Evidentally, there is, or least was, a Polish Delicatesan where Dr. JK's books are available for sale, in both Polish and english. I've read accounts online, that plenty of people in the Polish community of Chicago are following the Homo Optimal Diet, and I think there was a news article about many senior citizens on H.O.D. who'd meet once a week in one of the delis to discuss it.

This is true for many people, in the very beginning. Once the body starts burning fat effectively -- and feels "safe," as you put it -- one can and should cut down on the dietary fat, even as far as a 1:1 ratio in the case of some very obese people. If you start to stall, then you've gone below your body's limit, and you'll have to raise it again.

But people have different reasons for being overweight, so this advice isn't going to work 100% of the time. Some people might need to increase their protein beyond the typical amounts -- with a corresponding decrease in the proportion of fat -- in order to get their systems in working order to actually start burning the fat. (Thus my suggestion to Nancy.) And there are further adjustments that are sometimes necessary.

In a few rare cases, if the person's system is sufficiently disordered, it takes months before any weight is lost, no matter how carefully the ratios are optimized. I realize that most people on these boards wouldn't be willing to stick with the diet that long, but ON wasn't designed to promote weight loss; it's meant to promote the best overall health for everyone, and prevent or cure many mental and physical illnesses. Weight loss (or gain, if needed) is just considered a side effect.


I'm saying that the books and the paper are based on the same model -- i.e., the basic ratio of 1:2.5-3.5:0.5-0.8 that Dr. Kwasniewski developed 30 years ago, and that still forms the backbone of ON today. In fact, the preface to the English edition of Optimal Nutrition gives the same ratios as the Atkins paper, because this is the "two-minute explanation." It's only if you go on to read the book itself, that you'll see that there are exceptions. This is clearly stated in chapter 1:

"It must be emphasized that the proportion 1:2.5-3.5:0.5 is not an iron-clad rule. Assuming that proteins and fats are animal-source, such a ratio guarantees a body's proper functioning during the initial stages of optimal dieting. Once a body gets used to its new diet, which happens after 2-3 weeks for healthy young people and 6 weeks or more for older people, its demand for protein and energy falls. (...) There may be certain variances from this principle depending on the dieter, his environmental conditions, and the sicknesses he suffers from."

He goes on to mention various examples of this, including the 1:1-2 P:F ratio that's recommended for a very overweight person during the stage of rapid weight loss.

Unless you can cite a work by Dr. Kwasniewski, written since 2000, that clearly states that the ratio for overweight or obese people is never to be adjusted, I think you need to stop holding up that 2-page "Optimal Diet vs. Atkins" paper as the only reference that's needed. It makes no sense to ignore additional information that the books and web sites all state very clearly. As someone who claims to have the "facts" about ON, you owe it to yourself, and everyone here, to look at the whole picture.

Hi again Pangolina!

Thank you so much for sharing your personal experience and your obvious expertise with us. You are making such rational & articulately interesting points, that I just might order the english language version of his books.

IN
Total contradiction. First you say the 1: 2.5 is for people in the very beginning. Okay. Then, at the bottom of your post you say the 1: 1-2 ratio is for a very overweight person during the stage of rapid weight loss.

FACT: Regardless of the diet plan, the most rapid weight loss is in the very beginning.


Happy to comply. Optimal Diet vs. Atkins was written in 2004.

And in it Dr. Kwasniewski writes: "The recommended daily ratio between P, F and C in the ON (calculated per 1kg of ideal bodyweight) for an overweight person is 1:2.5:0.8, until the bodyweight is stabilized in the normal range."

I know you don't want to hear this. But unless you can prove this paper was written by someone else despite his signing the bottom of it - this is the last word of Dr. K himself on this particular subject. It's succinct, it's precise, and it's very, very clear.

Furthermore, when you write: "Once the body starts burning fat effectively -- and feels "safe," as you put it -- one can and should cut down on the dietary fat..." you are showing that you do not understand how stored body fat works when one suffers from metabolic fat accumulation syndrome, or even how insulin resistance makes fat storage or loss work.

While I can appreciate your using ON as your only reference in regard to nutrition, it is, as you have said yourself, concerned more with nutrition than weight loss. But the folks on this forum are interested in, first and foremost, weight loss. And the best biology, the best science and the best reference for how we store body fat -- and the best way to lose it -- is Good Calories, Bad Calories by Gary Taubes. I recommend that you read it. Just about everyone who has originally believed as you believe now (about stored body fat) changed their minds after reading it. I believe you will too.

As for nutrition, where it comes to ON, I have never disagreed with you, nor will I. I only state that it's not necessary for weight loss to eat the foods listed therein, but only to follow the ratios. And all the weight the posters on the main K thread have begun to lose (while NOT eating the ON foods for the most part) are proving my hypothesis correct. I'm genuinely sorry if this causes you distress, but facts are facts and can't be changed to suit someone's theory.

