What is the Hard-Boiled Egg Diet? Benefits & Risks
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The hard boiled egg diet focuses on learn protein and low carbs to effectively lose weight quickly. Get a daily guide on how it works & what to watch out for below!
While the egg diet helps you lose weight quickly, it might not be the best option for you! This extreme weight loss diet can be hard to stick to long term, and it can have some side effects.
There are different versions of the boiled egg diet, but the typically you eat 3 meals a day. These meals consist of only lean protein and foods low in carbohydrates. You also eliminate junk food and snacks.
This high protein diet started back in the 1970s. Vogue published a popular egg and wine diet, and with the keto diet growing in popularity, the original diet morphed into an “egg-fast” to jumpstart weight loss.
Are Hard Boiled Eggs Good for Losing Weight?
There’s no doubt that eggs are good for you. Low in carbohydrates and calories but rich in vitamins and minerals, eggs are a good source of protein. Plus, they’re bioavailable. This means we can digest and use the protein from eggs more than from any other food.
But only eating eggs as your main (or only) source of nutrition may not be a great plan long-term.
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What Is the Hard Boiled Egg Diet?
The diet requires you to increase your protein intake and drastically reduce – or eliminate – carbohydrates and other dietary elements.
There are no universal ‘rules’ for the diet and there are several variations. In general though, it typically is a short-term diet of fasting; people usually follow it no more than than 2 weeks at a time.
What Can You Eat?
- Eggs
- Lean proteins (turkey, chicken or fish)
- Lower carb fruits like grapefruit and berries
- Low carb vegetables
- Zero-calorie beverages (water, herbal tea, black coffee, diet soda)
Your eggs can be cooked however you like, but you have to stick to the foods above. This means you could bake, boil, scramble, or poach them to give you a variety of meals.
What Can’t You Eat?
- Alcohol
- Junk Food (processed or fried foods)
- Beverages with calories (milk, juice, soda)
- Foods high in salt
You should also stick to 3 meals a day with no snacks.
Keep in mind that fruits and some vegetables can still be high in sugars and carbohydrates so you want to limit or avoid these completely.
You can still eat produce lower in carbs, including citrus fruits, green leafy vegetables, mushrooms, broccoli and other low carb vegetables.
The 3-Day Military Diet and the Mono Diet are also similar to this plan. If you’re looking for a “quick fix” and aren’t big on eggs, you should look into these 2 options instead.
Tips for Results on an Egg Fast
Drink Your Water!
You should be getting about half your body weight in ounces per day.
Get Enough Sleep!
You should get 7-9 hours per night. Did you know sleep may effect weight loss as much as a workout? It’s true! We compared sleeping vs working out here.
Track Your Fiber!
All of these eggs can leave you gassy. Track your fiber to help your digestion.
Consider Healthy Fats.
You may find adding healthy fats keep you feeling more full. Ghee, MCT Oil, and avocado are great go-to options.
Have Your Eggs Ready!
We love this little gadget that cooks 12 eggs at a time! This keeps this diet easy to prep for!
Advantages of the Hard-Boiled Egg Diet
This type of diet WILL produce weight loss in the short term. What’s more, many aspects of the diet are beneficial. For example, the advice to avoid alcohol, processed and fried foods is key to any healthy diet.
Disadvantages of the Hard-Boiled Egg Diet
Unfortunately, any weight loss will be temporary, because a diet like this is impossible to maintain long term. ‘Yoyo’ dieting – where you lose weight quickly, then regain it – is unhealthy.
Eliminating carbs will leave you feeling weak and lethargic, and the sudden increase in protein can play havoc with your digestive system. This can cause nausea, constipation, and bad breath.
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3 Variations of the Diet
The Traditional Egg Fast
You eat eggs or a small amount of another lean protein at every meal.
You can also serve a low-carbohydrate fruit or vegetable with breakfast and dinner.
The Egg and Grapefruit Diet
You eat eggs or a small amount of another lean protein at every meal. You can also have half a grapefruit with each meal.
