Can you skip the lean, green food on Medifast?

I get a lot of questions about medifast “lean green food”. If you’re not familiar with this, it’s the largest meal you make each day while on this diet. You can eat five prepackaged meals a day that you really just have to prepare. But, “lean and green” requires a bit of food preparation. However, you can also do this very simply. The only real requirement is that you have 5 to 7 ounces of lean protein and three servings of vegetables. You can achieve this in any way you want.

Still, people often write to me and ask if they can skip the lean and green food or eat a pre-packaged meal instead. In other words, they would be eating six “medifast meals” while forgoing lean and greens. I’ll tell you what I think about this practice in the next article.

Why most people consider skipping their Lean and Green: I find that most people want to skip this because they think it will allow them to lose weight faster. Roughly each prepackaged meal has about 100 calories each. Obviously, very few home-cooked meals will meet this criteria, whether “lean” or not. So if you have consumed your 5 prepared meals, you only have 500 calories for the whole day. People decide that they don’t want to ruin this hard work by eating a bigger meal. I understand this thought, but I know for a fact that it is flawed because I experimented a lot with cutting it and it backfired.

Why I think you should NOT skip it: My experience: This is what most people don’t understand. The calories from this main meal are already built into the program. This diet is designed so that you eat around 1,200 calories per day. This is an acceptable low amount by most standards. Having 500 calories before this gives you a lot of wiggle room with your main meal. Even if you take some liberties, you’ll often still be in the 1200-1300 range unless you simply don’t follow the guidelines.

Understand that ketosis requires regular meals: Medifast works because ketosis works. Since you are eating a low number of calories and a high amount of protein, your body is forced to burn fat instead of carbohydrates. But you will slow down this process if you don’t give your body the fuel it needs to do its job. If you see the big loser, you know that Jillian annoys the contestants when they don’t eat enough. The same thing will happen if you start skipping meals. I know for sure from personal experience.

So don’t kid yourself. You really don’t need to. I really believe that if you eat regularly within reason, you will get better results. And, lean and green are beneficial not only in terms of keeping your metabolism going, but also in terms of teaching you how to plan and prepare healthy meals. You will need it later when you go to the maintenance phase of the plan.