Fast food junkies are reveling in joy right now and everyone who has been saying for years how bad fast foods are and that anyone who diets cannot seriously think of eating these foods is going to have to read what one man did to prove them wrong…
John Cisna, a science teacher experimented with an all Mcdonalds diet for 90 days and ended up losing 60 pounds. This was a science experiment he set out to test after his students asked him if it was possible to eat nothing but foods from this fast food chain.
The only thing about this story that makes sense is that John didn’t go and eat nothing but burgers. He actually stuck to a particular regiment:
- 3 meals a day: Breakfast, lunch and dinner.
- No more than 2,000 calories consumed a day.
- He walked for 45 minutes almost every single day.
- He ate items on the menu that were very basic: Oatmeal, egg whites, salads and a value meal.
And besides this leading to 60 pounds of weight loss, he also lowered his cholesterol! If you don’t think Mcdonalds foods, the type of stuff he was eating isn’t unusual. But there are a lot of people who think Mcdonalds foods are loaded with calories, trans fats and other bad ingredients.
I though most salads on the Mcdonalds menu had more calories than some of their value meals but this is incorrect. The Mcdonalds page which lists all of their salads also shows the calories per meal and the highest in salads was the Premium Bacon Ranch Salad with Crispy Chicken which has 480 calories. The lowest was somewhere between 100-200 calories.
How many calories you consume is more important than what you eat.
Besides proving that it can be done, John also proved how important calories are. There are diets where you can eat practically anything you want, but in limited proportions and still lose weight, but maintaining a limit to how many calories you consume daily is very important.
This sort of eating approach is probably not going to be recommended by most doctors, not only because of the ingredients you’re going to be eating but also the money that you’re going to spend, but if you want to try something like this, find out how many calories you need to eat everyday to feel satisfied and don’t pass that limit.
John didn’t go over 2,000 calories but that was his example. The article which talked about John’s experiment did not say how tall he was, his age or how much he weighed before/after he tried the Mcdonalds “diet”. If someone doesn’t go over 2,000 calories, he might have started around 200-220 and by the end of it was under.
To find out how much calories you need to eat everyday to lose weight, but also not starve, find your BMR which will tell you this and then don’t go over that amount. Try to eat foods with a low satiety and rarely treat yourself to a big meal. You should have no problem losing weight then.
I’m actually not at all surprised by this. And I think that you are right.
These days I often hear how veganism is the way to lose weight and be super healthy. However, I met some people who although were vegan they were still quite overweight just because they eat too much!
However like others said, from a nutritional point of view, I don’t think the foods he was eating is making him healthier.
It isn’t Vanessa, and while he did lose weight, let’s not forget the unhealthy ingredients he put in his body through this experiment. On one hand he did experience a positive health outcome, on the other, the ingreidnets he ate may impact his health down the line.
Wow great information. I never would have thought anyone could lose weight eating McDonalds!! I have heard that restricting calories and minimal exercise could help lose weight but I didn’t think someone could sustain that over time. Do you think that anyone could sustain that diet over a long period of time or just for the purposes of dropping weight?
It could be possible Guy, but let’s not forget the health issues that come from eating all of those bad ingredients. It just doesn’t make sense for people to think they can be healthy and eat this way for long periods.
Hi there,
It just goes to show that calories and exercise are a great way to lose weight. I have heard that walking is just as good as jogging, this kind of reinforces that 45 mins a day is nothing really. I sometimes walk home from work which is approx 30 minutes but it’s weather dependent.
I’m not sure about eating McD’s for 3 months though, surely that can’t be healthy, even if you do lose weight?
Oh you have my internal protest bells ringing loud and clear. I can see why he would have lost weight based on what he was eating. And I guess the purpose of this article was to prove that you could lose weight eating mcdonalds. BUT, it is definitely not an eating plan you would want to sustain for long due to the foods lacking variety and nutrients which therefore over the long term would result in health problems. However, I do admire people who are willing to out their bodies under an experiment purely just to see what would happen and to challenge the status quo of our assumptions.
I’m just awestruck! 3 meals a day every day for three whole months at McDonalds! I would have expected him to gain 60 pounds not lose 60! That’s almost 20 pounds a month! That’s just crazy! That takes real dedication to eat there every single day for each meal. With so many options on the menu it’s incredible that he had the self control to keep to his 2000 calories a day maximum.
Interesting story. I can’t help but wonder if John walked 45 minutes every day before he started this experiment. If he didn’t, it’s easier to understand how he could have lost 60 pounds. Just like how many calories you consume per day is important, how many calories you burn is key, too.
The story is a great way to illustrate your point that you should be mindful of the number of calories you consume every day.
Thanks for the info.
I don’t think he walked much before, but I think the walking might have been about 10% of all of his results. Most of them were through “dieting”.
Wow this was an incredibly interesting read – imagine getting away with this sort of thing!
I suppose i see the logic in it though. I LOVE my beer and my wine – I drink it about three nights out of the week ( and we’re not talking about one or two here! ). The thing is I’m a distance runner and I love to run every morning therefore I do not gain weight. I think the key to this guys story is the 45 min exercise
It made a huge different Chris, but I think the lesser calories per day was where the major part of the weight loss was from. He didn’t workout that much either.