Example Mayo Ketogenic Diet

Premise

The following indications are for information purposes EXCLUSIVELY and are not intended to replace the opinion of professional figures such as doctor, nutritionist or dietician, whose intervention is necessary for the prescription and composition of CUSTOMIZED food therapies.

Mayo diet

The Mayo ketogenic diet (which has nothing to do with the known and contemporary "Mayo clinic diet") is a dietary strategy invented at the beginning of the last century and revived with some modifications in the 1980s.

The Mayo diet lasts about 14 days, of which 12 are slimming and 2 of rest or recovery; this is a fairly extreme and absolutely NOT RECOMMENDABLE method, which aims to significantly reduce weight in a useful time of two weeks.

The Mayo diet is NOT calculated but uses daily caloric intake well below 1000kcal and divided into only 3 daily meals: breakfast, lunch and dinner. The key principles of the food choice according to the Mayo diet are the following:

• Abolition of ALL condiments, except those for the CONTOUR
• Abolition of milk and derivatives, except 1 yoghurt over the 14 days
• Abolition of cereals and derivatives, except 1 slice of bread per day
• Abolition of legumes
• Abolition of potatoes
• Abolition of fruit, except the GRAPEFRUIT
• Abolition of added sugars and sweet foods
• Vegetable consumption limited exclusively to: celery, tomato, cucumber, salad and spinach
• Consumption of 6-36 eggs per week, with the possibility of replacing them with meat or fish cooked on the grill or with steam
• Free consumption of drinks like coffee and tea.

The main meals of the Mayo diet (28 in total) "should" be managed as follows:

• 10-12 egg meals
• 10-12 meat-based meals
• 3 fish-based meals
• 2 fruit-based meals
• 1 yogurt-based meal

Negative aspects of the Mayo diet

I reiterate that the Mayo diet is NOT balanced, therefore it represents a highly uncountable food scheme; obviously, if the primary requirement of a weight-loss therapy is the effect of weight reduction, the Mayo diet would surely boast an excellent reputation, but it is not. In fact, the first goal of the "diet", whatever it is, is to preserve the health of those who perform it and, of course, this is not the case!

The Mayo diet is EXTREME; as such, it can only bring about a considerable level of stress for the body. First of all, the Mayo diet CANNOT be applied to sports subjects or even simply "active", since the caloric intake and that of carbohydrates are absolutely insufficient to support any type or level of physical and motor activity. Secondly, the balance of macro and micronutrients is almost non-existent and the fact that the authors advise against extending it beyond 14 days is to be interpreted as a warning. The contribution of animal fats (due to the quantity of eggs and meat) is worrying to say the least; in 14 days a person following the Mayo diet could take almost 10, 000mg of cholesterol (the lipid which, if present in excess in the blood, is potentially responsible for atherogenic phenomena). In this regard, considering that a good portion of the obese population presents AT LEAST a form of metabolic alteration (correlated to the reduction in life expectancy), I would dare to say that the Mayo diet is absolutely not the most suitable solution for weight loss. Last but not least, the potential depletion of muscle tissue; this happens in the body's attempt to meet the daily energy needs, therefore following the massive demolition of tissue proteins due to hyper-activation of hepatic neoglucogenesis, in turn aimed at glycemic maintenance.

Food supplements useful for the Mayo diet

The useful supplements for the Mayo diet are, more or less, all those on the market! This statement is not absolutely excessive or provocative, but faithfully respects the nutritional needs of anyone who dares to follow it.

This means that Mayo diet CANNOT be considered a harmless or applicable food strategy; making use of many supplements COULD reduce the physical discomforts and the problems related to it, but certainly it would constitute a remarkable choice.

Food supplements MUST have the function of completing the nutritional intake of a diet compromised by valid or inevitable reasons, and not that of limiting the damage conferred by obsolete and potentially harmful nutritional strategies.

Example 7 days of Mayo diet

WARNING! In the example that follows, it will be my pleasure to change the frequency of consumption of food of animal origin by drastically reducing the eggs and favoring the consumption of fish, so as to make the dietary pattern as unbalanced as possible (a company, alas, anyway impossible!)

Example Mayo Diet - Day 1

Example Mayo Diet - Day 2

Example Mayo Diet - Day 3

Example Mayo Diet - Day 4

Example Mayo Diet - Day 5

Example Mayo Diet - Day 6

Example Mayo Diet - Day 7 - Rest