Lose up to 7lb in FIVE days and get ready for the beach with the Dukan Holiday Diet (2024)

By Daily Mail Reporter
Updated: 07:29 EDT, 27 July 2011

Dreading the moment you hit the beach this summer? Does even packing your swimming costume fill you with terror?

The new Dukan Holiday Diet, starting exclusively in today’s Mail and continuing all next week, could be the answer to your prayers.

It’s the protein-packed weight-loss plan that’s swept Britain and now it’s been adapted by Dr Pierre Dukan himself to get you ready for the beach.

Of course, it’s only a few months since Carole Middleton used the Dukan Diet to get ready for a certain wedding. Kate’s mother revealed the secret of her quest to slim down for the big day in an interview. ‘I’ve been doing it for four days and I’ve lost 4lb,’ the 56-year-old revealed.

Speculation soon followed over whether her willowy daughters might have been adopting the principles of the diet plan, too.

Certainly the Dukan diet has been the most high-profile and universally popular weight loss regime since the Mail announced its arrival in Britain in April 2010.

Since then, this high-protein, low-fat eating plan has been credited with swift weight loss among those for whom dieting is a struggle and also the glitterati.

Jennifer Lopez credits Dukan for the toning of her famous curves, actress Penelope Cruz says Dukan snapped her back into red carpet shape after the birth of her daughter, and Welsh singer Katherine Jenkins swears by its simple methods to keep her looking great for the cameras.

The diet plan was devised by French doctor Pierre Dukan to provide his obese patients with a weight-loss solution that didn’t sacrifice the great Gallic love for food. After 20 years of research Dr Dukan published his findings in 2000 in his book I Don’t Know How To Get Slimmer, which became a bestseller.

Central to the plan is that it acknowledges the pleasure to be had from eating and promises efficient weight loss while enjoying unlimited quantities of real food.

It is these principles — and this speedy weight loss — that make Dukan such a perfect way to get in shape for your summer holiday, and why Dr Dukan himself has developed a special plan for the Mail to get you ready for the beach.

Starting today, and continuing next week, the Mail will show you how to use this new Dukan Holiday Diet to lose weight fast — and then keep it off during your holiday and stay trim when you return.

Follow Dr Dukan’s plan from Monday, and by next weekend you could lose as much as 7lb!

Over five days, we will show you how to adapt the diet to suit the amount of weight you want to lose, and how to eat when you go on holiday. And, don’t worry, you can still have a great time enjoying delicious food and a glass of wine each day.

To help you, on Monday and every day next week, the Mail is giving away a glossy Dukan recipe card to help you lose weight. You can pick up yours from Tesco or WHSmith. The cards will suggest what to have for dinner during the first five days of the Dukan Holiday Diet — including dessert.

Then, inside the paper every day, you’ll get a daily meal planner with delicious options for breakfast, lunch and snacks.

‘It is very important that on holiday, you feel special and not deprived,’ Dr Dukan says.

‘A holiday is not a punishment, even if you’re on a diet. You don’t have to suffer, and there’s absolutely no reason why you should automatically gain any weight at all.’

Independent registered dietician Dr Sarah Schenker agrees.

‘Huge quantities of carbohydrates, particularly refined carbohydrates (white bread, pasta and rice) are just not good for your health, so the Dukan low-carb, protein-rich system strikes a mid-balance closer to a healthy way of eating than many of us realise,’ she says.

‘Even people who do not have a weight problem could learn a lesson from the Dukan system, by switching to a couple of carb-lite days after a carb-heavy weekend.’

HOW DUKAN WORKS

The Dukan Diet is not one, but four interconnecting diets designed to work against the body’s natural reluctance to let go of excess weight, and to ensure the pounds that are lost don’t come back.

It starts with a short, sharp Attack phase where you eat nothing but protein — just meat, fish, eggs and (unlike Atkins) no-fat or very low fat dairy products. This is the kick-start that gives you the initial, rapid weight loss, and sets the tone for the other stages of the Dukan plan.

Dr Dukan says this first stage of the diet produces obvious and immediate results — many people can expect to lose as much as 7lb in just five days.

‘There’s nothing wrong with spending one to five days in the protein-only Attack phase of the diet if you are otherwise healthy,’ says Dr Schenker.

‘It is an effective way to kick-start a diet. Even though much of the initial weight lost will be water, the speed of weight loss can be encouraging, and there’s a lot to be said for the motivational benefit of seeing your weight tumbling down.

‘As avocados, nuts and seeds are banned in the early stages of the diet, you should try to include oily fish in your protein selection (up to two portions a week for women of childbearing age, and up to four portions a week for men and post-menopausal women) to ensure you have a good intake of essential fats and fat soluble vitamins.’

You stay on the Attack phase from one to ten days depending on how much weight you have to lose, before moving on to the Cruise phase. This is the workhorse stage of the diet where you alternate the pure protein days of Attack with days when you add a delicious array of unlimited salads and vegetables to your wide selection of meat, fish and no-fat dairy products.

On Cruise, you can start a meal with a salad or soup, then follow it with meat or fish and vegetables. Most dieters lose a 2lbs a week during the Cruise phase, and stay on it until they reach their target weight.

The majority of diets would only take you this far, but Dr Dukan noticed how often his patients’ weight would begin to creep back up again once they reached their target weight and resumed their old eating habits.

To counter this, he created a third Consolidation phase for when you reach your ideal weight. In this stage, in addition to unlimited protein and salads/vegetables, you put fruit (one piece a day), bread (two slices), cheese and starchy foods like pasta (in moderation) back on the menu.

You are even encouraged to have two totally unrestrained ‘celebration meals’ a week — with alcohol, butter, bread, chocolate . . . or any other foods you truly love, but usually feel guilty about.

This is an important part of the diet’s acknowledgement that food, in all its variety, must be relished and enjoyed if you are going to stay at your target weight for ever.

Dr Dukan’s research shows that sticking to the Consolidation stage for five days for every 1lb you lose, allows the body to permanently establish its new equilibrium.

The fourth and final stage, Stabilisation, allows you to eat and drink whatever you like without guilt or restriction, with one caveat: only protein on Thursdays. For ever.