Last week I shared my latest review opportunity, The Unthinkable plan from Muscle food. A plan that includes all your meals and snacks delivered to your door, support from pros and workouts to see you through to peak fitness. I have just finished five full days on the plan, followed by two regular days and I'm back to share my results and review of the products, service and plan.
With over 7 stone to lose, I was never going to get to goal in five days unless I mysteriously lost some limbs in the night. I did though lose 6.8 pounds in five days which is more than any other plan I've done apart from shake diets, but this one had me feeling full, not deprived in the sightest and actually looking forward to meal times!
I'm super pleased with my loss for just five full days on plan and two 'regular' days. Although the first weight tends to be water that you lose, I'm still super happy to have shed some of it, I'm feeling so much better already, I have more energy and best of all I've broken the habits and been 100% on it, which is the first time I've felt like this in about two years. I only wish I could have carried it on for a month or two, I think I'd be transformed!
The food
The plan includes the three main meals of the day, as well as three decent sized snacks to have when you need them. As I hadn't ordered the plan myself (I was sent products to review), I wasn't 100% sure what else to do other than the DVD and food, but with all health plans I know you are encouraged to drink extra water, so I also got back into the habit of drinking at least two litres of water per day alongside, which has been pretty easy in this heat.
The food itself was surprisingly good and for a high protein plan, there was nothing that tasted 'proteiny' like a lot of foods and shakes can. I was given full proper meals, no messing about on portion sizes and the snacks were pretty hefty too! I was worried at one point that maybe I'd misunderstood as it seemed such a decent amount to be eating, but one quick message to Muscle Food and I was assured it was correct and my loss just goes to show that you don't have to starve yourself to lose weight, but actually you can eat a good portion of the right things and get healthy.
The protein enriched chocolate and cereal bars were included as snacks and they were all really tasty, especially a salted caramel one that was just off the scale tasty! I really liked the savoury snacks too, especially the flavoured chicken breast sticks and crisp type snacks called Zippers.
Breakfast each day was a porridge of some kind and on the day I didn't fancy a hot breakfast, I opted for a bowl of the high protein Shreddies that were gifted with my products.
The main meals were all lovely, some super easy to prepare chicken and veg type meals for lunches, as well as stir fry type dishes and my favourites - lasagna, spag bol and pizza. Having things like pizza when you're trying to get fit seems odd, but these are again high in protein and you really get your fix without doing the damage to your weight or plan. I was really impressed with the goats cheese pizza and I will buy these again to swap for our home made ones every now and again, they are so tasty.
Over the week, my tastes seemed to change and I was craving more grains and veg than cakes and bread which has really surprised me. I've enjoyed the food and not once woken up with that dreaded 'oh yeah I'm on a diet' feeling which can often lead to a bad case of diet failure.
Exercise and support
As I was just reviewing the programme I didn't have full access to the support available, but there's lots of help to be had and a really good community with all the customers helping each other reach their goals, as well as expert help when needed.
I have the DVD and have watched bits of it but sadly after full days of walking the week before down in Devon, my legs hips and back were completely shot at, so I wasn't able to do much more than the warm up. That said, I did make sure to step up easier to manage tasks like walking, making extra trips by foot and walking more as much as I could through the week. The DVD has a great fitness test on it though, so as soon as I feel I can cope with it without damaging myself even more I will be using the DVD, it's easy to follow with no annoying celebrities doing their best to entertain, just hard work and results.
Verdict
At £60 per week for the plan I did, this isn't something I could currently do for the full 12 weeks cost wise, but I really really wish I could! This is genuinely the easiest 'diet' I've tried in terms of keeping motivated, having a variety of foods and not feeling deprived one bit at any point. Although I had to talk myself out of a couple of naughty moments with treats, I didn't find it anywhere near as hard as I do normally and I'm hoping this has kick started another more permanent health journey that I can carry on. I also found it really easy to follow alongside family life and I like the fact the kids saw me eating good healthy food and getting more exercise which I intend to keep up.
I highly recommend this plan as I found it very easy to follow, I had no nasty withdrawal feelings despite a very eaty week the week before on holiday, the food is well portioned and tastes good. Everything you need comes straight to your door and it's all worked out to make you the best you can be, with no prep, no stress and an easy to follow programme with support where you need it.
My one and only negative would be that some of the items got a bit squashed in transit, so although they are packed well in terms of keeping fresh, they do get a bit bashed which could cause leaks etc. This is a minor issue though and if you have any problems they will send out a replacement as the customer service seems really good too. If you are in a position to do the unthinkable - go for it! You can even get £5 off any of the plans with promo code - WAFFLE5
