https://www.youtube.com/embed/A9S6qxHS2us
- I am pretty excited that
we get to have some wine. (upbeat music) Mmm, that is excellent. Hey guys, it's Katie and for the next 14 days, I'm gonna be trying out
the Mediterranean Diet. I've actually been wanting to
do this for a very long time because it actually seems
more like a lifestyle change than a super restrictive way of eating. And it apparently has many health benefits such as increasing life expectancy, reducing major chronic diseases and improving your quality
of life and well-being.
There's been celebrities
that have also attested to its health benefits like Selena Gomez, Penelope Cruz and John Goodman. I kinda wanna undo some bad habits that I've created over the last two years in quarantine, out of quarantine and just commit to my
health and happiness. So to get started, I
spoke with a dietician. And basically the Mediterranean Diet is an eating plan based on
the traditional cuisines of Greece, Italy and other countries surrounding the Mediterranean sea. It's mainly plant-based and emphasizes the intake of whole grains, fruits and vegetables, healthy fats, such as olive oil, as well as nuts and legumes, over the intake of animal protein, which is usually served
in smaller portions.
Typically fish or seafood
is the preferred meat. And it's also about your lifestyle. So sharing meals with
others, not watching the TV or being on the computer
when you're eating, being present and connected and also partaking in daily
activities that you like. Like walking your dog or riding a bicycle. The things to avoid on this
diet are processed foods, refined grains and
foods with added sugars, which is gonna be hard for me. While alcohol is usually
for just special occasions, you can have a glass of red
wine a night if you like. Which I would like. I think this is doable. I'm gonna try my best, so lets try it. So day one of this diet
started a little bit rough. Okay, so I was supposed to go shopping and meal prep last night, but I ended up sitting in
about 10 hours of traffic. So I just really didn't
feel like doing it. So today I'm gonna see
what I have in my pantry and then go to the store, do shopping and get myself set up
for the rest of the week.
So that morning for breakfast, I basically had to just
look around my kitchen, see what I had and I scrounged up some
muesli that I cooked in water, I added an old banana
that was about to go bad, some chopped walnuts, cinnamon and just kinda threw something together. That's pretty good. Not the best thing I've
ever had for breakfast, but sweetness of the banana,
the crunch of the walnut. I can see how this would
be a very filling meal. So after I had breakfast, I
headed out to go shopping. This is my receipt, very long. (indistinct) I got tons of fruits and vegetables. I don't love vegetables so it was weird to get
this many, like asparagus. I'm excited to push myself out
of my comfort zone and cook. So I'm gonna put all of this stuff away and then I'm gonna start making dinner. So I made some whole wheat pasta with this pesto that used baby rugelach, spinach, lemon, almonds. I had never had anything
like it.
It was really tasty. I put that all together and to
make it a little bit hardier, I threw in some white beans. There was no meat, but that was okay. I am pretty excited that
we get to have some wine. I am excited to eat those. - I am too. - This doesn't feel like a diet. - If this was a pasta only diet. (chuckles) - [Both] That was good. - I think we're also going to walk tonight because part of the Mediterranean
lifestyle and diet is like eating with other people, sharing a meal - Walking around. - and then maybe doing
some exercise you enjoy. - Great.
- We are walking in the dark. Do you feel healthy over in the shadow? - I feel so healthy.
- This is the creepiest video that's ever been made. - I love it. - It's so creepy. Don't poop, Rizzo. (indistinct) No. Good morning. It is day two
of the Mediterranean diet and last night's dinner was really good. And so it doesn't really
feel like I'm dieting at all, 'cause carbs are not
off limits on this diet.
I missed dessert last night, but I think you know I'm a grownup, the glass of wine was
kind of dessert on its own and overall, I'm feeling good and I'm ready to make some breakfast. I made one of my favorite
things, avocado toast. So I took some whole wheat bread and then I mashed up an avocado with like lime juice, garlic powder. And then I topped that
with some cherry tomatoes, salt, capers and then I just
sprinkled it with some chives. It was so good. It was quick to make, I don't always normally eat breakfast, but I do feel like it's important when you're starting a diet to try to make sure you're
incorporating that in.
And I just had leftovers
of that pasta for lunch and for dinner, I made a really easy soup. Basically what I did is I
heated up some olive oil, added onion, carrots and celery, cook that down to the (indistinct)
for about five minutes. Then I added some salt,
some garlic, rosemary, added in some chicken
stock and some tomatoes, come up to a boil and then I simmered that for 30 minutes.
At the end, just added in
some white beans and kale, popped it off with some
bread at the very end. Aha! - This is really good.
