The “Eco-Atkins” rundown (once again – for fairness sake)

Now I clearly stated previously, that I’m not a big fan of this diet, for several reasons:

1) Its not REALLY a low-carb diet (more like slightly lower-carb)

2) They use the ‘Atkins’ name for marketing only (kind of a bastardization)

3) Its a vegetarian diet (serious lack of quality protien sources)

4) It implies that ‘Regular Atkins’ is inferior and harmful (which is bunk)

I also come to realize that there is very little information on the web regarding this diet, and a good number of people stumbled upon my previous post (as snarky as it is) looking for Eco-Atkins information. So here it is, albiet through the looking glass of my perspective.

I mean, if people really are well meaning and WANT to know about a (slightly) healthier way of eating and I’m in a position to inform them – by all means. Helping people and caring is what its all about.

Eco-Atkins in a nutshell or a legume (literally)

Here is the breakdown of the diet straight from the horses mouth – actually its from a recent study on the diet, conducted by none other tahn the study’s inventor and main proponent, as well as some Canadian soy companies (funded by them, assumably).

“The low-carbohydrate [Eco-Atkins] diet provided the minimum level of carbohydrates currently recommended (130 g/d) and eliminated common starch-containing foods, such as bread, baked goods, potatoes, and rice. The protein content was provided by gluten (54.8% of total protein), soy (23.0%), fruits and vegetables (8.7%), nuts (7.5%), and cereals (6.0%). Gluten was provided in the nut bread and wheat gluten (also called “seitan”) products and, together with soy, in burgers, veggie bacon, deli slices, and breakfast links. In addition, soy was provided as tofu and soy beverages. Nuts included almonds, cashews, hazelnuts, macadamia, pecans, and pistachios. The fat was provided by nuts (43.6% of total fat), vegetable oils (24.4%), soy products (18.5%), avocado (7.1%), cereals (2.7%), fruits and vegetables (2.3%), and seitan products (1.4%). The diet was designed to provide 26% of calories as carbohydrates, 31% as protein, and 43% as fat.”

This diet was created by Professor David Jenkins of The University of Toronto, (yes, this is the same David Jenkins who created the Glycemic index – which in itself kind of a damage-control move against low-carb, Atkins-type diets since he was concerned that vegetables were being demonized too harshly – thus he created a new scale for them) – it stands to reason that he wanted to try and merge the successfulness of the Atkins plan with the “healthiness and hipness” of a vegetarian diet. That way the low-carb people would be happy, the anti-meat people would be happy, and maybe Atkins supporters would be happy by association. Right?

Well, Not really.

First of all, it uses the “minimum level of carbohydrates currently recommended” (assuming they’re referring to the National Institute of Health numbers on that one), which by his calculations comes out to 130g daily. 130g? Are you kidding me? Now, granted, that is lower than the current American consumption level (200-300+g carbs per day I believe), but still no-where near the amount of carbs you’d have to cut to in order to kick-start the metabolic changes neccessary to create the REAL low-carb benefits (somewhere in the 20 – 50g range – depending on who you talk to).

I understand that eating all these “alternative protein sources” that are part of the diet all have carb additives or are naturally high in carbs themselves – so maybe on a non-meat diet that has and adequate amount of protein you basically HAVE to eat 130g carbs just to reach your daily protein requirement (which he doesn’t mention in the study or on his site)

If you’re really interested in this – I’d reccomend that you pick up a copy of the REAL Atkins book, or even Protein Power – and then try to adapt it to a more vegetarian plan, I will warn you though – they make a pretty good case for eating meat. I would too, you’ll feel better, be healthier, and lose more weight by doing a standard low-carb diet that is rich in animal derived proteins.

To each their own. if any die hard vegetarians are looking to be challenged or have an open mind, I would urge you to check out Stephen Budiansky’s excellent “The Covenant of the Wild: Why Animals Chose Domestication” – its great for getting an overall historical perspective on what we eat and why.

