When it comes to diets and healthy eating, I’ve tried my fair share of weird regimes. Unfortunately in the past, these included meal replacement shake diets and detox teas, two things I’d never recommend now I’m older and wiser(ish). These days, I follow a fairly simple, fad-free diet that consists of a lot of soup, stir frys, and every Quorn product I can get my little sausage fingers on during the week.
Over the weekend, though, my indulgences can be disGUSTingly mammoth (who really shares sharer bags of Malteasers after all? Freaks, that’s who). I’m therefore still interested in anything that can keep me on track during the week, while also allowing me to eat food that I can, y’know, chew. So when Dietbon got in touch earlier this year and offered me a week’s trial run of their weight loss plan, I was intrigued to give it a go.
How does Dietbon work?
The concept of the 1 week diet plan* that I was gifted was simple – you get six days’ worth of low-calorie, ready-made meals and snacks delivered to your door, and are free to eat your own food on the seventh day. All of the meals are apparently dietitian-approved, with absolutely zero preservatives, enhancers, artificial colours, flavourings or sweeteners.
The diet plan includes pancakes for every breakfast, as well as cookies and a fruit compote for your snacks every day. Lunches and dinners are selected from a menu of 59 dishes. I was a little apprehensive that there wouldn’t be much on offer for vegetarians, but I was so pleasantly surprised. From soy steak and mash to lentil dhal, there was a huge variety of choice so I was able to pick six different meals to mix and match over my week.
Was it easy?
Over the week that I tried Dietbon, I found it really easy to stick to. I usually just have porridge or a protein smoothie for breakfast, so the pancakes were a really nice addition to my normal diet (and I squirted some zero-calorie sauce over the top for an extra bit of indulgence). I then had salads most of the days for lunch, which always had a grain or lentil base so I never felt deprived. The cookies were demolished as an afternoon snack, and then I really enjoyed all of the evening meals.
One thing worth noting is that depending on your normal meal sizes, you might find the portions a little smaller than what you’re used to. This wasn’t an issue for me, as I’m usually just cooking for myself and eat quite small portions anyway. The diet plan also encourages you to add vegetables to your meals, so it’s easy to bulk the dinners out this way so you feel like you’re eating more.
The only real concern I had when completing the plan was how my macronutrients would look for a week. Without going into too much boring detail, I try to keep my diet at around 40% carbs, 30% fat and 30% protein throughout the week, and I track this using MyFitnessPal. With the pancakes and more carb-based meals than I’m used to, I expected that my carb intake for the week would shoot up, and so to counteract this slightly I still ensured I had my protein shake nearly every day (usually replacing the fruit compote, which was the only product I wasn’t a big fan of).
I tracked my Dietbon week on the MyFitnessPal app as usual, and was pleasantly surprised to see that my macro split stayed relatively close to my target each day (screenshots below for fellow MFP nerds).
Dietbon Results
I believe the plan that I was on kept you at around 1200 calories per day, which is actually around what I normally eat my on healthier non-running days (bearing in mind I’m only 5’2 and live the sedentary life of a potato). Because of this, I wasn’t expecting to see any weight loss over the six days of my plan and so didn’t actually weigh myself.
However, in terms of how easy I found Dietbon and whether I’d recommend it to others, it was a big success. As someone who hates cooking, having my meals prepped for me and knowing they were within my recommended calories was a huge sell. I was also genuinely impressed with the variety of meals, ingredients and flavours. It really couldn’t be any further from the boring, meal-replacement soup plans I’ve tried in the past – I looked forward to each meal and even got some ideas for things to make myself in the future.
Would I recommend it?
In short, yes – if you want a calorie-controlled diet where you’re going to actually enjoy the food (and be allowed to chew! What a treat) then Dietbon is a great option. One thing that would prevent me from continuing with the plan is the price – a one-off week of meals is £99. This price does drop drastically to £44 per week if you sign up for the 4 month plan, and so this would be the more affordable option if you knew you wanted to commit to losing weight on the plan. While it’s not something I need to continue with right now, I think it’s definitely worth exploring if you have long-term weight loss plans.
Have you ever tried something like Dietbon, or would you like to? Let me know in the comments!
