Jason Vale - the self-proclaimed Juice Master - claims that by living on his life-affirming juices and nothing else for a week that you will lose at least 7lbs.

It’s quite a claim so I decided to buy a copy of his book and take a closer look.

The first thing to say is that Vale seems to enjoy swearing in his book - he seems to do it just to try and get attention and while I’m not immune to a little swearing myself it did get a bit tiresome after a while.

Perhaps the reason he likes to swear is that he comes across as such a self-confident (almost cocky) individual and I, for one, found it very difficult to like the character writing the book. This is in sharp contrast to, for example, Bill Philips in Body For Life. I just kept thinking “stop blowing your own trumpet!”.

Most medical practitioners these days recommend around 1-2lbs of weight lost per week when dieting and it’s interesting (and revealing) to here Vale explaining how his diet fits into this.

Basically he says he doesn’t care. His readers want to lose weight fast so who cares if it goes against medical recommendations?

In terms of fairness I should say that I have publicly lost well over 2lbs some weeks here on this blog so I am in no way saying I am perfect but I do point out what is recommended and his relaxed attitude I find a little hard to swallow.

Then there’s what I see as somewhat hokey science. Vale agrees that digesting food takes up a lot of energy for the body which is why so many diets, such the the Body For Life diet recommend eating 6 small meals rather than 3 larger ones, but Vale then claims that by juicing the ingredients, and so saving your body expending extra energy that it is “saved for the task of removing fat”.

Seems a very strange claim and is only one example of many that made me think “Now hang on here, where is the science to back up those claims”.

With this avalanche of negativity toward the 7lbs In 7 Days book you’re probably assuming you shouldn’t buy it.

But I don’t think it’s as easy as that. You see, the evidence suggests that the actual diet itself does work - it’s an interesting, successful weight loss regime - even if you take into account Vales various ways of “cheating the system”.

For example he recommends weighing yourself the night before you start the diet then the morning after you finish the diet to check you’ve lost 7lbs or ore. Well, pardon me, but by weighing yourself then (a) you’ve got an extra half a day of time to lose weight and (b) we all weigh less first thing in the morning than last thing at night so you’re going to show weight loss doing this even if you don’t follow the diet.

He also recommends 2-3 exercise sessions of 20-30 minutes each, per day. That’s up to an hour and a half of cardio per day which, again, would help anyone lose weight irrespective of their diet.

No matter. However you cut it, this diet does seem to work.

It’s just wrapped up in what, to me, was a dreadfully written, boring and repetetive book.

You’ll have to wade through a lot of rubbish within the covers but if you follow the core principles it’s likely you’ll lose quite a bit of weight without too much difficulty - and isn’t that what we all want?

Popularity: 8% [?]

Jason Vale’s greatest claim to fame is that he helped glamour model Jordan to lose 2 stone in 3 months.

The technique Vale uses is that of a “super juice diet” which he claims will enable the average person to lose at least 7lbs in 7 days. His claims sounded so interesting (and the shakes so tasty!) I thought I’d take a look into it.

I have therefore just begun the diet as yet another experiment for this blog and I have to say that so far I am really impressed. It’s been easy to stick to, I haven’t felt particularly tired and have even felt able to visit the gym for a workout.

All you drink is fresh water or warm water with lemon in (never understood that one myself - makes my skin crawl just to think of it!).

Food, as I say, is 100% juice-based - and you can consume up to 6 a day though it seems many people find they don’t need that many.

Because of this you need to feel comfortable with a very different kind of diet. No cutting corners. No “sins” or off days. You need to complete the full 7 days straight though it is just a week so I don’t think it’s asking too much.

You could, for example, prepare juices in advance and take them into work with you in bottles or flasks though Vale is keen to mention the shakes should ideally be comsumed fresh.

Whilst it does take some getting used to living on fluids, so far I haven’t seen any side effects to speak of and once you’re comfortable using a juicer and a blender, all of the shakes are easy and quick to make.

Be aware of course that they will require quite a bit of preparation before and cleaning up afterwards.

Here is a sample shake taken straight from the book to give you an idea of the sort of drinks you can expect…

1/4 small pineapple
1/2 stick of celery
1 inch chunk of cucumber
1 handful of spinach leaves
1 small piece of lime
2 apples
1/4 avacado

Vale’s book lays out on a day-by-day basis exactly what shakes to drink in what order which makes it very difficult to slip up.

Find the right day, find the right recipe, make it, drink it, clear up, done.

So far I have found the shakes to be delicious and I actually look forward to the next one though it is only fair to say that my girlfriend isn’t as keen on them as I have been. You’ll have to make your own mind up on this point.

I should mention just how much fruit and vegetables you’re going to get through - it’s quite shocking when the shopping list given in the book for the first 3 days of the diet includes figures like *35* apples!!!

Here’s a picture I took of the ingredients in one shake we made:

That picture amounts for 2 shakes - just one average-sized cup full of juice each after using the juicer!

Here’s the final product:

I hope you have a compost heap or know someone with a small holding because there is a lot of pulp left at the end of preparing one as I’m sure you can imagine.

In general this seems like a very interesting diet. Tasty food, step-by-step instructions, easy process.

Only time will tell whether it actually works but Amazon have some glowing testimonials on their site for the book.

Popularity: 8% [?]