Again, I will repeat: to lose stored body fat, whether at the beginning of your journey or near the end -- in the presence of low protein and low carb -- is to eat high fat, not low or moderate fat. The scientific, medical and biological reasons for this are all clearly laid out in GCBC (and many other LC books written by highly respected authors). I hope you read it.

Lisa

I'll have to check on that. ON recommends starches over sugars, but doesn't seem to say much about fructose per se, except to point out that it gives slightly less energy (only providing 3.73 kcal/g when burned in the body, vs. 3.91 for sucrose and 4.12 for starch). But I'm pretty sure there's a fair bit about it in Homo Optimus, especially in the section on diabetes.


It's because they're efficient; they give you the fuel without the bulk. They're also convenient and cheap. This is why he includes white flour in many of the recipes. He's well aware that there are fewer vitamins and minerals in refined grains, but given that plant foods are such a tiny part of the diet -- and dairy, eggs, broth, and offal are so rich in micronutrients -- he's not concerned about this. He believes that the slight loss of vitamins is more than offset by the benefit of not stuffing up your gut with fiber.


Vegetables, whether starchy or non-starchy, are limited to a certain amount; I think it's 300 g per day (will check on this). If you're counting net carbs only, it seems as if it would be easy to go over that limit if you mainly ate bulky salad vegetables, etc. European food labels apparently state the net carbs when they say "carbohydrate," so it would seem that that's how he expects us to calculate them, but AFAIK nobody on this board has been able to verify this for sure.

Okay, here's something I just found in ON:

"While on the topic, it is important to realize that fruits and vegetables contain very few carbohydrates. To ingest 50 grams of carbohydrates, it would be necessary to eat around 6 1/2 pounds of lemons, 6 pounds of dill pickles, or 5 pounds of spinach."

Fitday says that 5 lb spinach has 82 g carbohydrate, of which 50 g is fiber, which would give 32 net carbs.

6 lb dill pickles has 71 carb - 30 fiber = 41 net carbs.

(The figures for lemons seems to be for peeled fruit, and I think he's talking about the edible portion from 6.5 lb unpeeled, so I'm not going to try to wrap my head around that.)

So, the numbers don't really match up either way -- maybe they do their measurements differently in Europe? There's a 9 g & 18 g discrepancy for net carbs, vs. a 32 g & 21 g discrepancy for total carbs. Given this information, I'm betting on net carbs, as they're much closer.


As for fruits, I don't recall him mentioning limiting them (except in cases such as diabetes), but I'll check. He does say that it's preferable to discard the fiber, e.g. by making fruit into jelly and throwing out the pulp.

This isn't necessarily true; as you've said yourself, it takes some time for the body to be willing to give up its fat stores. This can happen very quickly for some, and more slowly for others.


For an overweight person, it can indeed stay at 1:2.5 for the whole time, if that's what works best for them. It really depends on their body, and the degree of overweight.

For an obese person, the fat intake can go very low, once rapid weight loss has begun. Then it goes up to 1:2.5 once they've lost most of the weight (and are thus "overweight" rather than obese). Then up to 1:3.5 for maintenance, and even 1:4 or 1:5 for a very fit person with high energy needs.


Then I guess Dr. Kwasniewski doesn't, either.


Thank you for the suggestion. I take it that this means that you're no longer promoting the Optimal Diet. If not, I hope you'll at least take a break until you've familiarized yourself with some more of Dr. Kwasniewski's work.


"Optimal Nutrition" isn't my theory; it's Jan Kwasniewski's. If you don't believe in it, that's all right with me. I'm posting for the benefit of others, who are interested in learning about what he has to say. (FWIW, a lot of the people on the Paleo forum seem to be interested in more than just weight loss.)

And I'm not distressed -- this is a logical issue, not an emotional one.

The carb portion for both the obese and the overweight individuals is 0.5 -- is this correct, Pangolina? I've read that elsewhere, too, but can't recall where.


Thanks again, Pangolina!

Pangolina - I hope you don't mind that I've quoted you on another thread here, as although I read about these ratios for the obese - as opposed to the overweight, and the healthy weight maintenance phases, I can't remember where I read about it online.

Here is where I quoted your last posting, for Valtor AKA Patrick, who apparently was unfamiliar with these ratios.


High-Fat Diet Delays and Fasting Advances the Circadian Expression of Adiponectin Sig
LC Research/Media Forum
Active Low-Carber Forums


http://forum.lowcarber.org/showthread.php?p=7795420

0.5 - 0.8 is the standard range for both normal and overweight. When he gives the "potted version" of the diet, sometimes he uses the former number, sometimes the latter.

0.8 is considered to be preferable for most of us -- even those who are somewhat overweight -- just to give a bit of a margin.