The Extreme Version
You eat nothing but hard-boiled eggs for the 14-day duration of the diet. Alternatively, you can serve your eggs poached or scrambled, as long as you don’t use butter or oil to prepare them.
Medical professionals don’t recommend this type of ‘mono’ diet because it is so imbalanced and can lead to malnourishment.
Sample Meal Plan
Monday:
- Breakfast: 2 Boiled eggs and a grapefruit
- Lunch: 1 Cup berries and 2 pieces of sweet potato
- Dinner: 1 Large plate of salad with chicken breast
Tuesday:
- Breakfast: 2 Boiled eggs and a grapefruit
- Lunch: Green vegetables with chicken
- Dinner: Leafy greens with 1 orange and 2 eggs
Wednesday:
- Breakfast: 2 Boiled eggs and a grapefruit
- Lunch: Low-fat cheese, 1 tomato and 1 piece of sweet potato
- Dinner: 1 Large plate of salad with chicken
Thursday
- Breakfast: 2 Boiled eggs and a grapefruit
- Lunch: 1 Cup berries and 2 eggs
- Dinner: Salad topped with steamed fish
Friday
- Breakfast: 2 Boiled eggs and a grapefruit
- Lunch: 1 Cup vegetables and 2 eggs
- Dinner: Salmon with leafy greens
Our Advice?
Nutritional balance is the key to a healthy body, so we don’t recommend the hard-boiled egg diet as a method of losing weight. With that said, eggs are high in protein and can be an important part of your diet. They’re super satisfying, so they make a great breakfast or snack.
We just personally follow a balanced diet eating a mix of healthy fats, lean proteins, and complex carbohydrates.
We may have an egg cup with bacon for breakfast, a green salad with nuts and olive oil for lunch, and a piece of chicken with a sweet potato and broccoli for dinner.
You can grab our sample meal plan for weight loss or our healthy breakfast, lunch and dinner ideas here!
Intermittent Fasting May Offer Similar Benefits
This type of fasting is where you only allow yourself certain hours of the day to eat.
We started using this type of fasting with the 131 Diet Method, and we’ve really enjoyed the results from it.
We also are still eating more than eggs each day, and we’re still seeing results!
Get Our Guide to Intermittent Fasting for Beginners
Need to lose weight faster?
We realize that you may have found this post because you want to lose weight fast.
We offer a few things that could help – check out:
- Our Nutrisystem Review & Results
- 21 Day Challenge for Simple Nutrition & At Home Workouts
- Our Guide to the Whole 30 or Clean Eating
what is “a piece of sweet potato” ?
Approximately 1/8 to 1/4 a cup.
Can I substitute something else for the sweet potato? I don’t eat sweet potatoes.
Yes, you could do another starchy vegetable (like carrots) or a whole grain (oatmeal would be a good one!).
Will it be okay if I mix the eggs to my oatmeal? And is it okay if I work on a graveyard shift? Last question, how about 3 eggs per meal? No other foods
Oatmeal is higher in carbs so you wouldn’t want to have it a lot on this plan, but you could always follow a more balanced diet if you wanted a well. You could totally do it on the graveyard shift as well.
I am on this diet 4th day … . I look worse than before. Yesterday was Friday, so I ate according the plan: 2 boiled eggs + 1 apple for breakfast, Boiled vegetables – 200 gram (broccoli, culliflower, carrots) and 2 boiled eggs for lunch and small piece of grilled chicken + boiled vegetables (like above). I still look today like I am about to explode!
No, thank you. 4 days ago I was much slimmer.
I am trying this because I love eggs and I NEED to lose weight. Thank you so much to the person for asking the question about the piece(s) of sweet potatoes. Thank you, K and K, for answering. I like sweet potatoes, but I prefer the carrots!
You could also do carrots if you wanted since both are starchy vegetables. :)
Do I have to do sports?
Nope!
Why ? I’m doing it and doing sports it is bad ?
Sports aren’t bad; you just don’t have to do sports with the fast if you don’t want to.
