The Negative Calorie Diet

You may have heard the rumor that celery has "negative calories," meaning that more calories are burned eating than what the food actually provides. This diet is based on these so-called negative foods.

What it is: According to Neil Barnard in Foods That Cause You to Lose Weight: The Negative Calorie Effect, certain foods are especially difficult for the human body to digest, making the body worker harder to digest them. These foods results in an overall negative calorie effect, subtracting calories from your daily total.

How it works: By eating particular foods with more cellulose, practitioners introduce more negative calories into their diets, thus reducing the number of calories consumed per day overall. In theory, this should lead to weight loss.

What you do: Practitioners eat particular foods including cabbage, celery, apples, radishes, onions, grapefruit, broccoli and asparagus. Barnard also recommends exercise for effective weight loss.

Benefits: If you are only eating these high-cellulose foods, you will indeed lose weight. People can introduce many of these nutrient-rich foods for good overall nutrition.

Downside: Only eating these high-cellulose foods will likely cause malnutrition, not to mention more serious digestive problems with only consuming foods that are hard for the body to digest. There is no scientific evidence for the idea of negative calories.