- I like it, yeah. - I love the freshness of the kale in it. And then it just tastes
nice and hardy and homie. - Yeah. And we haven't
had meat now for two dates and I haven't missed it so-- - No, not at all.
- Been good. So day three, I actually had to film off
site and I just threw together a really quick breakfast with the muesli and I added some chop dried fruit. I thought I was gonna like
it, but I absolutely did not. This was probably one of
the least favorite things that I ate. But by the time I got home from
my shoot and it was dinner, I was in a much, much better mood. And my husband and I actually
cooked together that day and we made this sheet pan chicken with all these peppers and
vegetables and potatoes. And you can eat potatoes on this diet, which I'm a big fan of
'cause I love potatoes.
Day three dinner and this looks delicious. Wait, don't be crazy. - I am crazy.
(indistinct) - Let's just be normal. (chuckling) This looks amazing. What are you doing?
- That's my face. - Day three dinner and I think this looks really good. - I think it looks great. - I'm excited to have some chickens. (chuckling)
- Some meat. - We have not had meat
for two and a half days. - That's good. - The sweetness of a pepper and the tomato is almost like jammy. - Mm-hmm.
- That's good. - Day four is like hard for
me to talk about because my cat was sick, it started to get sick
and we took him to the vet and so I didn't time for breakfast. And we got home that day
and ended up passing away, which was really hard. And so instead of making
some poor choices, which I think I go to food for comfort, but the one thing I will say is because I'd been cooking all week, I had all these leftovers being able to kind of sustain yourself through such an emotionally draining time.
I'm so glad that I had like
cooked earlier in the week and also had healthy things in the house. But believe me, I didn't
stay quite on track. Like we ordered out one night 'cause I just could not
bring myself to cook at all and I ordered pho. I definitely had a cookie. By day eight, I was getting back on track
because I wanted to commit to taking care of myself. But this wasn't really about
work or anything like that. Like eating healthy was about me. And so I got back on track, made myself breakfast
and I had avocado toast and I put an egg on it
and it was delicious. That night I made one
of my favorite dishes, which is whitefish piccata. I just wanna show you that I don't have enough counter space so when I'm working here,
sometimes I put it on a stool. (laughing) It's like a pile fish (indistinct) Dinner on day eight is
a white fish piccata.
I definitely struggled
tonight with flipping the fish and like lots of bits
got stuck on the bottom. - I think it looks great. - Might've been too hot. Maybe it was because I
used whole wheat flour instead of AP flour. Mmm. - That's very tasty. - It's different with the whole
wheat flour for sure, but-- - But I like it though. It still works really well with the whole wheat flour.
- Yeah. Day nine, I was really
getting into the diet. It was feeling like less of a chore. And I had made a beautiful
lunch of tomatoes with this kind of salsa
that went over the top. It was very yummy. And Chris and I actually sat
down and had lunch together. That is something we
haven't really been able to find the time to do while
we've been working from home. Maybe he's in a meeting
when I'm ready to eat or I'm in a meeting
when he's ready to eat.
But this day we found time, we sat down, we had lunch together and it was really, really nice. Mmm, mmm. - Oh, it is really good. - It's got nice acidity, nice pick. I love it. I love it. For dinner though, it was my favorite. I had gnocchi. I am not sure if it's totally
okay to eat on this diet, but I don't care. I had it. It was delicious. I made it with peas and
asparagus and it was so filling.
So I have never felt hungry
while doing this diet. Okay, are you ready? - Yeah.
- Okay. - You know what I like about that? - Yeah. - Everything.
- Everything. - It was one of my favorite
recipes. I found it online. And if you have to make
alterations for them to work, it's pretty easy to do. Just take out the butter,
add some oil, not a big deal. I'm having lunch at work and I've definitely am
breaking some rules. Day 10 was a real challenge for me because I actually had
to go in to film at work. We were filming a Lost in Translation. I didn't eat breakfast that morning. And when you're on set, you order lunch, they choose to go out to somewhere and I hadn't really ordered out while trying to strictly follow this diet. This diet's a little
bit hard to order out. I should have gotten
some brown rice today. I got regular rice, but I didn't have a lot of
time to make my lunch order. I just went for it and I got spicy tuna.
At least I'm having fish. That's good. And avocado. That's good. Everything has processed or
has something additive to it. Oh wait, oh my gosh. There's pistachios. I could have pistachios. It was really nice that day as I came home and Chris was making me dinner. What are we having? - We're gonna have some sort of a spicy crusted salmon and beans. - Dinner tonight looking good, Chris. Mmm, that is excellent.
