calories? Is there a diet that can help you reach your weight goals without having to track the energy contents of your every meal? Luckily, there is! The so-called diet in question is known as intermittent fasting.
Intermittent fasting is an eating pattern that has been widely accepted by many people trying to lose weight. Of all the different methods to do it, intermittent fasting 20/4 is one of the stricter versions. What are some intermittent fasting 20/4 benefits? Is intermittent fasting 20/4 everyday healthy and sustainable long-term? Read on to find out this and more.
The intermittent fasting 20/4 method is also known as The Warrior Diet. This diet was created in 2001 by Ori Hofmekler, an Israeli Special Forces member turned health and fitness author. It is important to note that the warrior diet is not based on science but rather a deduction of Oris experiences while he worked in the military .
Also, some supporters of this eating pattern claim that humans are natural nocturnal eaters and that eating at night allows the body to gain nutrients in line with its circadian rhythms .
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Why You Dont Need A Detox Diet
It sounds logical that fasting could cleanse your body of harmful substances that could cause a host of ailments like obesity, fatigue, and headaches. But there is no scientific evidence that you need to fast to “cleanse” your body or remove toxins.
Your body – specifically, the kidneys, liver, lungs, colon, and skin — is perfectly capable of removing toxins itself.
How Much Weight Can You Lose In A Week Fasting
According to a 2014 review, intermittent fasting reduced body weight by 38% over a period of 324 weeks . When examining the rate of weight loss, intermittent fasting may produce weight loss at a rate of approximately 0.55 to 1.65 pounds per week .
How much weight can you lose in a week fasting?
- When examining the rate of weight loss, people lost about 0.55 pounds per week with intermittent fasting, but 1.65 pounds per week with alternate-day fasting . People also lost 4-7% of their waist circumference, indicating that they lost belly fat.
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What Are The Proposed Health Benefits Of Fasting Diets
As mentioned, the research on intermittent fasting is limited, but mice studies and small studies in humans suggest the approach may in fact be effective.
For example, in one of Varadys studies, published in June 2018 in Nutrition and Healthy Aging, 23 human participants completed 12 weeks of eight-hour time-restricted eating, and researchers compared their weight loss results to a control group from a separate trial.
Varady and her team observed that the time-restricted group lowered their body weight by 3 percent more on average compared with the control group, and they significantly lowered their systolic blood pressure. But the sample size was small, and the dropout rate among the fasting group was high, at 26 percent, for even a short-term trial, though no one in this group reported dropping out due to issues with the diet, researchers wrote.
But what about alternate-day fasting? While Varady hasnt conducted studies directly comparing alternate-day fasting to time-restricted eating, another one of her studies, published in July 2017 in JAMA Internal Medicine, showed that alternate-day fasting was difficult to stick with and didnt result in better weight loss or heart benefits than a calorie-restricted diet. For the study, she and her team randomized 100 participants to follow one of the two diets or a control group, where their diets remained the same, for one year.
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How Long Have You Been Following Intermittent Fasting
Just started? If you have only just started intermittent fasting it might be that it takes a little while for your body to adapt to the new system. While most FastDay members find an immediate drop in weight on the scales, this early loss is largely due to changes in body water. It may be that you did not lose so much water and so the scales may not show a decrease straight away. Even using the tape measure to measure your waist may be slow to show a difference depending on where you are losing the fat.
FastDay says: wait at least a month before deciding there is a problem.
Been fasting for months and no longer losing weight? If you have been successfully losing weight but seem to have hit a plateau, there are several possibilities:
FastDay says: keep calm and wait for a month before deciding you have really plateaued, but in the meantime try counting calories on your non-fast days as well as fast days to check you are not eating more than you think. If you find that you really have stopped losing weight, consider adding another fast day if you are currently doing a 5:2 fasting pattern: upgrade to 4:3 or even ADF.
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Day Water Fast For Weight Loss Results
Interested to know what a 7-day water fast for weight loss will do to your body?
Even though it may sound extreme a 7-day water fast isnt impossible to do. In fact, it can be an effective way to kickstart your weight loss and health.
If youre stuck in a weight loss plateau then doing a 7-day water fast will help to reignite your weight loss. Or even if youre finally ready to take your weight and health seriously then this is for you.
When you think about it our ancestors didnt always have easy access to food. It wasnt as easy as grabbing a bag of Cheetos and Doritos from the pantry.
When food was scarce theyd go days or even weeks without it. They didnt have food delivery services like DoorDash back then.
Nowadays were zombies to food as were conditioned to eat so much of it all the time. How often do you find yourself mindlessly snacking during the day?
Theres nothing in the rule book of nutrition that says you have to eat all the time. One of the reasons people are so overweight today is our bodies are constantly trying to burn off all the calories and carbs. But then theres always more to spare which get converted to fat on your body.
Im sure youll agree there are some powerful benefits to doing a 7-day water fast for weight loss but there are also some dangers you should know about.
Here youll find out what happens to your body when you do a 7-day water fast, how much weight you can lose and how to hack it for the best results.
