I had the same experience quitting coffee on the "sugar diet" you described. Lifelong coffee drinker, quit and restarted many times. Currently drinking fruit juice and/or peppermint tea with ~100g of honey every morning instead, and almost zero desire for coffee.
Is that a real quote from Also Sprach Z? I tried reading it but had no idea what the f was going on.. he goes into the forest and talks to a dead guy or something.. wtf
I've been told you basically need to be reading an annotated version because it's so metaphysical.
Interestingly I find myself less interested in coffee during very high fat moderate to low protein very low to no carb stints (HFlplc?). Actually, I just have less thirst in general on such diet. I haven’t noticed this with any other diet though and in my pre keto / carnivore years I definitely on occasion had some mostly fruit stints (including notably just drinking smoothies for a bit after some dental surgery).
I'd expect this to work better with a timing element. The main metabolic function of fructose is to relatively directly replenish liver glycogen (which will tend to be depleted after an overnight fast or exercise), while glucose goes into general circulation. Fructose metabolism in the liver is strongest in the morning or early afternoon. So I'd expect a crude heuristic of sugar (e.g. fruit and juice and honey) ad libitum before 2PM, and starches (e.g. rice) ad libitum afterwards, to work better than an all-sugar all-day diet.
I thought that one deprecated PM starches? I'm proposing something like either a circadian-optimized Kempner diet (fruit and fruit juice in the morning, plain rice or potatoes in the afternoon), or you could relax the protein restriction and let lean meat consumption vary separately ad lib.
I did generate the idea partly by thinking about what might make the honey diet work for some.
Though overall it just seems like you personally might do worse on carbs and I don't want to contribute to torturing you.
Fruit til noon/then starch seems to be working for a bunch of more "normal" people, whereas the full on sugar fasting diet seems to be mostly hyperactive athletes or bodybuilders, from what I can tell.
Great writeup! I've tried the sugar diet thing mostly by eating pure sugar/fruits until a certain hour then having a protein re-feed in the evening on super lean chicken with no fat added to it and had okay results, though did have plenty of energy and felt great.
I did a strict sugar only/fruit only two days ago for one day and it was fine, but after that one day of doing it strict I don't think I'll do it again. It just doesn't feel good, at all, and I cannot imagine doing it several days in a row. Pretty sure I could even feel the inflammation as I started feeling odd pains here and there throughout my body.. At this point I am just sticking to eating a ton of bananas/apples (I love them) and having leaner proteins with starches in the evening, though I will try adding in more fats as I had a swampy meal yesterday with lots of butter and some coconut milk and oh God, it was so amazing.. Heck, maybe I'll go keto again. It's just the cost that's prohibitive, sadly.. I am saving so much money eating the way I do right now, lol.. (Beef is insanely expensive here now for even the cheapest supermarket ground beef, as is butter and chicken if not on sale.. Pork is cheap, but I avoid pork beyond a "treat" here and there as I quickly feel sick from it)
> black beans, beef, green beans, tomato sauce, mushrooms, spinach, onion, even beets.. so I made a giant stew pot w/ almost no caloric food in it.
That seriously sounds SO GOOD, omg.. Wish you shared a pic with us, haha.
I hope your ex_kempner goes well!! Not too far from what I am doing, if you exclude my lean meat, lol.. I love rice, I love fruits.. Just worried about the caloric restriction, though maybe eating a lot of fruits will help with that as they seem to be quite filling for me, and I often have them as a dessert after eating my dinner, as I'll still feel hungry but just a little bit, and 1-2 apples will often do the trick for me and fill me up.
Funny, cost wise it's the opposite for me. I spend <$7/day usually on ex150 with only 150g of beef (1lb lasts me 3 days) and the rest just spent on cream.
On the honey diet with high fruit, I was spending $50+ a day lol I think.
As I am less concerned about proteinmaxxing now, when I go keto again I might try something closer to your approach eventually and see how that works out, and just have 1lb of beef for 2-3 days vs 1.5-2lb every day.. lol.. and the lb cost here is like $8.5-9/lb, rip.
Fun fact, prior to covid it was very often on sale for ~2/lb so the price increase has been insane.
Here it's about $5-7/lb, depending on the type and what quality you want. For $9 you can get goat or pretty decent grass-fed stuff.
High meat carnivore gets pricey quickly, yea.