- Mm-hmm. - I'm not a huge fish fan,
I'm not a big salmon fan, so I would say so fishy, but
this doesn't taste super fishy. It's like every meal I have I'm like, oh, this might be one of my favorite meals. - It's pretty good. - Well, I guess it's another dinner just you and me sitting here. We always watch TV when we
eat dinner, almost always. But this is the 10th day
where we had just sat down and talked more. And honestly, I think
it's been really good for our relationship.
Like if you could sit
down with your family, when you have time and eat
together, I highly recommend it. Day 11, I am really starting
to crave some dessert. So I find a recipe online, a tasty recipe actually, for yogurt bark. So you just combine some
yogurt, some berries, you blend it all up, freeze it for a few hours
and you've got yogurt bark. For dinner this night I
really wanted to mix it up. I'm gonna make pizza. I found a recipe for a
whole wheat crust online. So I'll do that tonight 'cause you can eat pizza
on Mediterranean diet and I feel like if you can, you should. So I find a recipe online and I make this whole wheat dough. It takes a while because it has to prove and then prove again, but then Chris joined me and we did all the toppings together. We just use some stuff I had
left over from the (indistinct) like tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, we added some fennel
'cause we love fennel. And we did a little bit of ham, but usually I would do
like a ton of cheese, but meatless cheese on this diet, so trying to stay true to that.
- Hey! - California pizza. Can't
even wait to sit down. I'm gonna try this pizza. I'm so hungry. - How is it? - It's very good, but it's definitely a tomato pie. Don't have like the cheesiness that like a big, big,
cheesy pie would have but I don't mind it. And the wheat crust is good. Definitely not as good as
your regular old pizza crust, but it's still yummy. Survey says one Chris thumb up. Chris, I made dessert tonight.
- Whoa, whoo! - My hand's freezing up.
My hand's freezing up. - Oh my God, you're
gonna burn your fingers. - Should we try this?
- What is that? - It's yogurt and berries.
- Oh! - I just said berries
like you said berries. - Berries. Some berries. - It's a little tart. - I like that though. - Yeah. - It is tart.
- It got you. For breakfast this morning, I'm having some toast with
an egg and some berries. This is my second egg of the week. I don't think that's too many eggs. I usually would have
like two or one a day. So I've really cut back from
my normal eggs for breakfast. And I didn't have any avocado
so couldn't use any avocado.
So this is what we got. Cheers. It's oozing. Yes. I like your sweater. Your sweater's very cute. Day 12 of Mediterranean diet. I'm almost at the end of it. I thought it would be like, oh, I can't wait for this to be over. But actually it doesn't
feel crazy different. I feel healthy, I feel happy, I'm going on a walk with my dog. So just a couple more days
to go, definitely can do it.
I also had pizza leftovers for lunch. It was a super easy day, but I knew the real challenge
was coming the next day. Day 13 was my mom's birthday and we threw a big party
for her with all her family. It's a party, I'm having a
cocktail, just a little one. There was many Bundt cakes. There was a beautiful charcuterie board. My sister made tons of Mexican food that we ordered from my mom's
favorite Mexican restaurant. Cocktails and I partook in them all, but it was a special occasion. Yes, I went away from the diet, but again, I didn't feel guilty about it because on special occasions
you can indulge in this. Morning. It is day 14 of
the Mediterranean diet and I've got to say, I woke up. I slept in and I still feel so tired. Like my body feels very lethargic and I honestly think it's because I ate all that food yesterday,
like really rich food and I just kind of kind of
amazed how quickly my body has I think started to change with that diet.
I'm gonna go down and have
breakfast with my family and there's gonna be lots of temptations, but it's the last day of the diet and I'm just gonna try
to like keep on track and hopefully I'm gonna
feel better by this evening. And that night I flew
home and when I got back, Chris was cooking for me again and he made a beautiful dinner that was zoodles and shrimp. And I hate zucchini, like I hate it, but I loved this dinner. So maybe I don't hate
zucchini. Maybe I love it. We did however, on the last night, watch the season finale of
one of our favorite shows while we ate. This diet for me was
never about losing weight, but I did lose four pounds. And in two weeks, that's
a pretty healthy amount of weight to be losing and to be indulging in some
sweets and stuff during it.
I feel good about that. I overall just feel like
my mental health is better and I have more energy, I
think, across the board. It was a lot of work to make
your meal plans and go shopping and do all that prep, but at the end of the day, it made my life so much easier. Planning my meals for the week, that is so helpful as the week goes by. And it helps you make the right choices. If you have the right food in your house, you're gonna make better choices. The diet is super customizable. So there's no quantities that
you have to eat or something, there's no calorie counting. I didn't feel any guilt, which I think a lot of times guilt comes when you're dieting. And I don't like that. It sets me up for failure. Give it a try if you want to. Thank you guys for watching. (upbeat music).
