LighterLife 5:2 Diet - My Experience

I have been trialing the LighterLife Fastpacks as part of a 5:2 diet programme.  Overall my experience has been mostly positive.  I found I lost an average of 2-3 lbs a week if I ate well for the remaining five days of the 5:2 plan and I found that I felt pretty satisfied during the 600 calorie fast days. If I ate a bit too much on the five days I maintained my weight and didn't put any extra on.  It is very easy to follow and is an effortless and fuss free way of ensuring you get all your RDA of nutrients without exceeding the calorie count.

You can take a look at my earlier posts on the LighterLife 5:2 plan and on the LighterLife fastpack food.

I liked how convenient the plan was, you can choose which days you want to fast on and you can even take the Fastpacks with you away from home (kettle and microwave access is needed for some food preparation).  It works well around the family as you can eat together five days a week, making a dieting mum less of an issue for impressionable youngsters.  You can also work around special occasions where food is on the agenda, so you don't have to miss out on any events because you are on a strict inflexible diet.

The only negative I found was that I increasingly found that I missed fresh food. As my five day diet improved, I found the call for 'real food' did too. Don't get me wrong, the food is not at all unpleasant. In fact it is all really well flavoured.  But as a vegetarian much of my regular diet consists of fresh fruit, vegetables, pulses and lentils so the fastpacks are quite different to what I usually eat when I'm on a health kick. But I kept telling myself it was only two days a week and the benefits were clearly evident from the onset.  And so the convenience and reassurance of the programme outweighed this minor negative.

I'm not very keen on shakes as meal replacements if I'm honest.  Although these are quite filling, they just feel like a drink to me - not a meal.  So I was impressed to see LighterLife Fastpacks having the variety and including the meals which gave me the psychological benefit of having something proper to chew on for my dinner.  I was pleased that both the carbonara and bolognese are veggie friendly and tasty.

What the 5:2 diet did really well was give me the discipline that I sometimes lack when it comes to making decisions about eating.  Knowing that I could get by and not be hungry on 600 calories made me reassess my food intake.  This has lead to me being far more pro-active about healthy choices.  I have found the LighterLife Fastpacks to be a good short term solution for a 4-6 week diet that is incredibly easy to manage and which provides all the necessary nutrition. It is good to kickstart a healthy eating regime or to lose a few excess pounds before a special occasion.  It is also a really useful tool for ideal weight maintenance.

One thing I would like to see is a variety Fastpack box available.  At the moment the packs contain four of the same product.  It would be nice to see a day's food with a porridge, a soup, a meal and a bar available to purchase as a unit. That would make it more accessible to anyone wanting to do a one off short term 5:2 programme and try a variety of the foods available.

I thought the spaghetti bolognese was a really good diet meal that I would be tempted to enjoy as a low calorie lunch in its own right.  Also the Toffee bars would make a great everyday, low calorie and nutrient rich snack for when my sweet tooth needs sating.  So these products have potential to find their way into my diet even if I'm not doing the 5:2.

There was only one time that I really struggled which was the week when Freddy was really ill.  I was stressed, hadn't slept for nights and felt lousy.  Restricting calories when feeling like this did not work, leaving me feeling worse and very irritable. Commonsense really tells you that at times like this the diet has to take second place to simply getting yourself through a hard time.

And if I ever have to remind myself why it is important to keep my weight down and eat healthy I just need to look at this before mugshot photo.  I know selfie #2 is a bit blurred but the lack of extra chins is still clearly evident!  The LighterLife Fastpacks were just the kick start I needed after the excesses of Christmas and helped me avoid the comfort eating that often accompanies the miserable January weather.

For more information on LighterLife and the 5:2 Fastpacks go to www.lighterlifefast.com

Fastpacks are available in Superdrug stores and online.

LighterLife Fasting - How Easy is the 5:2 Diet?

I'm into the second week of my 5:2 diet plan using LighterLife Fastpacks on my fast days.  After week one, my weight had dropped by 3 lbs even though I had enjoyed an Indian takeaway on one of my 'normal' eating days.  Definitely the kind of dieting that appeals to me!

The LighterLife Fastpacks are much tastier than I thought they would be, and surprisingly filling even though the portion size is quite small.  Knowing that I am getting my full RDA of nutrients makes the 5:2 diet concept safe and reassuring.  I am not depriving my body of any vitamins or minerals, I am just cutting calories for two days a week.

The packs are easy to make up using water.  My advice though would be to put the mix into a bowl first then gradually add the water while whisking with a hand whisk.  Day 1's rather lumpy porridge taught me the lesson of proper mixing - you can't just chuck it in a bowl and microwave and hope for the best.  Since realising this, everything else has turned out perfectly well.

The porridge has a very fine texture, is sweet and creamy.   My kids said it looked like baby food, but I am one of those mums who secretly enjoyed the odd bowl of baby porridge or a smooshed rusk, so this was actually a positive to me!  I enjoyed it and it was comforting and filling. I have a late breakfast on my fast days, which I find stops me feeling hungry before lunchtime.

Lunch is a bowl of soup.  Again I enjoyed it as it is creamy, thick and highly flavoured.  I liked the little bits of vegetable in it, giving me something to chew on!  Again it was surprisingly filling for a bowl of soup.

