The FastDay Forum

I bought The 5:2 Bikini Diet by Jacqueline Whitehart and also The 5:2 Diet by Kate Harrison.

Do you have any other recommendations? I'm not keen on any 5:2 cookbooks since I'm vegan and feel like I'm wasting my money on all the meat recipes and also don't care for a lot of cooking.

What 5:2 books are you enjoying? I read a review of The Fast Diet on amazon U.S., and it basically stated the diet is so easy, you don't really need any books. I totally agree, but I still like to read them.

I noticed 5:2 Diet Cookbook was selling at around $17 yesterday at Coles supermarket, which is discounted. Tea time there is a thread here by @FatDog where lots of vegetarian cookbooks are discussed. Can't remember if is vegan but might give you food for thought (no pun intended) and interesting info in this low carb vegetarian thread.

Am sure there are a few vegans doing 5:2 so am sure they will reply

[Moogie]

I enjoyed The Fast Diet although much of it was basically the Horizon documentary in written word, there were some extra parts and references which were interesting. Haven't read any others, I don't really read much to be honest!

"Why We Get Fat" by Gary Taubes

It convincingly counters all of the common historical and too often-repeated solutions to the obesity problem such as" "eat less, exercise more", "eat less fat", "calories in calories, out" and "eat more grains".

It answers many of science-based questions posed here while remaining quite readible.

The last half of the book tells you what you can do to correct the problem of being overweight. Unfortunately it's light on fasting as a possible solution, but then it was written in 2009-2010 - well before 5:2.

It appears to be similar in content to
"Escape the Diet Trap" mentioned elsewhere. (I can't elaborate further because my copy of "Escape.." is currently "lost" somewhere between here and Amazon.)

And it has an 18-page references section pointing to quite a few studies, and a decent index. Well worth the read as an I-want-to_know-more companion to 5:2 FastDiet book/video.

'nuf said.

Woof woof!

Veggie 5:2 books appear to be rather thin on the ground - and the samples I've seen don't seem to be hugely inspiring.

I've tended to go for conventional veggie, or even omnivore, cookbooks and then modified them for 5:2 and low-carb. I reference a few of the ones that I've recently acquired in my journal, but I hope to do an audit and proper review of all the ones that I have soon... As a generality, there's no guarantee that veggie cookbooks will render more usable recipes than omnivore, e.g. the Cranks book I looked at the other day had near zilch in it (for me) but 'the diabetes cooking book' has had quite a lot of usable stuff in it!

These two web-sites are stock-full of easily modified delicious veggie / vegan stuff:

http://www.korasoi.com/blog/
http://www.vegangela.com/tag/low-carb/

This book about intermittent fasting in general looked interesting / useful, but I don't have it:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0957 ... ROKL5A1OLE

And, if you're into low-carb, there's no beating Volek & Phinney:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Art-Science ... and+phinne

Thank you everyone, for the input and the links.

Yeah, I've decided I definitely want to read all I can on 5:2 eating. I spent a lot of time searching on amazon U.S., and boy are there tons of books on the subject!

I guess I should have started with the original Fast Diet book first, but the other two are written by non-doctors, just regularly folks who talk about their weight loss experience on 5:2 with some good tips, so I ordered those. When the budget allows, I'll order The Fast Diet too.

One book I'm really interested is a book called The Alternate Day Diet. Apparently this fellow, Dr. Johnson was the one who started it all a few years ago, although I don't think I could do 500 calories every other day. 2 days a week is enough for me thank you. But his revised edition is coming out in December, and I'm interested in the latest research, etc., so that will be my Christmas gift to myself. And I'm thinking if down the road I stall, I might try 3 days a week. I would do that over counting calories daily like some folks are doing.

I hope my husband takes an interest in losing weight if I do it. I'm so worried about him.

If I can't follow this eating plan, I mean I just give up. No way am I going back to Weight Watchers. So this is the end of the road for me. No looking back now. I already planned out my fast day for tomorrow.

I bought the original Michael Mosley book that came out after the Horizon documentary (which I'd watched). I didn't start 5:2 until quite recently though. I was buying cookbooks from a discount online bookshop and Kate Harrison's 5:2 recipe book was on offer. That was the kick starter for me. I then went on to buy the 5:2 cookbook that goes with the Mosley book (the official one) and I also bought The Skinny 5:2 Recipes For One and I use this the most because I live alone and it's easier than cutting down recipes.

For the person asking about vegan 5:2 - my ex is vegan and he's lost about 10kg in the last year. Basically, on fast days he just avoids carbs, drinks lots of green tea and soups and ears a wide range of veg plus some tofu. I should add that he includes eggs in his diet at home on both fast and normal days - he keeps rescue hens and they are the only eggs he will eat.

Honestly? I think this forum is the best source. The collective knowledge, experience and wisdom here is better than MM and MS. Study hard.

I found two vegetarian single serving size 5:2 fast days cookbooks on amazon uk amazon:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Skinny-Vege ... diet+5%3A2

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Diet-Single ... iet+5%3A2#

The may have vegan recipes in them.

I am also looking for similar but just vegetarian ones as you can tell from the links. BUt I*d like them to have the metric measurements and not just imperial. And anm not sure if they do..

I just picked up THE HUNTER/FARMER DIET SOLUTION by Liponis last week, haven't started reading it yet. I found the TV presentation interesting and think it integrates quite well with the 5:2 diet. His theory that different body types respond better to different types of food. If I actually do try and follow his suggestions, I will let the group know if it speeds my weight loss.

Thanks for the book recommendations.

I'm doing the alternate day thing now but still get some great advice from these 5:2 books.

I'm surprised books can have the same title as the original 5-2 book. .. I guess the term 5-2 is not trademarked ?

Hi keep the faith! I hope this is working out well for you x

Ps a great book to put you right off junky sugary fatty food is Slim for Life by Jason Vale
Excellent book! Also he has written a book to put chocoholics off their addiction!