The Virgin Diet by JJ Virgin (2012)
What to eat and
foods to avoid
The Virgin Diet (2012) is a book about losing weight by
avoiding food intolerances that affect you personally.
- Eliminate gluten, soy, dairy, eggs, corn, peanuts, sugar and sweeteners
- Eat unprocessed, whole, natural foods that are humanely and naturally raised
- 1-2 meals a day are shakes – Virgin Diet Shakes
- Challenge (reintroduce and check reactions) with dairy and eggs to see if
there are any reactions and how frequently you can reintroduce them into your
diet
- Challenge with gluten and soy to see if you should avoid them completely
- Continue to avoid foods you’re intolerant to and regularly check your
intolerances
Below is a detailed outline
of the food recommendations in the book – but the book suggests much more than
just what to eat and what not to eat!
Buy a copy of the Virgin Diet to get the full
details.
The reasoning behind The Virgin Diet
This book advises that the key to weight loss is avoiding and overcoming food
intolerance – food intolerances stress your system and give you negative
symptoms including weight gain.
Some people’s bodies simply have difficulty tolerating certain foods, such as
gluten, lactose, or MSG. Usually, this is because the intolerant people are
lacking a specific chemical or enzyme that they need to digest the food. This is
simply a genetic problem, and there isn’t much you can do about it except to
avoid the foods.
Another issue is food sensitivities, which affect at least 75% of us. They’re
a type of immune reaction, but they mobilize a different type of antibody than
food allergies do – not IgE, but immunoglobulin G, or IgG. The symptoms don’t
appear until hours or days after you’ve eaten, and if you continue to eat the
offending foods, food sensitivities keep your immune system fired up on a
chronic basis.
Virgin Diet plan food list - what you can eat, and top food intolerance
foods to avoid
This diet has 3 stages:
- Cycle 1 – elimination – 21
days – cut out all the top 7 FI (food intolerance) foods; eat healing foods and
healing supplements
- Cycle 2 – reintroduction –
28 days – every week for 4 weeks, test one potentially healthy high-FI food.
Based on your responses, determine whether each food should stay or go
- Cycle 3 – lifetime – avoid
corn, peanuts, and sugar and artificial sweeteners 95% of the time, rechallenge
the potentially healthy high-FI foods that your reacted to in Cycle 2 after 3 to
6 months to see if you can now tolerate them; every 12 months repeat the program
Do not count calories.
Virgin Diet cycle 1 / elimination – food list
Cycle 1 of The Virgin Diet – what to eat
- Week 1 – jump week – each day eat 2 Virgin Diet Shakes, 1 meal, optional
snack.
- Weeks 2 and 3 – healing weeks – each day eat 1 Virgin Diet Shakes, 2 meals,
optional snack (you can do 2 shakes if you prefer)
- Virgin Diet Shakes consist of vegan pea-rice protein, fiber (fiber blend,
chia seeds, hemp seeds, freshly ground flaxseed meal or nut butter), organic
frozen berries, liquid (water, unsweetened coconut milk or coconut water);
optional extras
- Keep a food journal of everything you eat
- Eat a substantial, balanced breakfast, generally around 400-500 calories
- Meal timing
- Drink your Virgin Diet Shake within an hour of waking up. If you’re working
out first thing, you can have half your shake before and half after.
- Eat only every 4-6 hours, 3 meals a day (less ideal option – 2 meals, an
afternoon snack, then a final meal). If you are an athlete and actively
increasing your muscle mass, eat every 4 hours and have a meal 4 times a day
instead
- Stop eating 2-3 hours before bed
Plate proportion
- Percentages not given in the book, here is an approximation of what’s shown
- 25% clean lean proteins, 30% nonstarchy vegetables, 25% healthy fats, 15%
high-fiber, low-glycemic carbs, 5% nuts
Fiber
- Eat at least 50 grams of fiber per day – slowly increase your fiber so your
body can adjust to it
- Soluble fiber is great
- Top sources: Raspberries, lentils, nuts, seeds (especially chia seeds and
freshly ground flaxseeds), kale, quinoa, avocado, apples, winter squash,
broccoli
Drink plenty of water
- When you get up: 16 ounces
- 30-60 minutes before each meal: 16 ounces
- During a meal: limit to 4-8 ounces
- Start drinking water again 60 minutes after each meal
- Before bed: 8 ounces
- Daily total: 64 ounces minimum, more if you are in a hot climate, exercise
heavily, or are heavier. You should be drinking approximately half your weight
in ounces.