0.5 is required for diabetics, and can be helpful for others if weight loss proves difficult. It's the figure he most often recommends for obesity.

It's generally not necessary for the average person to go above 0.5, if you prefer to stay on the low end. But if you start getting leg cramps or signs of ketosis, he recommends raising the carbs by 15-20g.

Some of us certainly are. I'm trying stay healthy and build muscle, not lose weight.

I'm reading about ON for health reasons.

I'm on high fat with fairly low carbs and protein. I'm still not convinced that there are any benefits to dropping my protein to ON levels.

I guess it would be an excuse to eat pork belly all the time though!

Maybe it was on the Australian Homo Optimus Society site? On their main page on the Optimal Diet, they give some information about how the ratios are different for obesity and long-term maintenance. They refer people to Homo Optimus for more details about how to make these adjustments.

Something that I've mentioned before, but just wanted to repeat: Although Dr. K lowered the proportion of fat for overweight and obese people, he didn't wish to restrict their overall calorie intake. It might appear that way from a quick reading of the web information, but in fact they're allowed to eat to appetite, as are all Optimal Dieters. If this means that they exceed their "quota" of protein, that's okay, and even somewhat to be expected in the early stage. The protein allowance of 1 g/kg ideal body weight is meant for healthy people, and significantly overweight and obese people aren't healthy in Dr. K's view.

Along these lines, the AHOA site contains the following quotation, which is taken from Part 5 of Homo Optimus. In this passage, Dr. K is explaining why to the fact that the introductory menu in the book uses a 1:3 P:F ratio (rather than the usual 1:3.5), and also allows significantly more calories than the 1 g/kg protein guideline would seem to allow for.

"These discrepancies are intentional. Most of the guests who visited 'Arkadia' were seriously ill, often overweight. During the initial period of the treatment their bodies required more energy and more high quality protein. However, they did not need so much fat since on such a diet they were able to quickly start burning their fat and lose weight."

The daily menus are in the range of 80-120 g protein. Of course, this assumes that all the food is consumed, which won't necessarily be the case, as the fatty dishes are quite satiating. I'd be surprised if many of his patients were able to finish the breakfast for Day 8: an omelette made with 3 eggs and 7 tablespoons of butter, served with 2 tsp of jam.

Another point of interest, when looking at the menus: the daily ratios average out to about 1:3:0.5, but they don't stick closely to that number. F varies from 1:2 to 1:3.6, and C ranges from 0.2 to 0.8. So there's no need to worry about minor deviations, as long as you're aiming for the correct ratios overall. (Speaking from experience, though, you should make a reasonable attempt to balance your meals, even if you're eating out and just have to eyeball everything. Eating a meal that's clearly way unbalanced is likely to make you feel pretty awful afterward.)

Wow, to think I had missed this thread! Slipped under the radar.

Ok so the 1:1:.8 or 1:1:.5 ratios are interesting. But I guess it would only work if your body can use it's own fat fast enough.

Can anyone tell me why we don't ear about Adiponectin all the time?? It seems that everything is turning around it.

http://forum.lowcarber.org/showthread.php?t=394928

Patrick

So true.

Thank you

Of *course* I'm interested in weight loss, but what ended up helping the weight loss along was getting rid of gluten, dairy and so on. Paleo-ish eating does this for me. As I said earlier, no detective work needed.

Meanwhile, it really is a pleasure to eat good food.

I'm looking at Paleo-ish eating being a very good plan for ongoing maintenance too. So maybe I can add in a few things - but the 'off limits' foods will still be off limits. I'm just not going to eat grains, dairy, legumes, sugar and so on.

If for some reason, I wanted to get all hard-core on weight loss, I'd drop my carbs down to practically zero. I'd probably add a few back in once or twice per week - just to make sure I don't trash my thyroid or anything.

In terms of ON or OD or what have you - I don't like the dairy, and I'm not entirely sure it's such a great idea to drop the protein in favour of dairy and starchy carbs. Sure, maybe it "works" for weight loss, tweaking or stall-breaking, but I still don't think it's all that healthy.

PS - edited to add: I keep adding 'ish to "Paleo" because I still drink coffee, and egads...I eat tomatoes too.

My dad lives in Toronto! Do you know the name of the bookstore?

There are so many languages spoken at a Catholic church near where he lives, they have received special dispensation to hold Mass in Latin.

Sorry, I can't remember, but I think this is the web site where I read about it:

http://www.optymalni.com/

Not sure what page it was on. I was just poking around the site, cutting and pasting chunks of text into a translation engine, until I'd had enough of the endeavor.

There seems to be some sort of Optimal spa / B&B in Quebec; I found an article about it under the link "Arkadia w Kanadzie". This is their web site:

http://www.arkadiaeastman.com/

Maybe Patrick can go there and do some research for us, if he survives his fat-free experiment.