Cook a little: the 17 day diet, day 1

My next book review is on a diet book. Following my own rules-of-the-reviewer (with 'don't review a cookbook you haven't cooked from' being the one and only rule), this means I have to go on said diet. That's a first.

Well actually, I did follow a diet once. All I remember is that it was four days of tuna steaks for lunch, spoonfuls of peanut butter as a snack and lots of beets. As random as the famous Beyoncé 'maple syrup and cayenne pepper' diet then. I was supposed to lose four kilos in those four days, just like my assistant-at-the-time Rosie's mother did. I lost nothing. I'm still eating peanut butter straight from the jar though.

The book is The 17 Day Diet by Dr. Mike Moreno, who thankfully is a real doctor - a GP. (He comes with recommendations from Dr. Phil. Who came on a wave of Oprah Winfrey fame. It's all in the networking.) Dr Mike is not as shouty as I had expected: leafing through the book I only see a few exclamation marks. Good.

It's translated into Dutch by a lady who used to write for 'the glossies' and now writes her own books. You can tell she's not a translator. Some sentences are appalling. You can just hear Dr. Mike in the background, saying it in English with his (or so I imagine) American twang and big white smile. Be warned, I will not be able to stop myself from giving examples (in Dutch) of the odd odd sentence. (Yes, it is supposed to say 'odd' twice. Speaking of appalling sentences.)

On to the diet. After reading 60 pages, this is what I learned:

* The 17 Day Diet actually takes 34 days: there are four 17 day cycles and you need to go through at least two of them.

* Only 17 minutes' exercise a day is required. Walking is enough. Easy peasy.

* I will get rich. But not straight away, because eating fish twice a day, and (out of season) berries is expensive. But Dr. Mike promises that I will get a job more easily, with better pay to boot, once I have lost weight and look better. I hope my employers are reading this.

* I can still drink coffee. Thank God for that.

For the next 17 days, I am allowed to eat only fish, poultry (no skin), non-starchy vegetables and limited amounts of fruit, eggs and 'probiotics' (basically, yoghurt). No meat, no carbs, no sugar. I can see this would work. Here we go. This is what yesterday's shopping looked like. Healthy stuff.