- Green tea is a good option
- Limit coffee to 1 or 2 cups per day
- Green drinks / virgin shakes should be all green – no fruits, beets, apples,
carrots, or other high-glycemic vegetables or fruits
Clean, lean proteins
- 4-6 ounces for women, 6-8 ounces for men per meal
- Grass-fed beef, hormone-free free-range chicken and turkey, pasture-fed lamb
and pork, pea-rice protein, wild cold-water fish, wild game
- Enjoy lean red meat 3 or 4 times a week, focusing on game and lamb. Get the
rest of your protein from chicken, turkey, fish, and Virgin Diet Shakes
- Enjoy 2-3 6-oz servings of lowest-mercury fish per week – anchovies,
butterfish, calamari/squid, catfish, farmed caviar, clams, king crab,
crawfish/crayfish, flounder, Alaskan halibut, herring, spiny/rock lobster,
oysters, pollock, salmon, sardines, scallops, shrimp, sole, tilapia, freshwater
trout, whitefish
Healthy fats
- 1-3 servings of healthy fat per meal; 1 serving = 100 calories. 1 tablespoon
of fat, 1/3 avocado, or the fat in grass-fed beef, pasture-fed pork, lamb, or
wild cold-water fish
- Avocado, coconut milk or oil, extra-virgin olive oil (don’t cook it at
medium or high heat) , olives, palm fruit oil, sesame oil, wild cold-water fish
- Rock stars: red palm fruit oil and coconut oil
- Raw nuts (no peanuts) and nut butter, raw seeds (chia, hemp, freshly ground
flaxseed meal), Nuts – soak them overnight to reduce issues from lectins,
phytates and other enzyme inhibitors. Limit of 1-3 servings a day (5 brazil or
macadamia nuts, 10 walnuts, almonds, or cashews, or a tablespoon of nut butter,
not peanut butter)
- You can enjoy ghee, or clarified butter, ideally from grass-fed cows, even
in Cycle 1 as it has no milk solids
High-fiber, low-glycemic carbs
- ½ cup for women, 1 cup for men per meal
- Legumes including: Adzuki beans, black beans, chick peas / garbanzos,
cowpeas, great northern beans, kidney beans, lentils, lima beans, mung beans,
navy beans, split peas, white beans. Whenever possible, consume soaked,
sprouted, or fermented
- Non-gluten grains including: Brown rice, brown rice pasta or quinoa pasta,
brown rice wraps, millet, oat bran, quinoa. Whenever possible, consume soaked,
sprouted, or fermented
- Starchy vegetables including: Beets, carrots (raw only and along with other
foods), french beans, jicama, okra, pumpkin, squash (acorn, butternut, winter),
sweet potato or yam, tomatoes, turnip
- Grains, legumes, and starchy vegetables can be incorporated into a healthy
diet if they are not eaten in excess – 1-4 servings a day, where a serving is
approximately ½ cup
Non-starchy vegetables
- 2+ cups raw or 1+ cups cooked per meal, the more the better
- Arugula, beet greens, cabbage, chicory, collard greens, dandelion greens,
endive, kale, lettuce, mustard greens, radicchio, spinach, swiss chard, turnip
greens, watercress
- Artichokes, asparagus, bamboo shoots, bean sprouts, bell peppers*, broccoli,
brussels sprouts, cassava, cauliflower, celery, chives, coriander, eggplant*,
endive, fennel, garlic, green beans, jalapeño peppers*, kohlrabi, mushrooms,
onions, parsley, radishes, shallots, spaghetti squash, summer squash, tomatoes*,
zucchini (*nightshades, may cause issues for some people)
Low-GI to moderate-GI fruits
- In moderation
- Low-glycemic index fruits – favor these – blackberries, blueberries,
boysenberries, elderberries, gooseberries, loganberries, raspberries,
strawberries
- Moderate-glycemic fruits – eat in moderation – apples, apricots, cherries,
grapefruit, kiwi, lemons, limes, melons, nectarines, oranges, passion fruit,
peaches, pear, persimmons, plums, pomegranates, tangerines
- If you have issues with insulin resistance or high triglycerides, you should
only have one fruit per day or maybe even none
Low-FI foods – the least reactive foods
- Proteins: Hormone-free free-range chicken and turkey, pasture-fed lamb, pea,
rice, and/or hemp protein, wild cold-water fish
- Nonstarchy vegetables: All, but especially focus on: Broccoli, cabbage,
cauliflower, deep green leafy vegetables, kale, spinach
- Fruit: Apples, blueberries
- Fats: Avocado, chia seeds, coconut oil and coconut milk, extra-virgin olive
oil, freshly ground flaxseed meal, palm fruit oil
- High-fiber starchy carbs: brown rice, lentils, quinoa, sweet potatoes
Fermented foods
- Soaked, fermented, sprouted, or pickled – not commercially
- Pickled cabbage – traditionally prepared sauerkraut, kimchi
- Fermented fish sauces without gluten
- Kombucha without added sugar
- Dark chocolate – up to 2 ounces per day
- In cycle 3 if you can handle some dairy – greek-style yogurt or kefir
Healing foods and spices
- Aloe juice, apples, artichokes, avocado, beets, blueberries/berries,
broccoli, cabbage, chia seeds, cilantro, cinnamon, coconut / coconut milk,
