James posted his success with TCD on Reddit. I reached out to see if he wanted to share and he obliged. James is doing TCD to the tee: using starches to absorb highly saturated fats. He has experienced many of the same benefits I originally described in Introducing The Croissant Diet: increased satiation, increased energy, loss of weight and loss of inches around the waist, going from 47 inches down to 42.
James also came up with an important innovation for peanut butter lovers who’d like to do TCD. You can buy fat-free peanut butter powder and add whatever fat you’d like to it for TCD appropriate peanut butter!
OK, I’ll get out of the way and present James’ story, word for word as he sent it to me. OK, fine, I bolded the sentence, “I’m not going back”. Yes, I used bold as a verb. I’m American.
My name is James. I’m 35 male 6’6 and I am currently 247lbs down from 270 starting at June 2020 when I started the TCD I had lost 5lbs before this just excercizing. I’ve struggled with weight essentially my whole life, yo-yo’ing up and down as heavy as 355lbs and as far down as 260 with doing lots of cardio and lower carb.
I have had luck in the past with keto to a degree. But it was hard to stay on as I was always feeling deprived of carbs. I was also eating bacon and chicken and not a lot of beef.
At the height of my weight I was lifting heavy weights for powerlifting and Strongman and my priorities changed so I’ve been slowly chipping away at my weight over the last 5 or 6 years, trying to lose 10lbs or so a year and trying to stay at that weight so I was less likely to balloon back up and it was working, but it was hard. I’ve been biking for the last 5 years to help keep the weight off and it was working, although if I took off of biking I’d start putting on weight if I didn’t count calories( I hate counting calories).
I had got down into the 280’s and stalled for a while, mostly because I love beer and the bad diet that goes with beer and alcohol. I started a vegetarian diet to try and see if switching to this kind of diet would allow me to eat less calories while still eating more food, you see I’ve always dealt with over eating, not knowing when to stop because I felt like I never felt full unless I was absolutely miserable. Like I would gourge myself and only stop when I felt pain. I did feel better, but it was also hard to stay on because I do love meat and was again feeling deprived.
Starting in around June I had heard about the The Croissant Diet and seeing the science and reading about you discussing the French people’s diet It made so much sense. The French are skinny they people in there country that live into their 100’s and they eat gobs and gobs of saturated fat.
So, I bought some fire in a bottle staeric acid and started making butter with it using ghee, I also bought coco butter to change up the fats every once in awhile. I have been trying to actively avoid soy oil for years now, but now try to stay away from ALL PUFA’s which I admit is almost impossible, but heard you talk about how its important to make the fat ratios more saturated so to fix that I cook everything I eat in the Staeric and coco butter.
My breakfasts eaten around 7:00am, consists of either pancakes(with no PUFA’s) and syrup, bagels cooked in SAB(staeric acid butter) with grassfed cream cheese, or oil fee bread toasted in the SAB with SAB peanut butter or butter croissants I find at the super market that have no PUFA’s. See, I love peanut butter. But of course it is packed with PUFA’s so I bought some powdered peanut butter that has a fraction of the fat and added more SAB to make it a better fat ratio.
My lunches eaten at 12:30PM, consists of French family recipes I looked up and with the help of a buddy of mine that graduated college as a french chef, I’ve been making beef cassoulet and beef bourguignon with mashed potatoes jammed full of SAB, coco butter, regular butter, heavy cream, and whole milk, all grass fed.
My dinners eaten at around 5:30 or so, are usually light with either fried tortillas chips I make myself and some salsa with sour cream or yogurt with honey and I’m good for the night.
The biggest thing I love about this diet is that I don’t feel deprived and it has essentially ended my cravings for a lot of foods. If I don’t eat lunch on time its ok I can wait a little longer, or if I’m out eating I get a steak and mashed potatoes with extra butter and I’m fine.
Also, I love that i get all the benefits of Keto, no retained water, no swelling, no inflammation, sore joints, and I still get to eat carbs. My weight use to fluctuate 7 to sometimes 10lbs a day depending on how much beer or carbs I had, now its a pound at the most. My energy for bike riding is through the roof. I don’t get hungry as fast and my mile times have gotten better with less fatigue at a calorie Deficit! It’s absolutely amazing. The weight is now just melting off of me and I’m not even trying to limit myself. Its is impossible to over eat. I now know what it means to eat until I’m full. In fact my body self regulated the other day. I usually eat 4 pancakes with syrup and one day that was WAY too much food. I had to reduce my eating on my own!
Thank you for putting diet out there. I’m not going back.
The pictures are from June and today (Oct 1st). My video I took says my waist was 47in and now its 42in.
Pictures Before
After Photos
Congratulations! It really stuck with it over the years. A lot of people would have just given up.
Do you make the tortilla chips frying them in butter? They are my kryptonite but I know they’re just about the worst things you can eat. I have tortillas of course and I could certainly fry those in butter unless you have a better option.
My preferred frying fat is beef suet. Hard to find, but VERY high in stearic and satFat. Very satiating.
Instructions to make it: https://fireinabottle.net/grassfed-beef-suet-is-an-excellent-source-of-stearic-acid/
I had been using Fat Free peanut butter powder in my protein shakes until I read the croissant diet. Good to know it works on this diet. Now I can add it back in!
Brad, does this mean as long as you add the Stearic Acid butter to whatever you’re eating that you can eat anything? I bought the DIY stuff and made it. I like the idea of the ghee so I’ll do that next time but so far I’m not sure how often to eat it. I’ve been doing it in my coffee, in my bone broth, and last night added some to the steak I had. I’m not going to eat just croissants nor make them so I’m trying to replicate results with eating any food like it sounds like you all are doing.
Yeah, it doesn’t really matter how you use it. The important thing is to keep your overall SatFat ratios very high and minimize PUFA.
What do you mean by satfat ratios?
I mean that the theory of The Croissant Diet is to shoot for A high percentage of long chain Saturated Fat (SatFat) in your diet while minimizing monounsaturated and especially polyunsaturated fats.
If you are dealing with someone who (due to autoimmune issues) cannot consume wheat/gluten/grains/alcohol, how would one make this diet work?
Take a look at Emmy’s story.
We’re not currently consuming wine at my house because of my teen’s substance abuse issues but I’m trying vinegar instead. Dr. Jason Fung recommends consuming a small amount of apple cider vinegar prior to eating starches. He presents research that indicates carbohydrate absorption is slowed by the vinegar, reducing insulin spikes. I’ve wondered if the wine plays a similar role.