It would help if you started eating healthy meals. However, considering our culinary culture and the Best diet customs in the USA, this might seem like an overwhelming problem. For example, a typical USA dinner is heavy in sugar and carbs since we consume a lot of sweets, rice, and potatoes.
We also like munchies and can’t imagine going a day without namkeens and bhajis. We often show our affection for our friends and family by encouraging them to eat more and find it hurtful if they decline to have a second helping.
But avoiding USA cuisine in favor of foreign components or fad diets is not the solution. Additionally, you’ll discover that the best USA diet plan uses ingredients in your kitchen and will help you lose weight by adjusting your diet.
Low-calorie diet
Defined as: Consuming just 800 to 1,200 calories per day.
Pros:
According to the research analysis, restricting your daily caloric intake only to lose weight quickly while retaining as much lean muscle mass as possible works.
Cons:
Restricting your calorie intake will likely result in considerable internal conflict and tension. Additionally, eating should be a pleasure rather than a threat, and 800 calories don’t allow many opportunities for taste receptors to be content. Last but not least, reducing your daily calorie intake to this low might wreck your metabolism and hinder weight loss more than switching to one of these other diets could. This is especially true if you are already consuming double to treble this quantity of food.
Low-fat diet
Defined as: Getting just 20–30% of one’s daily calories from fat, the other 80–70% comes from a combination of protein and carbohydrates, usually focusing on the latter.
Pros:
According to the Institute of Medicine, a low-fat diet (or a high-carb diet, depending on your point of view) is based on consuming less of the macronutrient that is the highest in calories would result in consuming fewer calories overall. Studies have also shown that moving to a low-fat diet may aid immediate body fat loss, albeit short-term weight loss.
Cons:
The old notion that dietary fat is the enemy of body fat is perpetuated by eating in this manner. Additionally, it may not be superior to alternative diets: In a research published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, high-protein, normal-protein, high-fat, and low-fat diets were compared. At six months or two years, there was no discernible difference in the groups’ rates of fat reduction (though all did result in some fat loss).
Furthermore, while the low-fat group was instructed to maintain a 20% consumption of the macro, actual intake was closer to 26-28%, indicating that for most people, adhering to a rigorous low-fat diet is challenging and may be unachievable.
A low-carb diet
Defined as: Get 15–40% of one’s daily calories from carbohydrates, and the rest, 85–60%, comes from protein and fat.
Pros:
Research shows that switching to a low-carb diet may decrease body fat compared to a regular diet. The weight-loss effects are considerably more pronounced when you keep your daily carbohydrate consumption to 20% of your total calorie intake. You may also lower your risk for heart disease and stroke. According to certain studies, low-carb diets are superior to low-fat diets:
According to research published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, those who restrict their carbohydrate intake lose eight more pounds than those who reduce their fat intake. Your body learns to use fat as fuel when you reduce your carb intake to a certain degree.
Although research on the effects of low-carb diets on performance is conflicting, some data shows that those whose bodies adapt to fat-burning relatively rapidly may improve their endurance performance.
Cons:
You must be patient when you feel lethargic throughout the weeks it takes to become fat-adapted. Teaching your body to burn fat instead of carbohydrates takes time. Additionally, not all bodies burn fat as well as others, so your endurance could never measure up (though, as we said before, others see an improvement here.)
If you like sprinting or HIIT, you may need to eat more carbohydrates than other low-fat diets since, without carbs, your body’s capacity to produce explosive energy would most certainly drop.
Although you’ll likely decrease body fat, this diet keeps you focused on the incorrect macro: Studies have shown that a low-carb diet’s increased protein content, not only its reduced carbohydrate content, aids in weight reduction.
The ketogenic diet
Defined as: Less than 10% of daily calories come from carbohydrates, 10% to 30% from protein, and 60% to 80% from fat.
Pros:
Although technically a low-carb diet subtype, the keto diet is distinct because: In addition to forcing your body to become fat-adapted, carbohydrate restriction also causes your levels of ketone bodies to rise, which is essentially an indication that your body is operating on fat.
The ketogenic diet induces a particular metabolic state called ketosis in which your brain burns ketones rather than glucose, thus improving mental clarity.
According to the research analysis, consuming such a large amount of fat enhances your body’s capacity to burn fat. Additionally, research shows that keto athletes may reduce fat without sacrificing strength or power and have a greater VO2 max.
Cons:
The same research that highlighted the benefits of being a keto athlete also revealed that individuals on a diet had poorer exercise economies (how efficiently they use oxygen while moving). And although almost every other diet allows for some degree of macro range flexibility, consuming a few more grams of protein or carbohydrates can cause your body to enter ketosis, so you have to be entirely dedicated to getting the benefits of the keto diet.
Last but not least, you can struggle because of the minimal protein intake necessary to maintain ketosis: Just 5% more protein on a ketogenic diet quadrupled fat loss, according to a research analysis published in Nutrition, Metabolism, and Cardiovascular Diseases.
A diet rich in protein
Defined as: A daily calorie intake of at least 25% protein.
Pros:
Of all the diets listed here, increasing your protein consumption has been shown in research after study to drastically decrease body fat and develop lean muscle. For instance: According to a study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, men who engaged in sprint interval training, resistance training, and a diet containing 2.4 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day (roughly 1 gram per pound of bodyweight) gained 1.2 kilograms of lean muscle and lost nearly 5 kilograms of fat in just four weeks.
Since protein is so satiating, eating a high-protein diet while reducing calories will help keep hunger at bay and keep your metabolism from falling. Contrary to popular belief, consuming many protein-rich foods won’t make you gain weight or damage your internal organs, according to the research analysis.
Cons:
Because of the emphasis on protein, it’s easy to forget that you must consume enough fat or carbohydrates to power your activities. Therefore, pay attention to your energy levels and other macronutrients. And it is the only significant drawback. The only other drawback identified by the research analysis is that eating a lot of protein might hinder your attempts to gain weight since it is so good at reducing hunger.