The snack bars are actually quite big.  I have peanut bars and toffee bars which are both very nice.  they don't taste like a 'diet' product at all, which surprised me.  The peanut bar, pictured below is like a puffed wheat cereal bar crossed with a soft peanut brittle! The toffee bar is wafer and soft caramel in a chocolate coating.  They fill me up until dinner time and give you a sweet treat on fast days, plus they are packed with nutrients.

The pasta carbonara and spaghetti bolognese meals are both vegetarian dishes containing soya. I was honestly quite shocked that they tasted really nice. If I am honest, I expected something akin to a bland Pot Noodle but I was very wrong.  Both are really flavoursome with a good texture.  The carbonara, pictured below, was creamy with a real taste of smoky ham.  It was nice to have the pasta pieces and I felt quite satisfied afterwards.  The spaghetti bolognese is really yummy with soya mince and short pieces of spaghetti combined.  I have lost a few calories from my dinners because my daughters kept wanting to try them! So hats off to LighterLife for making 150 calories of dinner taste so appealing.

The overall experience of a fast day has been really positive.  I drank zero calorie drinks such as water and black decaff coffee.  I must confess that I did miss fresh fruit and veg on my first fast day, so I chopped up a carrot and kept it in the fridge to nibble on, just so I could eat something 'real'.  At only 30 calories, I feel this was a worthwhile addition that made the fasting much easier and satisfied that craving.  But knowing that I would be eating fruit and veg again the next day meant that missing fresh food was a very minor concern.

The food I am eating during the 5 normal days is what I would usually eat, meals such as vegetable stews, curries, Mexican dishes and Quorn based meals.  I am definitely noticing a psychological knock on effect from the fast days, making me eat better. On a whole, I am being more mindful of what I am putting in my body and not eating junk and unhealthy snacks between meals, as I don't want to undo the good I'm doing on my fast days. I still enjoy an occasional take away or meal out without worrying too much about my diet.  I find myself making better choices such as switching my usual Mocha to an Americano, or having fresh fruit as a snack.

I can switch around the fast days to suit myself as long as I choose two non-consecutive days.  So it fits in really well with my lifestyle.  I like the fact that I am not deprived of eating foods I enjoy during the week and I only have to be really strict on the two fast days.  But given that LighterLife have made the two fast days so easy, sticking to the plan is not an issue and takes minimal effort.  The 5:2 diet has given me a much needed focus on my diet after the excesses of Christmas and I do enjoy having a structure to my eating that drives me towards my goal.

You can continue to follow my LighterLife fastdays experience on Twitter @wendymcd83 with the hashtag #tryfast.

The 5:2 Diet Made Easy with Lighterlife

Last year everyone seemed to be talking about the 5:2 Diet, where you eat normally for five days then 'fast' for two days a week. Fasting days allow you to eat 600 calories.  In theory this sounded great to me as I am always looking for ways to keep myself mindful of my weight and I admit to enjoying the novelty of trying new diets. But I was concerned about the reality of coming up with 600 calories worth of vegetarian friendly food that would be nutritious enough to sustain me. It would have made the fasting days too complicated and stressful, and that hurdle was enough to put me off giving it a go.

LighterLife has joined forces with Superdrug to launch the first exclusive 5:2 Fasting products on the UK market.  The Fastpack range includes porridge, shakes, bars and meals in a variety of flavours.  Eating four of these products on a Fast day provides all the nutrients you need in a convenient way containing a ready calculated 600 calories.  It's very, very easy and fits in with busy lifestyles.  You don't have to cook separate meals for yourself or calculate calories or nutrients.  As you use them just two days a week, it is easy to work them into your weekly eating plan.  The meals, soups, porridge and shakes are easily made up using water so you can take them with you on the go, at the office or when away from home.

I was asked if I wanted to give the 5:2 diet a try for myself.  I am always happy to give diets a go as I am never more committed to healthy eating than when reviewing a diet plan!  After the excesses of Christmas, January is the perfect time to focus on healthy eating and shedding any gained weight.  For a short term diet plan, the 5:2 diet with Fastpacks sounds really easy and I am very interested in the concept of intermittent fasting as it is said to bring its own health benefits.

So today, on the first Monday of 2014, I will be embarking on my own 5:2 diet and reporting back weekly on how I am doing and how well the Fastpacks deliver on taste, convenience and satisfaction.  As a vegetarian, I was delighted to see the Fastpacks are all veggie friendly, even the savoury meals which contain soya and not meat products.

You can follow my journey here and I'll be updating on Twitter @wendymcd83 where I'll be using the #tryfast hashtag.

Available exclusively at Superdrug stores across the UK and Ireland, the new range start at £7.99 for a box of four Fastpacks^TM – which is enough for one day of fasting. The Fastpack^TM options include:

• Savoury meals such as spaghetti bolognese and pasta carbonara
• Porridge – the breakfast favourite!
• Four delicious shakes – vanilla, strawberry, banana and chocolate
• Four tasty snack bars in nut fudge, crispy peanut, cranberry & raspberry and toffee flavours (so you can indulge your sweet tooth!)

Fastpacks^TM are easy to make up and can be used on the go. They are fool-proof packs, which take the hassle out of 5:2 which makes intermittent fasting a sustainable lifestyle choice. 

There are promotional packs featuring the chance to win prizes over the 52 weeks of 2014 by entering a unique code online!

Find out more at: LighterLifeFast.com