Review: Atkins diet on a budget
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 12 4, 2013
About twenty years ago, my wife and I were staying with friends at a remote island resort. The resort was the only place on the island, so we had all our meals at the resort's restaurant. Night after night, our friends ordered steaks, but they passed on the bread and potatoes that came with the steak. Finally I asked them about this, and that's when I first learned about the Atkins diet, which involves limited consumption of carbohydrates to switch the body's metabolism from metabolizing glucose as energy over to converting stored body fat to energy. My wife and I thought that consuming a lot of meat was appealing, but our budget wouldn't allow eating that much steak.In Go Atkins Without Breaking The Bank, the author briefly describes the theory and science behind the Atkins diet. However, the focus of the book is on proper budgeting and shopping for food. The author recommends having most meals at home, where it's less expensive and easier to control what you're getting in your food (especially avoiding the dreaded "Carb creep"). With the increasing incidence of childhood obesity and early onset of diabetes, he puts special emphasis on children's meals. If you're going to be cooking at home more, you need a good set of cookware and utensils, and these should include a kitchen scale for accurately weighing portions.Shopping for food is what the book is about, and the author gives some tips on stretching your food budget with the concept of unit pricing to get the most for your dollar. He discusses buying meat and other staples of the Atkins diet. In some cases, buying at volume stores like Costco or Sam's Club, or even buying online may be the most economical way to go. In some areas, local farmers markets are a good source of fresh, lower cost foods. And don't forget coupons, they're often overlooked as a cost-saving practice. The book then addresses which foods and nutrients are most important to maintain good health while on the Atkins diet.The book could be a valuable resource for anyone on the Atkins diet or who's contemplating it.