Putting David Asprey's 'Bulletproof: The Cookbook' to the test
Who knew that Himalayan yak butter tea served up to a seriously overweight man would be the beginning of a revolutionary weight-loss diet?
Folks started to take notice of the diet that came from that event in February 2015 when a headline in the United Kingdom's Daily Mail read: “Want to know the best new way to lose weight? Just put some butter in your coffee.” After reading the accompanying article, I was incredulous; as you may be right now.
It was reported that many British workout fans found “(cow) butter coffee” the perfect breakfast; providing sugar-free calories, boosting energy and increasing mental acuity. That's some heavyweight potential for a butter and coffee combo meal.
Dave Asprey, the inventor of butter coffee (he calls it “bulletproof” coffee) and the author of “The Bulletproof Diet” used to weigh 300 pounds and worked out six days a week, which barely nudged his scale's numbers down.
Asprey hauled his porcine self to the Himalayas and, not surprisingly, the altitude made him sick. A Tibetan favorite tea blended with butter made from yak milk revitalized him, and when Asprey returned to the U.S., with great difficulty, he tried to duplicate yak butter tea.
After much testing, he found that “clean” coffee blended with organic grass-fed cow butter and organic coconut oil yielded virtually the same restorative results.
Combining “bulletproof” coffee with a food plan filled with what Asprey called “bulletproof” foods while eschewing foods that he calls “kryptonite,” made it possible for him to lose more than 100 pounds without working out.
He claims once he arrived at his svelte self he had a six-pack. Bulletproof? I'd say miracle.
Here are some foods Asprey considers “bulletproof”: 90-percent cocoa chocolate; organic vegetables like cauliflower, asparagus, avocado, cucumber, sweet potatoes, butternut squash; and olives. Also, organic unrefined coconut oil; grass-fed beef and lamb; pastured eggs; blackberries, lemon and blueberries; stevia and sugar alcohols (like maltitol, sorbitol and his favorite xylitol).
Here's what's on Asprey's kryptonite foods menu: soy milk; diet drinks; canned veggies; margarine and oils made from such GMO sources as soybean or canola; all cheese; wheat and quinoa; raisins; jams and jellies; commercial salad dressings; NutraSweet and Splenda; deep-fried and microwaved food.
I've spent the past two months loosely following Asprey's complex food plan that's a mash-up of a ketogenic (very low carb and high-fat) weight-loss diet and intermittent fasting. I did it to prove Asprey wrong.
Did I lose “up to a pound a day,” as his book cover suggests? No, but I did lose weight over those eight weeks.
The one thing about Asprey's food plan that I sincerely appreciated: no longer being hungry (read: famished) before lunch and dinner. The food cravings that bedeviled me my entire life disappeared in a surprisingly easy way: start my day with Asprey's “bulletproof” coffee and then loading up on fresh, organic vegetables and grass-fed or fully-pastured proteins for the remaining day's meals.
Satiety was obvious and my urge to overeat vanished.
Asprey's weight-loss food plan isn't everybody's cup of tea. It is far more complex than I can cover in this column. However, it does work.
Since we're creeping up on Thanksgiving, try the turkey burger recipe from Asprey's “Bulletproof: The Cookbook.”
• Don Mauer welcomes questions, comments and recipe makeover requests. Write to him at don@ theleanwizard.com.