curcumin/turmeric, dandelion greens, extra-virgin olive oil, flaxseed meal,
fresh garlic, ginger, green tea, lentils, oregano, palm fruit oil, pomegranate,
red onions, red peppers, rosemary, sauerkraut, sea salt, seafood (especially
salmon, sardines, sole, scallops), sweet potato, xylitol
Cycle 1 of The Virgin Diet – what not to eat
- The top 7 high-FI foods – completely avoid even the smallest traces of these
foods:
- Gluten – in all brans, baked beans, biscuits and cookies, blue cheeses,
bread and bread rolls, breadcrumbs, brown rice syrup, bulgur wheat, cakes, cheap
brands of chocolate, chutneys and pickles, couscous, crispbreads, crumble
topping, durum, farina, gravy powders and stock cubes, hydrolyzed vegetable
protein (HVP), imitation crabmeat, licorice, luncheon meats (may contain
fillers), malt vinegar, malted drinks, many salad dressings, matzo flour/meal,
meat and fish pastes, muesli, muffins, mustard and dry mustard powder, pancakes,
pasta (E.g. macaroni and spaghetti), pastry and pie crust, pâtés, pizza,
pretzels, Pringles potato chips, pumpernickel, rye bread, sauces (often
thickened with flour), sausages (often contain rusk), scones, seitan,
self-basting turkeys, semolina, shredded suet in packs, some alcoholic drinks,
some breakfast cereals, soups (may be roux-based), soy sauce, spice blends,
stuffing, waffles, white pepper, Yorkshire pudding. Make sure you’re only buying
oatmeal marked “gluten-free”
- Soy – in Asian foods, energy bars and shakes, miso, prepared foods, soy
protein powders, soy milk, soy sauce, tempeh, teriyaki sauce, textured vegetable
protein TVP, tofu, veggie burgers
- Dairy – in butter and many margarines, chocolate (except some dark chocolate
products), cottage cheese, cow’s, goats, and sheep’s milk, yogurts, and cheeses,
cream, sour cream, half-and-half, whipped cream, cream soups and chowders,
creamy cheese or butter sauces (often served on vegetables and meats), creamy
soups and sauces, ice cream, macaroni and cheese, many baked goods (bread,
crackers, and desserts), many baking mixes and pancake mix, many canned foods
(e.g. soups, spaghetti, and ravioli), many salad dressings (e.g. ranch, blue
cheese, creamy, and Caesar), mashed potatoes, shakes and hot chocolate mixes and
drinks, whey protein powder. Dairy may be listed on labels as: Butter or
artificial butter flavor, buttermilk or buttermilk solids, casein, caseinate,
sodium caseinate, cream, cream cheese, cottage cheese, lactose, lactalbumin,
milk, milk solids, nonfat milk solids, whey, yogurt, kefir
- Eggs – especially corn-fed – in baked goods, batter mixes, Bavarian cream,
boiled dressing, bouillon, breaded foods, breads, cake flours, creamy fillings,
custards, egg drop soup, egg replacers such as Egg Beaters, flan, french toast,
fritters, frosting, hollandaise sauce, ice cream, macaroons, malted drinks,
marshmallows, mayonnaise, meat loaf, meringues, noodles, pancakes, puddings,
quiche, salad dressings, sauces, sausages, soufflés, tartar sauce, waffles. Egg
may be listed on labels as albumin, egg protein, egg white, egg yolk, globulin,
livetin, ovalbumin, ovomucin, ovomucoid, ovovitellin, powdered egg, vitellin
- Corn – in breakfast cereals, cerelose, corn chips, corn syrup, dextrose,
dyno, glucose, grits, high fructose corn syrup HFCS, hominy, maize, margarine,
popcorn, puretose, sweetose, vegetable oil
- Peanuts – in baked goods, baking mixes, battered foods, biscuits, breakfast
cereals, candy, cereal-based products, chili sauce, Chinese dishes, cookies, egg
rolls, ice cream, margarine, marzipan, milk formula, pastry, peanut butter,
satay sauce and dishes, soups, Thai dishes, vegetable fat, vegetable oil. May be
listed on labels as emulsifier (uncommon), flavoring, ground nut, oriental
sauce, peanut, peanut butter
- Sugar and artificial sweeteners. Sugar in agave nectar, barley malt, beet
sugar, blackstrap molasses, brown sugar, cane juice crystals, cane sugar,
caramel, carob syrup, castor sugar, confectioner’s sugar, corn sweeteners, corn
syrup, d-mannose, date sugar, demerara sugar, dextrin, dextrose, diastatic malt,
diatase, evaporated cane juice, fructose, fruit juice, fruit juice concentrate,
galactose, glucose, high fructose corn syrup HFCS, honey, invert sugar, lactose,
malt syrup, maltodextrin, maltose, maple syrup, molasses, raw sugar, rice syrup,
sucrose, syrup, treacle, turbinado sugar. Artificial sweeteners including diet
sodas, other artificially sweetened foods, sweeteners including acesulfame
potassium, alitame, aspartame, aspartame-acesulfame salt, cyclamate, NutraSweet,
saccharin, Splenda, sucralose. Xylitol and a blend of xylitol and stevia are
allowed, although straight stevia is not allowed.
