After all the food fads and magical avocados, you will as ever, be a little disappointed that the new diet which is sweeping the nation and the disastrous effects of climate change away, is also sweeping meat feast pizzas and burgers into the bin. The price of preventing 11 million premature deaths per year, not including the lives of trees, animal and plant species, is to cut dairy, sugar and red meat radically. The orangutans will be thanking you for cutting red meat intake by 80%. But is the pleasure all yours? 

You can thank the EAT-Lancet Commission, the first ever to consider our mother earth’s dietary requirements. Whilst the cows roam free and Nando’s faces a menu revamp, we need to double our nut, fruit, vegetable and legume intake. January gym go-getters, your daily chicken staple is at risk of becoming a weekly treat. Is reducing risk of sugar and saturated fat related death, and minimising climate change effects down to a third of their current size, as easy as it is in theory?

An average daily intake of 2500 calories, recommended for men/ 2000 calories, recommended for women would consist of:
7g/ 5.6 of red meat and pork – one pigs in blanket
29g/ 23.2 of poultry – KFC popcorn chicken contains 24g protein, as a loop hole
28g/ 22.4 of fish – roughly 2 king prawns
250g/ 200g dairy – one glass of milk
1.5/ 1 Eggs per week
500g/ 400g of fruit and vegetables
125g/100g of legumes, peanuts, tree nuts or soy
52g/ 41.6g fats

As a student who prioritises wine over chicken fillets in my Aldi shop, I assumed this diet would be easy. After witnessing a housemate recently crash and burn at Veganuary at the hands of Yazoo, I believed this non-discriminating-of-food-groups-diet, would be more manageable- so I gave it a go. Most morning’s breakfast consisted of a cinnamon and raisin bagel (50g out of 16% carbs/around 127g), topped with crunchy peanut butter (10g) and a banana (100g). I saved my egg allowance for the weekend and a smoothie for those 9ams.

Lunch consisted of a menu of either beans (100g) on toast (50g and 5g butter), topped with grated cheese (25g); leftover veg stir-fry ( 62.5g of egg noodles, 200g of green veg); sweet jacket potato (114g), beans (100g) and cheese (25g); Peanut (10) curry with sweet potato (62) and kale (50g); chicken popsters (100g- up to 162.4 over a week) and mayo (20g); butternut squash (42.5g) burrito (10g kale, 50g rice, 25g wrap).

Dinner was mostly the fresh version of whatever I had for lunch the following day; stir-fry, sweet potato curry, butternut squash red Thai curry, green Thai curry (200g veg, 90g rice) and Cauliflower (200g), broccoli (300g), onion (30g) cheese bake (125g).

I will admit, because honesty is the best policy when it comes to food (I’m looking at you, Tesco’s mincemeat), that it was impossible to stick to simply one plate of sushi at YO! Sushi, and I cannot be held accountable for the Pit Stop mozzarella sticks and chicken dippers. This aside, the main struggle was controlling my carb intake. Keeping this to two out of three meals a day was challenging, whilst I had to replace my bedtime porridge with cucumber. Although unsatisfying stomach-wise, it was pleasing for the conscience. 

Overall, it was very accessible as a diet with only a necessary strain on my self-control for second dinner and snacks; with the diet being about 4% sugar, I had to replace my chunky KitKat with two custard creams. I could, if I made better choices, had satisfied this craving easily with fruit, which I did not eat enough of. If the self-improvement I would feel as a person, from following this diet, is the same outcome for our planet- then I fully support its impacts.