Skinny Chicks Don't Eat Salads

Anyone browsing through the dieting section in a bookstore could be forgiven for wondering how on earth to choose between them?

With the shelves groaning under the sheer volume of diet books, it takes something pretty special to make a book stand out enough to be picked up. In the case of this book, Skinny Chicks Don't Eat Salads, the title is clever, catchy and intriguing. It certainly warrants further investigation.


The book is a self help guide to healthy eating, written by Los Angeles nutritionist Christine Avanti. She has treated thousands of people who have spent their lives yo-yo dieting or never been able to properly follow a diet and successfully lose weight. Christine bases her guide on principles she developed to help herself, who as a onetime serial dieter, spent years following crazy diet plans, often losing weight but always gaining it back again.

While the book may imply skinny people don't ever eat salads, what it really means is, yes they do, but they don't live on them. The basis of her eating plan is all about keeping blood sugar levels stable by eating regular meals at four hourly intervals. She details how the body reacts when we eat certain foods and how it affects hunger and weight. All the scientific stuff is explained in easy to understand terms such as what happens when you reach a weight loss plateau or why you fail to lose weight when skipping breakfast. She also outlines the common pitfalls that many dieters fall into.

After examining the roles that the different food groups play in keeping us healthy, she includes a 14-day skinny chick meal plan in which she claims you will drop up to seven pounds in the first seven days. Each day includes four meals designed to keep you full so you never go hungry or become bored. Also you can eat the meals at any time you like as long as you leave four hours between them. What's so great about the meal plan is no food group is banned and as well as the meals being easy to prepare and varied they are exceptionally delicious. Everything is analyzed. Calories, protein, carbohydrates and fat content are all provided for each meal.

As with any diet plan, it should always be done in conjunction with exercise. As such, there is a section on different types of workouts aimed at all levels of ability from beginners to advanced fitness levels. There are specific exercises designed to target problem areas such as flabby bat wing arms and all exercises are described in easy step by step terms. After each set of exercises is a weekly timetable outlining which exercises you should follow and for how long.

What makes the book so easy to read and enjoyable is the inclusion of testimonials interspersed throughout the book from real people who Christine has helped. In all cases, none of them knew why they couldn't lose weight or why they gained so easily. But after Christine's advice they've all learned where they were going wrong and managed to get their weight under control.

Towards the end of the book, there are some really helpful solutions to common dieters nightmares such as what do you do when you’re going to a party or out to dinner? Christine makes it clear she understands that everyone has bad days and splurges out now and again. Her diet plan takes all this into account. And all her theories on how the body makes use of the food we eat is scientifically-based.

Overall, this is a diet book that doesn't feel like one. With regular meals throughout the day based on nutritious and filling food there's no need to be bored or hungry. The diet plan needn't be rigidly adhered to but can easily be incorporated into most people's lifestyle.

The testimonials given from real people throughout the book, photos included, provide scenarios that many failed dieters will be able to identify with. Though the word 'Skinny' is mentioned many times, the overall aim of the book isn't to become skinny, rather to learn how to lose weight in a healthy and natural way and keep it off. This is one book that you can dip into time again for inspiration or another of those tasty recipes.