Note: Oddly enough – many people search for ‘Eco-Atkins Book’, probably assuming that its a new publication from the Atkins people themselves, this is where I think the marketing messages get bastardized and can be misleading – There is no Eco-Atkins Book per se – but maybe Jenkins can whip one up (I seriously doubt he’d get away with calling it ‘Atkins’ though)

Now, as I have clearly stated previously, that I’m not a big fan of this diet, for several reasons:

• Its not REALLY a low-carb diet (more like slightly lower-carb)
• They use the ‘Atkins’ name for marketing only (kind of a bastardization)
• Its a vegetarian diet (serious lack of quality protein sources)
• It implies that ‘Regular Atkins’ is inferior and harmful (which is totally bunk)

But, (and that’s a big-ass but) I also come to realize that there is very little straight-forward information on the web regarding this diet, and a good number of people stumbled upon my previous post (as snarky as it is) looking for Eco-Atkins information. So here it is, albeit through the looking glass of my perspective.

I mean, if people really are well meaning and WANT to know about a healthier way of eating and I’m in a position to inform them (and maybe convince them to try my method) – by all means its worth a shot. Helping people and caring is what its all about. Just keep in mind that I’ll always tell the truth, good or bad.

Here is the breakdown of the diet straight from the horses mouth – actually its from a recent study on the diet, conducted by none other than the study’s inventor and main proponent, as well as some Canadian soy companies (and funded by them, presumably). It seems pretty complicated to me actually.

This diet was created by Professor David Jenkins of The University of Toronto, (yes, this is the same David Jenkins who created the Glycemic index – which in itself kind of a damage-control move against low-carb, Atkins-type diets since he was concerned that vegetables were being demonized too harshly – thus he created a new scale for them) – it stands to reason that he wanted to try and merge the successful-ness of the Atkins plan with the “healthiness and hipness” of a vegetarian diet.

Well, Not really.

First of all, it uses the “minimum level of carbohydrates currently recommended” (assuming they’re referring to the National Institute of Health numbers on that one), which by his calculations comes out to 130g daily. 130g? Are you kidding me? Now, granted, that is lower than the current American consumption level (200-300+g carbs per day I believe), but still no-where near the amount of carbs you’d have to cut to in order to kick-start the metabolic changes necessary to create the REAL low-carb benefits (somewhere in the 20 – 50g range – depending on who you talk to).

I understand that eating all these “alternative protein sources” that are part of the diet all have carb additives or are naturally high in carbs themselves – so maybe on a non-meat diet that has and adequate amount of protein you basically HAVE to eat 130g carbs just to reach your daily protein requirement (which he doesn’t mention in the study or on his site).

If you’re really still interested in this – I’d recommend that you pick up a copy of the REAL Atkins book, or Protein Power – and then try to adapt it to a more vegetarian plan, I will warn you though – they make a pretty good case for eating meat. I would too, you’ll feel better, be healthier, and lose more weight by doing a standard low-carb diet that is rich in animal derived proteins.

To each their own. if any die hard vegetarians are looking to be challenged or have an open mind, I would urge you to check out Stephen Budiansky’s excellent “The Covenant of the Wild: Why Animals Chose Domestication” – its great for getting an overall historical perspective on what we eat and why.

Note: Oddly enough – many people search Google for ‘Eco-Atkins Book‘, probably assuming that its a new publication from the Atkins (I seriously doubt he’d get away with calling it ‘Atkins’ though) people themselves, this is where I think the marketing messages get bastardized and can be misleading – There is no Eco-Atkins Book per se – but maybe Jenkins can whip one up if you’ve got a few bucks to spare…

Bottom line: Posturing and marketing fodder from people who have bigger agendas (and lobbyist groups behind them). Notice how all the media outlets jumped on that study and tried to say it was the greatest new thing – even though the study it self, was less than impressive…