Wow $2 - I don't know if I've ever seen ground beef for that low. I def remember it being on sale for $3 though, but that was lower quality and 70/30 which is insanely fatty. I usually prefer 80/20.
Super interesting, thanks for the article. I've been trying the sugar diet, too. I also notice veggie/savory cravings. So I tend to have a sugar phase and then either for lunch or dinner have (usually cooked) veggies. Something like zucchini and eggplant in tomato sauce, cucumber dipped in ketchup, red cabbage with apple, a stir 'fry',tomato juice with seasonings as a soup. All of it low fat, low starch. Seems to be working well so far, yesterday I had to 'cheat' since I was eating lunch with friends and had some vegetarian food (probably with pufa) and had totally planned to have a doner kebab for dinner (before lunch, when I was super hungry), but ended up going back on the diet organically, zero interest in the doner. I was always the type to say 'fuck it, let's just eat everything now' after a diet slip. Pretty neat!
Ha, unfortunately I couldn't find exact instructions for that part of the diet.
Although I found this interesting phrase in The Rice Diet Report:
Those who request it (or who are perceived to need it) are referred to outside psychotherapists, but for the majority. Dr. Kempner's mix of diet, exercise, and "motivational enhancement" is more than enough to do the trick.
In my experiments with a sugar / honey diet I've had two roadblocks: First I had a sort of hungover feeling, slightly dizzy and just weird. Now it seems that any time I have a new low on the scale I somehow crash, have a day of massive fatigue, the fatigue leads to going off the diet and a major weight gain the days after. I often get back to new lows a few days after and repeat the cycle. It seems to work only when I'm very active, sometimes I even get the urge to exercise but I don't yet know reliably how that can be achieved.
The most difficult part for me is the protein restriction, once I have a little lean protein without fat it causes massive hunger for me, much like when I tried glass noodles, full stomach massive hunger. And if I eat a lot of protein (or fat) the weight gain the next day is massive - though likely mostly water.
Did you take any supplements while on the sugar diet?
Yea my experience with lean protein is the same :'-(
I was taking B1 plus a B complex.
Can you sort of ratchet your weight down (if you still want to lose) or does this make you bottom out/plateau? I never got a hungover/dizzy effect losing fat on the cream diet, but I suppose my "general feeling of not-well being" was similar on the sugar diet..
> I have previously never done well on caloric restriction
Memo to self: As per Ocamz Razor, this, right here, is the core problem you should delve deeper into. All the tweaks, hacks, and silly experiments—just ways to avoid facing it. If you’d accepted that truth earlier, you’d probably be lean by now. It will be hard. It will require extreme sacrifice. You will have to give up something you love dearly, at least for a while. But there’s no cheap way out. And maybe—just maybe—you don’t actually want to lose enough to do what it takes.
What's the truth here? I can't do caloric restriction well and I don't sustainable lose fat on it, so I try other methods, yea. The other methods have helped me lose 100lbs once and 75lbs again this time.
Seems pretty decent score for the "silly experiments" vs the "dumb caloric restriction."
In short, extreme sacrifice does not work, I've tried it for decades. I've yet to see it work in anybody. It's just a terrible strategy, so I'm looking for better ones.
No, the sugar diet isn’t ad lib. You eat kinda normal. For example, my daily: 8 oz oJ and a Fruitbowl from Safeway with about 1 tablespoon raw honey for breakfast.
If i get hungry at lunch, an orange and a large McDonald's Banana/Strawberry smoothie or equivalent.
For Dinner, 50-100 grams lean (lean!) protein. 350-400 gram potato cooked in air fryer, covered in water sautéed mushrooms, zero-fat greek yogurt, Date Lady Sweet Chili sauce.
I use zero fat hard candy and jelly beans between meals if I feel hungry or need energy.
My fat grams are under 15 for the day. My protein is under 100. Carbs is around 500 grams. Total calories around 2300.
I had the same experience quitting coffee on the "sugar diet" you described. Lifelong coffee drinker, quit and restarted many times. Currently drinking fruit juice and/or peppermint tea with ~100g of honey every morning instead, and almost zero desire for coffee.
Very curious! Any ideas what might do that?
I also have way less cravings for coffee on a lot of sugar, and I love my coffee, lol.
So weird! Maybe we should market it as a caffeine quitting diet lol.
