Sacred Heart Diet
The Sacred Heart Diet is another one of those diets that supposedly was started by an institution, in this case the Sacred Heart Memorial Hospital and really was not at all. It has been called many names over the years including the Sacred Heart soup diet, cabbage soup diet, the Cleveland Clinic diet and many others as well. Despite the fact that it wasn’t actually started by a hospital, it still proves to be a very effective short-term diet for people that need to shed the pounds quickly.

Probably the most appealing thing about The Sacred Heart Soup diet is that it contains hardly any calories, but yet is satisfying. You can eat as much as you want whenever you want and it will not add a pound. It is supposed to be maintained for a week, and it does in fact help you shed a good 10 pounds, sometimes even more. However, it is not an easy diet to maintain for an entire week. Like any other diet, you will need strict discipline to meet your goals. If you cheat it will not work correctly.

During your seven day healthy soup diet, you can eat fruits and vegetables in any quantity that you desire. You can also consume the following beverages: unsweetened juice, teas, black coffee, cranberry juice, skim milk and of course water. In fact, it is very important to drink a lot of water. Water will help flush the pounds away, or at least so it seems. There are several variations of the Sacred Heart diet; you will see it with little differences when it comes to the ingredients. The recipe I tend to like the most is as follows:

6 green onions
2 green peppers
2 cans of stewed or diced tomatoes
1 bunch of celery (with the tops on)
½ head of cabbage
1 Package of lipton soup mix (I prefer onion soup mix)
1 box of beef stock (I use stock because it does not contain MSG like the canned broth does)
Bunch of carrots
V-8 juice (to taste if desired)
Seasonings (salt, pepper, I like lots of garlic and onion)

When it comes to what you are supposed to eat on and not eat on certain days, I do not follow it exactly and was still successful. However, I did not eat foods that were not in the diet plan at all and that is I think the key to success. According to the published Sacred Heart diet here are the daily recommendations.

All of these things are in addition to the soup.
• Day One-Eat any fruits you like (except bananas).
• Day Two-Eat all the veggies you want
• Day Three-Eat lots of fruits and veggies aside from the soup
• Day Four-Eat bananas and all the skim milk you want
• Day Five-Eat 10 to 20 ounces of beef, a can of tomatoes and 5-8 glasses of water
• Day Six-Eat all the beef and veggies you want
• Day Seven-Eat brown rice, unsweetened fruit juices, fresh veggies and lots of soup