Our family of four ate only potatoes for 10 days, to help us lose weight, simplify cooking, cut food cravings and prove to ourselves we could do it. Here are our results from our 10-Day potato diet reset.
The potato diet has many names: the potato hack, the all potato diet, the only potatoes diet, the potato reset and SpudFit potato challenge.
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Why potatoes?
We've been mostly plant-based for almost 10 years, but were not consistent with it always. Sometimes, I would let too much high-fat vegan food and oil creep into meals, thinking a little bit wouldn't hurt.
Or, we would indulge in junk food (vegan or not) at times.
Couple that with the year that was 2020, plus recovering from a major health crisis in our family and we all needed to reset our healthy ways and lose some weight.
After doing plenty of research, I felt like doing the SpudFit Challenge would be a good option.
Potatoes are pretty much the perfect food. If you want the science behind it, check out Dr. John McDougall's book, The Starch Solution.
From a practical standpoint, we're at home all the time, so there wouldn't be a huge temptation to eat out. Also, potatoes are super cheap, so it would actually cut our grocery bill down.
The SpudFit challenge we decided to do is by Andrew Taylor, an Australian bloke who ate only potatoes for a whole year, lost over 100 pounds and regained his health. Originally, we were going to do it for 30 days, but 10 days proved to be enough for us.
I highly recommend taking a look at his website if you want more information about the positives effects of eating only potatoes.
The challenges
I had no qualms at all about whether it was healthy. I had done my research.
My biggest questions were:
- Could we actually eat nothing but potatoes day after day?
- Like, could we actually stick with it?
- Considering I'm a food blogger and we are accustomed to eating lots of variety every day, could we really eat only one food for 10 days straight?
- Would working on my website, seeing all the pictures of food be hard for me?
I really didn't know if we could do it. I hoped we could. There are good reasons to stick with it. But, we've never done anything like this before.
Potato diet rules
We did the SpudFit challenge, so the basic "rules" were:
- Eat only potatoes
- Eat as much as you want
- Small amounts of oil-free condiments are fine (like ketchup or BBQ sauce)
- Seasonings are fine
- Coffee, tea are fine
- Drink lots of water
We also allowed aromatic, flavoring vegetables, like onion and garlic, for making soup or mashed potatoes.
Please look at Andrew Taylor's SpudFit website, if you're considering eating only potatoes. He has lots of information and videos that are super helpful.
If you would rather do a potato reset, which includes vegetables, check out Jeannine Elder's The Potato Reset book or the potato reset guidelines on her website.
How I prepared mentally
Once we decided that it was something we should do, I signed up for the free 5-day SpudFit course via email. That helped me prepare mentally for the challenge. Here's his YouTube channel.
I also watched some YouTube videos from others who had done it, like Jeannine Elder of The Potato Reset book and Potato Wisdom YouTube channel. I signed up for the SpudFit Facebook group.
I also thought about what we would do after we finished with our potatoes. Obviously, what we were doing before wasn't working for us.
So, I realized that we needed to adjust our plant-based diet, so that it would help us continue losing weight after the challenge was over.
Want more information, weight loss recipes and some visual 50/50 plate examples? Sign-up below to get my free ebook, printable calorie density chart and more:
It's so helpful to hear from others who have been successful at staying trim and healthy on a plant-based diet. So, in addition to re-reading The Starch Solution, with a focus on Dr. McDougall's maximum weight loss advice, I also sought out those who had done what I was trying to do.
I found some new faces on YouTube, who have some fantastic resources for getting lean on a plant-based diet.
Recommended YouTube Channels:
So, after we finished our 10 days, we started eating a plant-based diet again, but focused on eating a 50/50 plate. More about that later.
How I prepared practically
The week before
I stopped restocking on other non-potato groceries for a few weeks before we started. We actually had a huge winter storm in Houston the week before we started, so this helped, since we had to eat the food in the house during that crazy week.
A few days before we started, I ordered a crazy amount (like 50 pounds) of potatoes from the grocery store. The Instacart lady was like, "umm, do you really want 10 bags of potatoes?"
Yes. Yes, I do. Stop judging me.
Haha, no really, I realize it is definitely not the standard grocery order.
As a friendly reminder for y'all, though, it's not just me doing this. It's me, my husband, and two teenage boys. That's a lotta potatoes.
Our grocery order was:
- gold potatoes (our favorite)
- white potatoes
- purple potatoes (for fun)
- sweet potatoes
- Japanese sweet potatoes (also called Korean yams)
- russet potatoes
- frozen oil-free shredded potatoes for hash browns
- 4 jars of BBQ sauce (oil-free)
- extra ketchup (we already had plenty, but just in case!)
- chives
- garlic
The day before
The day before, we cooked up about 20 pounds of potatoes, to have for the next few days. We made them a few different ways, so we'd have some variety.