It will be interesting to read the Kempner Chronicles! You need a German shouting at you to maintain discipline
The whipping will continue until willpower resumes!
rhymes with your usual -- the whipping cream will continue until morale improves
As Nieztsche was fond of saying: "Du machst Reisdiät? Vergiss die Peitsche nicht!". (Also sprach Dr. Kempner)
Is that a real quote from Also Sprach Z? I tried reading it but had no idea what the f was going on.. he goes into the forest and talks to a dead guy or something.. wtf
I've been told you basically need to be reading an annotated version because it's so metaphysical.
Interestingly I find myself less interested in coffee during very high fat moderate to low protein very low to no carb stints (HFlplc?). Actually, I just have less thirst in general on such diet. I haven’t noticed this with any other diet though and in my pre keto / carnivore years I definitely on occasion had some mostly fruit stints (including notably just drinking smoothies for a bit after some dental surgery).
I'd expect this to work better with a timing element. The main metabolic function of fructose is to relatively directly replenish liver glycogen (which will tend to be depleted after an overnight fast or exercise), while glucose goes into general circulation. Fructose metabolism in the liver is strongest in the morning or early afternoon. So I'd expect a crude heuristic of sugar (e.g. fruit and juice and honey) ad libitum before 2PM, and starches (e.g. rice) ad libitum afterwards, to work better than an all-sugar all-day diet.
Yea sort of like the Honey Diet.
I thought that one deprecated PM starches? I'm proposing something like either a circadian-optimized Kempner diet (fruit and fruit juice in the morning, plain rice or potatoes in the afternoon), or you could relax the protein restriction and let lean meat consumption vary separately ad lib.
I did generate the idea partly by thinking about what might make the honey diet work for some.
Though overall it just seems like you personally might do worse on carbs and I don't want to contribute to torturing you.
Ah yes, I meant the timing element per se.
Fruit til noon/then starch seems to be working for a bunch of more "normal" people, whereas the full on sugar fasting diet seems to be mostly hyperactive athletes or bodybuilders, from what I can tell.
Great writeup! I've tried the sugar diet thing mostly by eating pure sugar/fruits until a certain hour then having a protein re-feed in the evening on super lean chicken with no fat added to it and had okay results, though did have plenty of energy and felt great.
I did a strict sugar only/fruit only two days ago for one day and it was fine, but after that one day of doing it strict I don't think I'll do it again. It just doesn't feel good, at all, and I cannot imagine doing it several days in a row. Pretty sure I could even feel the inflammation as I started feeling odd pains here and there throughout my body.. At this point I am just sticking to eating a ton of bananas/apples (I love them) and having leaner proteins with starches in the evening, though I will try adding in more fats as I had a swampy meal yesterday with lots of butter and some coconut milk and oh God, it was so amazing.. Heck, maybe I'll go keto again. It's just the cost that's prohibitive, sadly.. I am saving so much money eating the way I do right now, lol.. (Beef is insanely expensive here now for even the cheapest supermarket ground beef, as is butter and chicken if not on sale.. Pork is cheap, but I avoid pork beyond a "treat" here and there as I quickly feel sick from it)
> black beans, beef, green beans, tomato sauce, mushrooms, spinach, onion, even beets.. so I made a giant stew pot w/ almost no caloric food in it.
That seriously sounds SO GOOD, omg.. Wish you shared a pic with us, haha.
I hope your ex_kempner goes well!! Not too far from what I am doing, if you exclude my lean meat, lol.. I love rice, I love fruits.. Just worried about the caloric restriction, though maybe eating a lot of fruits will help with that as they seem to be quite filling for me, and I often have them as a dessert after eating my dinner, as I'll still feel hungry but just a little bit, and 1-2 apples will often do the trick for me and fill me up.
Funny, cost wise it's the opposite for me. I spend <$7/day usually on ex150 with only 150g of beef (1lb lasts me 3 days) and the rest just spent on cream.
On the honey diet with high fruit, I was spending $50+ a day lol I think.
Wow! That's definitely a huge difference!
As I am less concerned about proteinmaxxing now, when I go keto again I might try something closer to your approach eventually and see how that works out, and just have 1lb of beef for 2-3 days vs 1.5-2lb every day.. lol.. and the lb cost here is like $8.5-9/lb, rip.
Fun fact, prior to covid it was very often on sale for ~2/lb so the price increase has been insane.
Here it's about $5-7/lb, depending on the type and what quality you want. For $9 you can get goat or pretty decent grass-fed stuff.
High meat carnivore gets pricey quickly, yea.
