K-pop diet: The latest fad from Korea
What's the story
The Koreans are influencing the world with their cinema, culture, music, and beauty ideas. Koreans believe in taking what nature has to offer and turning it into a magical potion. The K-pop diet is one such trend that promises healthy weight loss relying on all-natural ways. South Korean pop stars have made it all the more popular, a reason why people also love it.
Don'ts
Avoid sugar, dairy products and bread
One of the advantages of the K-pop diet is that it cleanses your skin and improves your health. The most important part of this diet plan is to cut down on the consumption of sugar, dairy, and bread. It discourages unhealthy snacking. While practicing it, you must remain away from chocolates, candies, sodas, and other sugar-loaded foods.
Do's
Include fermented food in your meals daily
Fermented food is known to aid weight loss as it creates healthy probiotic bacteria. It also helps improve the digestion process and strengthens the immune system. Tempeh, miso (fermented soybeans), kimchi (fermented vegetables) are some such foods that are a part of almost every Korean meal as they help improve gut health. Tempeh is also made from soybeans and is incredibly nutritious.
What to eat
Major components of the diet
The K-pop diet largely comprises rice, steamed vegetables, eggs, fish, and meat. As vegetables contain a low amount of fat, it helps in weight loss. Eggs and fish are encouraged to be consumed steamed. You can enjoy whole chicken soup to fulfill your protein requirements. No wheat is allowed, so pancakes and noodles made up of mung beans are a good alternative.
Fitness
Exercise is the key
Apart from food, exercising is another area that one must concentrate on while following the K-pop diet. Any kind of physical activity combined with a proper diet is the solution to weight loss. You can also follow a special K-pop workout that involves pushups, squats, jump squats, planks, burpees, and crunches. The internet is full of exercise plans that you can follow.
Health
Potential health benefits of the K-pop diet
Given that the diet encourages the consumption of whole foods, vegetables, and lean meat, you end up filling up yourself with healthy foods that are full of fiber and other nutrients. Since you will be staying away from processed foods and sugar, combined with working out regularly, weight loss is a logical outcome. It can also lower blood pressure and keep heart problems away.
Criticism
Why are some people slamming the diet?
However, even though the diet has found several takes across the world, it is criticized for pushing people to lose weight not to become healthy, but to attain a certain body type. Even its name points toward the fact that it is telling people to eat a certain way to look like their favorite K-pop stars. This is why the diet has become debatable.