The main potato recipes we repeated over and over again were:
- Mashed potatoes with unsweetened almond milk and sea salt
- Baked Murasaki sweet potatoes (these are also delicious grilled)
- Baked potato halves with seasoned salt, eaten with ketchup or BBQ sauce
- Steamed potatoes in the Instant Pot
- Oil-free Hash browns with BBQ sauce, ketchup or salsa
- Potato soup
- Air fried mash potato nuggets or fries
- Roasted oil-free potato wedges
How I felt day by day
Day 1: I felt excited about starting and felt well prepared, since we prepped about 15-20 pounds of potatoes the night before.
Day 2: Woke up ready to eat. Made frozen hash browns in a non-stick skillet with some Trader Joe's no-chicken seasoning. Drizzled with some BBQ sauce. Ate with a cup of black tea with oat milk and pinch of sugar. Prepped more potatoes for tomorrow. Had less pain in my joints when getting up out of a chair.
Day 3: Experimented with different seasoning on my potatoes. My children experimented on their own with preparing their potatoes in different ways, for variety.
Day 4: Had a dentist appointment. Felt really tired this afternoon.
Days 5-8: Just normal days, busy with activities. Just ate when hungry. Meal prepped more potatoes every other day.
Day 9: Both of my kids have said that they feel better, more agile and flexible.
Day 10: Starting to get bored with potatoes. I've honed in on my favorite ways to prepare them and am pretty much sticking with that. In case you're wondering, my favorite ways of eating potatoes right now, in order, are: oil-free hash browns with garlic salt and a little ketchup, simple mashed potatoes with unsweetened almond milk and salt and baked sweet potatoes with a sprinkling of kosher salt.
Goals with this challenge
Our goals for doing this potato diet challenge were:
- Lose weight
- Cut cravings
- Simplify cooking meals for our family
- Prove to ourselves we could do it
- Reset and jumpstart our weight loss plan
Potato diet results
Well, we did it! We ate nothing but potatoes for 10 days. Surprisingly, it was not as difficult as I imagined it would be. I definitely built it up in my mind to be something harder than it turned out to be.
Could we do 30 days or longer? I don't know, but 10 days was just enough for our family.
I found extra time each day because our meals were so simple.
And, I didn't have any trouble working on my food blog, surrounded by pictures of delicious non-potato dishes.
Unexpected results
I normally do most of the cooking in my house. But, during this challenge, my husband (the official mashed potato maker) and both of my boys did more cooking than they usually do.
Maybe it was because we were dealing with just one ingredient for every meal?
Maybe it was because Momma wasn't hogging up the kitchen all the time?
Maybe it was because they just love potatoes? I don't know.
But, I really enjoyed seeing their creativity and willingness to prepare meals for the family and for themselves, without Momma's help.
So, how much weight did we lose?
As a family, we lost 22 pounds total in 10 days.
- My husband lost 7 pounds
- my 14 year old lost 6 pounds
- my 12 year old lost 5 pounds
- I lost 4 pounds
We were very happy with the results.
Overall, it was a fantastic "reset" for us as a family. And, the new adjustments to our way of eating are easier to make because we started with this potato reset.
What's next? 50/50 plate
I can't tell you how excited we were to eat something other than potatoes, haha. It was definitely monotonous. But, that's kinda the point of it.
Will we still eat potatoes? Yes. We didn't get that sick of them!
Now, going forward, since we still have some weight to lose, we will focus on following Dr. John McDougall's Maximum Weight Loss Program. You can read about it in his book, The Starch Solution.
Basically, it is a whole foods plant-based diet that is geared towards losing weight.
The concept of calorie density plays a huge role.
Want more information, weight loss recipes and some visual 50/50 plate examples? Sign-up below to get my free ebook, printable calorie density chart and more:
What is calorie density?
"Calorie density is simply a measure of how many calories are in a given weight of food, most often expressed as calories per pound. A food high in calorie density has a large number of calories in a small weight of food, whereas a food low in calorie density has much fewer calories in the same weight of food. Therefore, one can consume a larger portion of a low-calorie dense food than a high-calorie dense food for the same number of calories."
- Jeff Novick, MS, RDN
That quote is from The Calorie Density Approach to Nutrition and Lifelong Weight Management article on www.drmcdougall.com.
We'll be cutting out high fat plant foods and increasing our intake of vegetables, fruit, whole grains and starches.
Our goal will be to eat a 50/50 plate at each meal. So, half of our plate will be non-starchy vegetables or whole fruit. The other half will be plant-based starches.
What's a 50/50 plate?
This is suggested by Dr. McDougall as his Maximum Weight Loss Plan, on pages 216-217 of his book The Starch Solution.
