Best diet? Consumer Reports weighs in on Jenny Craig, Weight Watchers, Atkins and more

Consumer Reports Health

(CBS) In the battle to beat the bulge, Consumer Reports has crowned a winner - at least when it comes to mainstream diets like Atkins, Weight Watchers and Jenny Craig.

Consumer Reports reviewed seven diets in all, the three above plus the Zone, Slim-Fast, Ornish and Nutrisystem. Each of the diets takes a different approach and Consumer Reports was quick to point out that the best diet is the one you stay on. So some amount of personal preference is involved in finding the diet that's right for you. 

Atkins, for example, is a high fat, low carb program that doesn't cost anything more than the price of books. The diet delivers a fairly high calorie count - 1,915 per day - but gets low nutrition marks for its big doses of saturated fats, which can potentially lead to heart disease. The company doesn't offer personal support.

Jenny Craig and Weight Watchers are the old stalwarts in the group. They both rely on a combination of personal counseling and balanced calorie-controlled meals. Jenny Craig meals are all purchased from the company. Weight Watchers allows you to freestyle based on their recently revamped point system but there is also a large market of Weight Watchers packaged products in grocery stores and online. Jenny Craig allows 1,315 calories per day, while Weight Watches is more generous at 1,865 per day.

The Slim-Fast program centers around a packaged bar or shake for breakfast and lunch plus a 500-calorie home dinner and plenty of fruits and veggies. The calorie count is pretty aggressive at just 1,125 per day. There's no real support other than their website.

The Zone is a diet plan that relies on breaking foods into fairly proportional groups - 30 percent lean protein, 30 percent fat and 40 percent low-glycemic carbs like fruits and vegetables. You can buy the books and figure it out for yourself, but there's also a packaged food plan that costs $179 every two weeks.

Ornish is a 1,525 calorie per day program that is based around a popular series of books by Dr. Dean Ornish. There are no packaged meals or counseling to buy, so it's only as expensive as the food you buy and cook. Consumer Reports was greatly impressed by the author's tasty recipes, but worried that less experienced cooks would be put off. The Ornish menu they reviewed was near-vegan with no added sugars and had so little fat that it fell below nutritional guidelines. But it got high marks for flavor and sodium control.

Lastly, Nutrisystem is a packaged food system that lets you buy all of your meals from the company's website. The costs run from $352 to $430 per month. Optional one-on-one support is available via telephone, web chat or email. The system scored well for dietary balance except for sodium.

So, who did they crown the winner and why? Check the slide show below to find out.

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Best diet? Consumer Reports weighs in

[KristaBBW]

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[Prof_Elhashemy]

The Luqaimat Diet That Beats All Others

According to Consumer Reports in May, 2011; Jenny Craig is the best ranking diet-plan, beating most famous diets including: Slim-Fast, Nutrisystem Weight Watchers, Atkins and Ornish and the Zone Diet.

Consumer Reports based its ranking primarily on the results of a 2010 study involving 332 participants in which 92% of the dieters adhered to the Jenny Craig program for 2 years lost an average of 8% of their body weight.

There are two top ranking diet plans that are based on portion control, namely: Jenny Craig and SlimFast.

Jenny Craig: combines personalized counseling (over the phone and in person) with prepackaged portion-controlled meals.

SlimFast: is portion control diet depending on branded snacks and shakes. The modified SlimFast advise the dieters to eat six times a day - three snacks, two SlimFast shakes or bars and one 500-calorie meal. The expected weight loss is about 10% of body weight loss in six months.

Luqaimat diet is the portion control diet of the Arab world. It has four major advantages over the abovementioned highly ranked and famous Jenny Craig and SlimFast diets.