Processed foods, including gluten-free processed foods
Proteins
- Avoid commercially fed animal protein, fed on corn/soy and given hormones
- Avoid farm-raised fish
- Avoid fish that’s heavy in mercury and other heavy metals – grouper, king
mackarel, marlin, orange roughy, shark, swordfish
- Limit other high mercury fish to 1-2 6-oz servings a month – saltwater bass,
bluefish, Atlantic halibut, American/Maine lobster, mahi mahi, sea trout, canned
white albacore tuna, fresh bluefin tuna, fresh ahi tuna
- Eat no more than six 6-oz servings of lower-mercury fish per month – cod,
crab (Dungeness, blue, snow), monkfish, snapper, canned chunk light tuna, fresh
Pacific albacore tuna
Fats
- Avoid rancid, refined, or hydrogenated (trans) fats
Sometimes nightshades can cause you trouble
- If you have joint pain, try avoiding: Eggplants, peppers, potatoes, tomatoes
High-glycemic index foods
- Fruits: Bananas, grapes, mango, papaya, pineapple, watermelon
- Any other high-glycemic index foods
Beverages
- Avoid coffee and tea (there is contradictory advice in the book on these),
soft drinks
- Avoid alcohol
- Bottled water in plastic bottles
- You could have rice, almond, and hemp milks a bit here and there if coconut
milk is not available, as they’re loaded with sugars or carbohydrates without
nutrients. Fallback is unsweetened almond milk.
Genetically modified foods / GMOs
Virgin Diet cycle 2 / reintroduction – food list
Cycle 2 of The Virgin Diet – what to eat
- As above, plus reintroduce one forbidden food per week – eggs and dairy (as
they’re potentially healthy), soy and gluten (potentially unhealthy, testing to
see whether you need to by hypervigilant about them).
- Only use healthy, unprocessed versions of these foods and in moderate
amounts. Do not indulge in these foods during reintroduction
- Week 1 – test soy
- Monday to Thursday, add 1 meal that includes soy to your meal plan, from the
recipes in the book
- Friday to Sunday, go back to your soy-free diet
- Track your symptoms every day – www.thevirgindiet.com/symptomschecklist (free registration)
- continue to have at least one Virgin Diet Shake each day, stay hydrated, and
follow the meal timing rules
Week 2 – test gluten
- Monday to Thursday, add 1 meal that includes gluten to your meal plan, from
the recipes in the book
- Friday to Sunday, go back to your gluten-free diet
- Track your symptoms every day
- continue to have at least one Virgin Diet Shake each day, stay hydrated, and
follow the meal timing rules
Week 3 – test eggs
- Monday to Thursday, add 1 meal that includes eggs to your meal plan, from
the recipes in the book
- Friday to Sunday, go back to your egg-free diet
- Track your symptoms every day
- continue to have at least one Virgin Diet Shake each day, stay hydrated, and
follow the meal timing rules
Week 4 – test dairy
- Monday to Thursday, add 1 meal that includes dairy to your meal plan, from
the recipes in the book
- Friday to Sunday, go back to your dairy-free diet
- Track your symptoms every day
- continue to have at least one Virgin Diet Shake each day, stay hydrated, and
follow the meal timing rules
- If you can’t tolerate cow’s milk, you may be okay with goat’s and sheep’s
milk in Cycle 2. The best way to consume this type of milk is raw and fermented,
in the form of kefir or yogurt. Try a separate challenge for these
Even if you discover that you can tolerate gluten, soy, or eggs, do not add
them back into your diet during the other three challenge weeks
If by mistake you have one of the forbidden foods in cycle 1, make sure you
wait 21 days before you challenge the food you inadvertently ate
If you show a response on the first day, then that’s not a food that you
should be eating. You can rechallenge it again in 3 months if you want to.