Wow $2 - I don't know if I've ever seen ground beef for that low. I def remember it being on sale for $3 though, but that was lower quality and 70/30 which is insanely fatty. I usually prefer 80/20.
Super interesting, thanks for the article. I've been trying the sugar diet, too. I also notice veggie/savory cravings. So I tend to have a sugar phase and then either for lunch or dinner have (usually cooked) veggies. Something like zucchini and eggplant in tomato sauce, cucumber dipped in ketchup, red cabbage with apple, a stir 'fry',tomato juice with seasonings as a soup. All of it low fat, low starch. Seems to be working well so far, yesterday I had to 'cheat' since I was eating lunch with friends and had some vegetarian food (probably with pufa) and had totally planned to have a doner kebab for dinner (before lunch, when I was super hungry), but ended up going back on the diet organically, zero interest in the doner. I was always the type to say 'fuck it, let's just eat everything now' after a diet slip. Pretty neat!
Nice, that sounds encouraging!
For you to do strict Kempner, doesn't that mean you need to hire someone to physically punish you when the going gets tough?
Ha, unfortunately I couldn't find exact instructions for that part of the diet.
Although I found this interesting phrase in The Rice Diet Report:
Those who request it (or who are perceived to need it) are referred to outside psychotherapists, but for the majority. Dr. Kempner's mix of diet, exercise, and "motivational enhancement" is more than enough to do the trick.
We should hire some redditors to call him up or send him voice messages every day around the clock. 🤣
In my experiments with a sugar / honey diet I've had two roadblocks: First I had a sort of hungover feeling, slightly dizzy and just weird. Now it seems that any time I have a new low on the scale I somehow crash, have a day of massive fatigue, the fatigue leads to going off the diet and a major weight gain the days after. I often get back to new lows a few days after and repeat the cycle. It seems to work only when I'm very active, sometimes I even get the urge to exercise but I don't yet know reliably how that can be achieved.
The most difficult part for me is the protein restriction, once I have a little lean protein without fat it causes massive hunger for me, much like when I tried glass noodles, full stomach massive hunger. And if I eat a lot of protein (or fat) the weight gain the next day is massive - though likely mostly water.
Did you take any supplements while on the sugar diet?
Yea my experience with lean protein is the same :'-(
I was taking B1 plus a B complex.
Can you sort of ratchet your weight down (if you still want to lose) or does this make you bottom out/plateau? I never got a hungover/dizzy effect losing fat on the cream diet, but I suppose my "general feeling of not-well being" was similar on the sugar diet..
> I have previously never done well on caloric restriction
Memo to self: As per Ocamz Razor, this, right here, is the core problem you should delve deeper into. All the tweaks, hacks, and silly experiments—just ways to avoid facing it. If you’d accepted that truth earlier, you’d probably be lean by now. It will be hard. It will require extreme sacrifice. You will have to give up something you love dearly, at least for a while. But there’s no cheap way out. And maybe—just maybe—you don’t actually want to lose enough to do what it takes.
I could not disagree more. Maintenance of a healthy weight should be effortless. If it isn't, then your metabolism is broken.
Yup.
What's the truth here? I can't do caloric restriction well and I don't sustainable lose fat on it, so I try other methods, yea. The other methods have helped me lose 100lbs once and 75lbs again this time.
Seems pretty decent score for the "silly experiments" vs the "dumb caloric restriction."
In short, extreme sacrifice does not work, I've tried it for decades. I've yet to see it work in anybody. It's just a terrible strategy, so I'm looking for better ones.
It’s not ad lib
Kempner? Yea the portions are extremely small.
No, the sugar diet isn’t ad lib. You eat kinda normal. For example, my daily: 8 oz oJ and a Fruitbowl from Safeway with about 1 tablespoon raw honey for breakfast.
If i get hungry at lunch, an orange and a large McDonald's Banana/Strawberry smoothie or equivalent.
For Dinner, 50-100 grams lean (lean!) protein. 350-400 gram potato cooked in air fryer, covered in water sautéed mushrooms, zero-fat greek yogurt, Date Lady Sweet Chili sauce.
I use zero fat hard candy and jelly beans between meals if I feel hungry or need energy.
My fat grams are under 15 for the day. My protein is under 100. Carbs is around 500 grams. Total calories around 2300.
No exercise.
What do you mean by "eat kinda normal?" That's what I mean by ad lib, I eat as much as I want, not less, not more.
Interesting 🧐