Ten Steps
to Eating Perfectly
          by Alden Wicker

1.  They said that fast food executives were turning fat profits by making us fat, so I stopped eating fast food.

2.  They said that killing animals was wrong, so I became a vegetarian.

3.  They said that fertilizer run-off from industrial farming is killing the Gulf of Mexico, the pesticides are killing honeybees, so I started only eating organic.

4.  They said that shipped food is too carbon intensive and not as fresh, so I started eating only local, in-season food.

5.  They said that it was wrong to punish a cow by milking it twice a day, or to steal a chicken’s eggs, so I became a vegan.

6.  They said that the paleo diet would restore my body and make my teeth healthy, so I stopped eating anything cultivated.

7.  They said that cooking food destroys its nutrients, so I starting eating only raw food.

8.  They said that following a macrobiotic regimen would prevent cancer, so I followed it.

9.  They said that I should follow a zero-waste diet, so I stopped buying anything with packaging.

10.  Then, when I showed up at the farmers market in December with my reusable bag looking for local, certified-organic, vegan, unprocessed, uncooked, uncultivated, whole foods, without packaging, that would fit into my macrobiotic diet, I realized that the best thing for the planet, the animals, and my health would be to just stop eating altogether.

At the end of the day:
Calorie Restriction
equals
Calorie Restriction.

See the article below from Dr. Arya Sharma, who is one of the world’s top medical obesity specialists.

Dr. Sharma is highly respected by obesity researchers, health professionals. His opinions are based on many years of extensive obesity research as well as many years of practical experience with obese patients. 

Alternate Day Fasting Is No Better Than Any Other Fad Diet
                   by Dr. Arya Sharma,  July 11, 2017

It seems that every year someone else comes up with a diet that can supposedly conquer obesity and all other health problems of civilization.

In almost every case, the diet is based on some “new” insight into how our bodies function, or how our ancestors (read – hunters gatherers (never mind that they only lived to be 35) ate, or how modern foods are killing us (never mind that the average person has never lived longer than ever before), or how (insert remote population here) lives today with no chronic disease.

Throw in some scientific terms like “ketogenic”, “guten”, “anti-oxidant”, “fructose”, or “insulin”, add some level of restriction and unusual foods, and (most importantly) get celebrity endorsement and “testimonials” and you have a best-seller (and a successful speaking career) ready to go.

The problem is that, no matter what the “scientific” (sounding) theories suggest, there is little evidence that the enthusiastic promises of any of these hold up under the cold light of scientific study.

Therefore, I am not the least surprised that the same holds true for the much hyped “alternative-day fasting diet”, which supposedly is best for us, because it mimics how our pre-historic ancestors apparently made it to the ripe age of 35 without obesity and heart attacks.

Thus, a year-long randomized controlled study by John Trepanowski and colleagues, published in JAMA Internal Medicine, shows that alternate day fasting is evidently no better in producing superior adherence, weight loss, weight maintenance, or cardioprotection compared to good old daily calorie restriction (which also produces modest long-term results at best).
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A Scientific Study was recently published concluding that an alternate-day fasting diet was NOT superior to a daily calorie restriction diet for Metabolically Healthy Obese Adults with regard to adherence, weight loss, weight maintenance, or improvement in risk indicators for cardiovascular disease (including insulin resistance).

The lead researcher in this study, Dr. Krista Varady, has previously done extensive research on Alternate Day Fasting.  Those studies are currently considered the best scientific authority on Intermittent Fasting, and her previous research findings have often been extensively quoted by the majority of Intermittent Fasting Gurus, including Dr. Jason Fung, author of The Obesity Code (2016) and The Complete Guide to Fasting (2016)

Below is a recent article from TIME. 
 

Fasting Isn’t Better for You Than Regular Dieting
Alexandra Sifferlin   May 01, 2017    TIME

Losing weight is hard, which is why weight loss experts have long searched for different approaches to make it easier for people. One strategy gaining steam is intermittent fasting, where people fast or lower their calories substantially for a short period of time. (This diet plan also has potential lifespan-extending benefits.)

But new research published in JAMA Internal Medicine suggests that the fasting diet may not be the weight loss key it's been hyped up to be.

In the new trial, researchers wanted to know whether people who tried a fasting diet would be more successful than those on a standard diet. They told 100 people with obesity to follow one of three diets for a year. Some were told to cut their calorie consumption by 25% per day—a typical calorie restriction diet—while others did an alternate-day fasting diet, where they ate about 500 calories on “fast” days and whatever they wanted on “feast" days. The last group, which served as the control group, ate what they normally would.

The researchers expected that the people in the fasting group would lose more weight and have an easier time sticking to the diet than regular dieters, but the results didn't reflect that. At the end of the year, people who did the fasting diet and those who just cut calories both lost an average of 13 pounds. However, people in the fasting group actually had a harder time sticking to the diet, and more people in that group dropped out of the study.

“I really thought people would have an easier time and lose more weight on the [intermittent fasting diet] and I was shocked they lost the same amount,” says study author Dr. Krista Varady, an associate professor of nutrition the University of Illinois at Chicago and author of the book The Every-Other-Day Diet. “Th...