If you notice a symptom by the fourth day, you can put that food into your
diet every fourth day – not any more often, or you might start reacting more
intensely
If you show no reaction, especially to eggs and/or dairy, then these are
foods that you can work into your diet in cycle 3 – every second or third day,
not every day
If you still have symptoms and aren’t noticing that they’re triggered by
these four foods, you might have trouble with the second tier – shellfish, tree
nuts, citrus, and strawberries. Give yourself a 3-week period to drop those
completely from your diet and see what happens
Cycle 2 of The Virgin Diet – what not to eat
As cycle 1, but the foods listed in Cycle 2 “what to eat” are
reintroduced
Virgin Diet cycle 3 / lifetime diet – food list
Cycle 3 of The Virgin Diet – what to eat
- As cycle 1, plus the foods that you can tolerate tested in cycle 2Continue
assembling meals as before, using the Virgin Diet Plate (plate proportions) and
focusing on clean, lean protein; healthy fats; high-fiber low-glycemic carbs;
and nonstarchy vegetables
- At least 95% of the time, avoid sugar, artificial sweeteners, gluten, corn,
soy, and peanuts
- Use the 3-bite rule – once or twice a week, you can have three polite bites
of something you otherwise wouldn’t eat (including desserts) as long as it isn’t
something to which you react badly.
- If you can tolerate them, include healthy forms of eggs and dairy based on
how you did in cycle 2: if you had no reaction, you can eat them every other
day. If you had a reaction by the fourth day, you can eat them every 4 days. If
you reacted immediately, leave them out for at least 3 months
- Follow the meal timing guidelines above
- Substitute 1 meal each day with a Virgin Diet Shake
- Stay hydrated
- You can reintroduce alcohol – limit to one glass of red wine per day for
women or two glasses for men. You could perhaps treat yourself to one
gluten-free beer per week; choose dark beers
- Use non-food rewards
- If you’re still trying to lose weight
- Replace 2 meals per day with Virgin Diet Shakes
- Replace your high-fiber starchy carbs with more nonstarchy vegetables
- Drink more green tea to boost your metabolism
- Up your fiber
- Make sure you drink enough water
- Shift from higher fat animal protein such as grass-fed beef and lamb, to
lower fat chicken breasts, turkey breasts, and scallops
Move through cycles 1, 2, and 3 once a year, every year, for the rest of your
life, to recheck what you can tolerate as this may change
Cycle 3 of The Virgin Diet – what not to eat
- As cycle 2
- Any foods that you react negatively to
- Alcohol over 1 glass a day for women and 2 glasses for men; mixed drinks
- 95% of the time avoid the forbidden foods that you don’t react negatively
to. Use the 3-bite rule – once or twice a week, you can have three polite bites
of something you otherwise wouldn’t eat as long as it isn’t something to which
you react badly.
Health benefits claimed in The Virgin Diet
The diet in this book claims to reduce the risks for: abdominal cramping,
acne, ADD/ADHD, anxiety, arthritis, osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis,
asthma, bloating, blood sugar crashes, brain fog, candida/yeast overgrowth,
chronic mucus/stuffy nose, congestion, constipation, dark circles under the
eyes, depression, diarrhea, dull lifeless hair, eczema, fatigue, food addiction,
food cravings, food intolerance, gas, headaches, heartburn/GERD, hyperactivity,
inability to lose weight, insomnia, insulin resistance, irritable bowel syndrome
IBS, irritable bowel disorder, joint pain, leaky gut syndrome, moodiness, muscle
pain, overweight/obesity, poor or unsteady energy, premature aging, psoriasis,
rosacea, sinusitis, skin rashes, small intestinal bacterial overgrowth SIBO,
throat clearing
As always, this is not intended to be a replacement for professional medical
diagnosis or treatment for a medical condition. Consult your doctor before
starting a new diet. This page describes what the authors of the diet recommend
– Chewfo is describing the diet only, and does not endorse it.
Buy a copy of the Virgin Diet to get more
information on food intolerance, recipes, and exercise recommendations. See also
the diet website at
http://thevirgindiet.com, the products store at
www.jjvirginstore.com, and the Twitter feed at
https://twitter.com/jjvirgin.
How have you found the diet helped you? Please add a comment below.