Hi. Is it unlimited green veggies and how much chicken?
I’d say unlimited green veggies and about 4-6oz of chicken per serving personally.
Im not a fan of grapefruit.. is there an alternative?
An Orange would be a good alternative :)
I’ve had a duodenal switch stomach operation which my life solely depends on high protein diet around 150g, and only 50g carbs.
Would this be suitable for me as I’ve had some regain and need a kick start and I’m better when following something thats known to have good results.
Thankyou Annie.
This is something you’d want to show and ask your doctor before starting (or any new diet really).
Is there a dressing of some kind for the salad ? Vinegar and olive oil?
Yes, that would be perfect!
Looking interesting, hope this will help my wife to lose some of her weight at last
What can be put in the salad?
We recommend fresh vegetables like tomatoes, onions, and cucumbers. We also recommend staying away from creamy dressings and croutons.
What would you expect the weight loss to look like? 1lb a day, and then 7lb on the last day? 1.4lb a day?
I’m trying this out because during covid-19 I’ve gained about 15lbs. If this even helps me lose that, I think I’ll be back to where I want to be. Just for my data gathering experiment baseline, I’m weighing in twice a day. Just for curiosity. Let me know what you think.
I’d say it will be a pretty steady loss, but if you don’t see any the first day or two – up your water! That will help you see it come off in the 3-7 days! I hope this helps jumpstart your results and get you feeling like yourself again! The Covid-19 weight gain is so common, and it’s great you’re fighting it!
What fruit is best to eat.? I like apples, pineapple, bananas. And oranges.
Your lower carb options are going to be the best — berries, melon, pineapple, and oranges.
Alright! I can’t believe this is 14 days already! I took your advice and drank more water. I got an average of 14.7k steps a day (157km or 97.5miles total) during this time. I also cheated somewhat. I had some almonds, 1% milk in my coffee, 3 sandwiches, popcorn (just salt, no butter), yogurt and banana chips. I was not expecting 20lbs. But I wanted to see what I could negotiate with my body by eating, so that I can see if I can stretch this out and make it more sustainable. I have lost 9lbs so far. I’m 5’7″, athletic (moving 10 60lbs bags of gravel for half an hour kind of athletic), and weighed 185lbs. Now I weigh 176lbs. October 15th last year I weighed 172lbs. I’m hopeful that I can actually hit that, and be back on track to a BMI of 25 by mid-November! That would be crazy! The last time I was 164lbs was 10/18/2017. I won’t go that low that fast the year, but it’ll be nice to hit that by December!
YAY! That is so awesome to hear, and we love that you made it fit your own lifestyle too! Your goal is great for your BMI too, and we have no doubt you could hit that by mid to late November! Really it gets a little tougher as you get closer to your goal, and that is normal! :) So be kind to yourself, but we definitely are so excited for you and so excited to know how your progress continues!!
Alright ladies! Once more into this plan! I’m about to go into COVID-hibernation again, and want to kickstart this round with another two weeks! I’ve stayed at 172 since the first time round, with some monthly swaying, (that we all know about!) and I’ve planned some cheats/pacing myself as well. So in time for the holidays, I will have not only busted through my COVID weight gain for 2020(which I already have done anyway), but also knocked a hole into my weight loss goals. For anyone out there wondering if it’s possible, it IS possible to do this! I didn’t lose 20lbs the first time, and I won’t this time either. But understanding just how much protein and fiber together can help to satiate the feeling of hunger, helps out. Once I’ve taken my weight down a step, I just have to maintain it! Yay! Happy Holidays ladies!
YAY!!! Congratulations!!!!!! We are so glad you loved this plan enough to come back to it too!! Happy Holidays!!!
Hello the egg diet looks very interesting. I did the military diet made great progress. This time I want to try something different . I do a good bit of fasting so this diet should work pretty good for me. Thanks.
Hi can i repeat the meal of day1 for day2 ??
Yes!
Can I have tea with the boiled eggs , half a cup ?
Yes as long as it’s just plain tea (no sugar or anything added).