My food tastes are pretty basic so I cant help with recipes. Most of my meals are pretty basic. Veggie salads with some tuna or chicken. Breakfast is usually high fat low sugar yogurt with a handful of mixed berries. OK what to avoid. Avoid grain based foods like bread, rice, pasta, pizza. Avoid potatoes. Avoid fruit juice like the plague. Eat fruit in moderation and go for berry type fruits. Avoid bananas. Avoid sugary drinks and diet drinks. Have fats like cheese, avocados, yogurt. Have protein like chicken, tofu, tuna, beans, walnuts and almonds. Get most of your carbs from veggies.

Avoid anything with sugar in it like the plague!! Drink lots of water. Take two tablespoons of apple cider vinegar before each meal.

Do 5:2 it WORKS!!

Personally I try and limit those foods every day, but that’s just me. I loved eating good bread so that was a biggie for me. Those foods are now sometimes treats. If you have them once a day then that’s not a sometimes treat, that’s a food staple.

Really depends how hard core you want to be about it. I would definitely avoid them on your fasting days. Eating those foods on your fast days will make it almost impossible to succeed. You just have to read the posts on here to see all the good intentions that go astray when people eat carb dense foods on fast days. If you can also avoid them on your non fast days all the better. Grain based foods are very calorie dense and they send your blood glucose through the roof which then sends your insulin through the roof which means all excess glucose is stored as glycogen and fat. You only need two tablespoons of glucose circulating around in your blood at any one time. The rest must be processed by the liver and stored as glycogen and then fat.

Good luck 5:2 works. I lost 20kg (44 pounds) over the course of a year and have been in maintenance 6:1 since March.

Ive got Italian parents so pasta was a staple for me. I now might have a pasta dish once or twice a month (if that). If I can give it up anyone can.

How are you on sugary treats? If you don’t have them that’s great. If you do have them then try and eliminate them. Avoid chocolate, ice cream, biscuits, etc. Avoid any breakfast cereals including “health” cereals, they are pure crap. Some of them have up to 35% sugar content. Avoid sugary drinks and diet drinks. Diet drinks trigger your brain into wanting sugar/carbs. When the sugar doesn’t arrive you’ll go hunting for sugar!! Whens the last time you saw a skinny person drinking a diet drink? There’s a reason you don’t see skinny people drinking diet drinks.

The chocolates not doing you any favours. It will take you the best part of one month to detox from the sugar hit. Up to you really. Chocolate or your figure? Your call. Hard to have both. If the flavoured water is sweetened with an artificial sweetener then its sending the wrong signal to your brain. Your brain interprets sweetness as “calories are on their way”. When those calories don’t arrive because you fooled your brain, your brain sends out a strong desire to go and find real calories. Try plain carbonated mineral water or just add a squeeze of lemon juice into plain water.

Good luck.