In French, the word for potato is pomme de terre. This literally translates to apple of the earth. By this logic, potatoes are the lowest-hanging fruit of all.
More seriously: We keep getting more and more interested in the all-potato diet. This is a diet where you eat nothing but potatoes (and sometimes a bit of seasoning) for a few weeks to a few months. It sounds like a dumb gimmick that could never work, but there are a surprising number of people out there saying that they tried it, it worked for them, and they kept the weight off for months or even years after.
Anecdotes are limited in all sorts of ways, but there are a surprising number of very strong anecdotes about the all-potato diet causing huge amounts of easy, sustainable weight loss:
In 2010, Chris Voigt, the Executive Director of the Washington State Potato Commission, ate nothing but 20 plain potatoes (and a small amount of cooking oil) for 60 days straight. Theoretically, 20 potatoes a day was the amount he would need to maintain his weight (2,200 calories). Despite this, Voigt lost 21 pounds over his sixty-day diet.Andrew Taylor of Australia lost 114 lbs over a year of eating nothing but potatoes and reports feeling “totally amazing”. Last we heard he’s still doing pretty well. Magician Penn Jillette lost over 100 lbs using a strategy that started with two weeks of a potato-only diet, and seems to be keeping it off. This also inspired at least one copycat attempt from the Krocks, a couple who have jointly lost over 220 lbs starting with two weeks of an all-potato diet.We also recently learned about potato hack, which we haven’t looked into much but has very positive reviews on Amazon.There also have been a few attempts on reddit, like this one, where user AdFair8076 said, “Potato’s are a super food imho. Lost 9 lbs in a week and haven’t put it back. Appetite is better!” EDIT: also u/DovesOfWar, u/caleb-garth, u/window-sil, etc.
Again, anecdotes by themselves are limited. We don’t know how many people tried this diet and didn’t get such stunning weight loss. We don’t know how long the weight stays off for. And the sample size is really small. Someone should really do a study or something, and figure this thing out.
Well, ok, if you insist. But you all have to help!
Tl;dr, we’re looking for people to volunteer to eat nothing but potatoes (and a small amount of oil & seasoning) for at least four weeks, and to share their data so we can do an analysis. You can sign up below.
Aren’t there already diets that work? Well, maybe, but we certainly don’t have any that work reliably. Reviews of meta-analyses say things like, “Numerous randomized trials comparing diets differing in macronutrient compositions (eg, low-carbohydrate, low-fat, Mediterranean) have demonstrated differences in weight loss and metabolic risk factors that are small (ie, a mean difference of
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