What To Look For In A Healthy Weight Loss Diet: How Nutrisystem Stacks Up

Weight loss diet plans come in all kinds of packages. Some are low-fat, high carb. Some are high-protein, with little or no carbs at all. Some require that you eat a strange combination of foods. When you think about the Nutrisystem diet, consider how it stacks up with some of the others.

1. A good, healthy diet will have plenty of variety in fresh fruits and vegetables. Many diets do well in this category. Nutrisystem itself encourages dieters to eat about 4 cups of fruits and vegetables a day. They plan for you to eat a lot of salad, including fat-free salad dressings in with their meals.

Weight Watchers gives values to all the fruit and vegetables and leaves it up to you as to how many you will eat. While this may seem haphazard, it really works if the dieter stays with it. The reason is that eating small amounts of high point foods will leave them hungrier than eating a lot of lower point foods like fruits and vegetables. Over time, they will switch to a healthier way of eating. The weekly meetings encourage this.

The Sonoma Diet has healthy fruits and vegetables, but the emphasis is on eating smaller portions of everything. This does not give these colorful food groups the boost they need in the diets of most overweight people. However, some of the top ten power foods in the diet are vegetables and fruits.

2. A healthy diet has high quality carbohydrates. Nutrisystem is making its theme the good carbs and bad carbs idea. They have very few menu items that are fast-acting carbohydrates, although the regular Nutrisystem diet does have some desserts with 12 or more grams of sugar. If you prefer not to have these desserts, you can do the diabetes diet from Nutrisystem.

Here again, Weight Watchers depends on the points system to encourage people to go for the healthier carbohydrates. They cost fewer points, so dieters can eat more of them. The support system focuses on getting people to make healthy carb choices.

The Sonoma recommends a Mediterranean style diet that includes whole grains. In fact, whole grains are considered one of the top ten power foods of the Sonoma Diet. Wine can be considered a carbohydrate, and the Sonoma diet permits it. It is not considered to be a good carb by most diets, but it does have some health benefits.

3. You need protein to make a diet complete. The Nutrisystem program includes lean meats and dairy to take care of protein needs. Some of the entrees are based on soy protein rather than meat. If you want your meals ready to eat, the Nutrisystem diet makes getting your protein fairly easy.

Weight Watchers has a point system for proteins as well. It is much less complicated than some of their other point system values. Lean meats, fish, and soy are all acceptable within the Weight Watchers diet. There is no guessing about how much protein you will eat. It is a set amount every day.

The Sonoma Diet does not highlight meats or other proteins as the main features of their plan. No protein food is among their ten power foods. Yet, the Sonoma Diet is all about enjoying food rather than avoiding particular foods. You will not have to give up all meats on this diet.

Nutrisystem has all the healthy components of a good diet. There are a few unfortunate slips, such as the sugar in some of their desserts. Some other diets, like the Sonoma Diet, are more focused on taste than this diet is. However, the Nutrisystem shapes up fairly well along with these other diets.