1. Luqaimat diet generates results surpass all other globally famous diets. For patient with BMI around 40, weight loss after 1.5 years amount to 30.5% of the patients' average original weight. These results exceed by far the results of 8% and 10% generated from Jenny Craig and SlimFast, respectively.
2. Luqaimat diet does not require specific meals or prepackaged foods. The dieter can eat any food he wishes as long as it is in small portions.
3. Luqaimat diet raises the self-esteem and confidence because the dieter will be trained on delayed gratification, which in turn will potentiate his decision making abilities.
4. Luqaimat diet can be maintained for long since all kinds of food are allowed. Hundreds of my patients are still following Luqaimat diet since 2005.

Luqaimat is an Arabic word for the minimum amount of food in one's diet that must be eaten in order to keep fit. I innovated my Luqaimat diet in 2005, the diet plan advise the dieters to eat 5 Luqaimat each day in addition to one moderate-size diversified meal.

Each Luqaimat may be a single piece of fruit, vegetable, a small piece of bakery, sweets, or chocolate, or five units of nuts, and so on, repeated every 2 - 4 hours. The moderate-size diversified meal consists of 3 plates the first contains a maximum of 1.5 cup-full of starchy food and vegetables plus palm-sized meat, poultry or fish. The second plate contains a maximum of 1.5 cup-full of green salad, and the third plate contains a matchbox size of sweets.

Worth highlighting that the modified SlimFast diet which was developed only in 2009 follows the same idea as my Luqaimat diet plan (which was developed in 2005) in regard of advising 5 small snacks and one moderates sized meal.

In my opinion, Luqaimat diet plan is the perfect formula for weight loss due to many reasons including the following:

1. Obese people are allowed to eat all their favorite foods (but in small volumes), so they can maintain their diet for good and stick to it.

2. Obese patients are educated about the action of Luqaimat on their gut and brain, so they will reach better mind-gut cooperation.

3. Obese people are trained on satiating gradually their stomach through boosting frequently Elhashemy's Stomach Satiety Spot "ESSS", so within few weeks, they will not need to eat big volumes of food.

4. Obese people are trained on regenerating gradually their brown fat through eating frequently purple fruits and vegetables laden with anthocyanins (according to Elhashemy's theory of brown adipose tissue regeneration).

All these reasons result in unprecedented success rate in weight loss using Luqaimat diet plan. This is why, tens of thousands of obese and super obese patients in Egypt and the Arab world are following my diet plan instead of going on globally famous diets, or being submitted to bariatric surgery.

The Egyptians and Arabs interest in Luqaimat diet plan is reflected on increased viewing of several videos about Luqaimat diet on youtube. Some of those videos had around 130,000 viewers on youtube in one year time.

You can read more details of my innovated Luqaimat diet through searching the web via Google engine for "Luqaimat diet" or "stomach satiety".

[Bojax39]

No diet is magic. It takes watching what you eat and how much in addition to getting a bit of exercise. A little more on the proteins and green veggies, a little lower on the calories in fats, carbs and useless sugars and getting off your TV watching butt in favor of more physical activity goes a long way.

BUT a healthy balanced diet plan is a good guidepost and gives you a place to start.

HINT: if a diet sounds too weird like:

"get 12 hours sleep, cut down on food and drink all the distilled water you can along with eating all the bananas you want"

then it's probably NOT a good place to start. :-)

[ghostofandy]

The problem with diets is people tend to exercise less. If you eat 250 fewer calories, but burn 250 fewer calories you're getting nowhere. Eating less means you have less energy, so people tend to sit down and relax more. It's hard, but you actually have to burn *more* calories, which means more exercise. Definitely not easy, and that's why most diets fail.

[Blake_Carrington]

So, which one is better? Neither. If any "diet" would work, there would only be one. You have to adjust your "consumptive profile" and eat small 8oz portions over 5-6 times a day, 2-3 hours apart. Cut out fast food completely, don't use a salt shaker, stay away from sweets and snacks and drink lots of water. Processed foods, rice and potatoes have to be very limited. Equally important is exercise, and that's not a walk around the block either. You can't maintain a healthy weight by your "diet" alone. Trade TV for better health; you'll be glad you did.