A 50/50 plate is where 50% (or half) of your plate is full of non-starchy vegetables (like broccoli, kale, squash, tomatoes, etc.).
The other 50% (or half) of your plant-based plate is your starchy vegetables (like potatoes), grains, beans, etc.
We're also limiting high-fat plant-based foods more so than we were before. So, less cashew cream, nuts, seeds, avocado, etc.
Are we never again going to have guacamole? That's not what I'm saying.
But, I've realized that those foods will make us gain weight or prevent us from losing weight, so I'm going to omit or limit them for now. And, that's okay.
At this point, I'd rather be in a healthy weight range and feel better, than indulge all the time.
What I eat in a day
Here's exactly what I ate in one day - a sample meal plan, if you will:
- For breakfast: Bowl of cooked oatmeal with sliced banana. Sautéed asparagus on the side. Drink: hot black tea with oat milk
- For a snack: 2 small bananas. Drink: water
- For lunch: Plate of (50%) roasted zucchini, broccoli and asparagus and (50%) spaghetti with homemade oil-free marinara sauce, topped with brown masoor lentils. Drink: iced orange vanilla rooibos tea
- For a snack: sugar snap peas with homemade, oil-free hummus
- For dinner: leftovers from lunch. Drink: water
Want more information, weight loss recipes and some visual 50/50 plate examples? Sign-up below to get my free ebook, printable calorie density chart and more:
❓ FAQ
The short answer is: however many it takes for you to be satisfied and not hungry. It's different for each person. The long answer: One medium-size potato has just 110 calories and is absolutely fat-, salt and cholesterol free, making them a nutritious and filling food when you're trying to lose body fat. One whole pound of potatoes has just 350 calories. People generally eat between three to four pounds of food each day, on average. So, if you only ate potatoes and ate to satisfaction (about 4 pounds or 12 medium potatoes), you would only consume 1400 calories that day. Will eating 1400 calories put you in a calorie deficit? It most likely would, but for some people, it would not. Why don't you try it for a week and see how you feel?
To cook potatoes with the goal of losing body fat, follow these few simple principles: 1. Avoid oil and fat - do not cook the potatoes with oil, butter or ghee. Oil is 119 calories per tablespoon, so when cooking potatoes with oil, you can easily double their calories! Instead cook them in water, broth or by baking or air-frying them. 2. Do not eat them with high fat condiments or toppings, such as cheese, butter or sour cream. Instead use low fat or fat free toppings such as: salsa, BBQ sauce, ketchup, mustard, spices, vegetables and fat free sauces.
The potato diet is a science-backed method of losing body fat by eating only potatoes for a period of time. In some versions of the potato diet, vegetables and fruit are included as well.
During our potato reset, it was fun to focus on just one ingredient. I've added some new healthy potato recipes, as a result. Whether you're looking for a side dish, or need some recipes for your own potato diet challenge, maybe these will help you out.
🥔 Healthy oil-free potato recipes
- Healthy Hash Browns (air fryer or stovetop)
- Oil-Free Roasted Potato Wedges
- Vegan Broccoli Cheese Baked Potato
- Breakfast Tacos with Spinach, Sweet Potato and Spicy Charro Beans
- Baked Potato Halves (easiest meal prep idea)
- 3-Ingredient Vegan Mashed Potatoes (dairy-free, oil-free)
- Healthy Sweet Potato Pudding (vegan)
- Instant Pot Steamed Potatoes
Kay says
This is very inspiring. I'm planning on doing the same! I've been vegan for about 13months but I was vegetarian for about 7years. I was def a junk food vegan and vegetarian and I've been focusing on whole foods for the past few months. This is a food plan I could get used to!
Abi Cowell says
That's great!!! I wish you the best on your journey! If you haven't already, be sure to sign up for my e-book, The Key to Plant-based Weight Loss: Calorie Density. It'll give you some additional information about what to do after you've eaten just potatoes. You can sign-up for it here: https://veryveganish.com/the-key-to-plant-based-weight-loss-calorie-density/
Mike says
I tried the Potato Challenge and a Mary’s Mini and made it a total of three days each time.
I got so food bored that my wife told me to eat something else because I was really moody and “dark” (as she put it). I love starches, but the same thing for every meal wasn’t working for me - and WORSE- I actually gained a pound each time (could’ve been water weight from the seasonings I had to use to force it all down).
50/50 is much more palatable to me…when I stick to it.
Abi Cowell says
I can understand that, for sure. It takes about 10 days for me. The 50/50 plate is much more doable and realistic for me, as well.
ggirl says
The idea is to eat just plain potatoes. No condiments, no flavorings. This is to reset everything. You had ketchup, BBQ sauces, and all kinds of seasonings. Look at Penn Jillette.
Abi Cowell says
That's definitely one way to do it! We chose to do it a different way and it still worked out great for our family.