Hamptons Diet

Do low carbohydrates and monounsaturated oils make a difference?

The Hamptons Diet is based on the same premise as the Mediterranean diet—eat more vegetables, fish, and Omega-3 fatty acids while consuming the majority of your fats in the form of monounsaturated fats. Certainly the ideas are healthy, but for many people the idea of having to cook foods from scratch may not be feasible because of work schedules or budget constraints.

In addition, where the Mediterranean Diet calls for cooking in olive oil, the Hamptons diet maintains that Australian Macadamia Nut Oil has the lowest in monounsaturated fats of all the oils including olive oil. Of course, if you can’t find it locally or are allergic to nuts, you can substitute an estate bottled extra virgin olive oil.

Personally, I found the idea to be one based on marketing strategies rather than any factual scientific evidence. Nonetheless I decided to try the Hamptons Diet and discover for myself if there was in validity in the book’s claims that the type of fat one consumes has a bearing on weight loss.

Unfortunately I am one of those people who are allergic to nuts, and I could not find estate-bottled extra virgin olive oil, so I used just extra virgin olive oil for all of my cooking and any food preparations that required cooking oil. It was very expensive, but if it helped me lose the twenty pounds I wanted to lose, it would be worth it. I had tried many other diets in the past but as soon as I went back to eating regular food, I gained the weight back again.

I have to admit the entire concept of “good” and “bad” fats confused me. I knew enough to know that monounsaturated fats were better for me than polyunsaturated fats, but I really didn’t understand any major differences between different types of monounsaturated fats.

I also didn’t understand how eating more vegetables could make a difference unless I was substituting vegetables for proteins. In spite of my lack of understanding, I followed what the Hamptons Diet book told me to do.

Although I did lose the weight I wanted to lose, it was an extremely slow process. I know losing weight slowly is better as it promotes lifestyle changes, but it took me almost four months to lose the twenty pounds, which I found very frustrating.

I won’t say that my limited success was the fault of the Hamptons diet, but I know that after I lost the weight and resumed cooking with vegetable oil did not cause me to gain any weight back. With that in mind I feel the type of oil has no bearing on weight loss—exercise and attitude do. I maintained many of the new eating habits I had learned though on a more limited scale and still kept the weight off.

I won’t say it’s been easy, but I have accomplished what I set out to accomplish, and I still feel the results would have been the same if I had used Mazola Vegetable Oil.

Review by Charlene Forrester