We’re all fascinated by celebrities. We study their every move: what they wear, what their skin care routine is, what they eat.
As dietitians, we know that nutrition can be overwhelming and it’s easy to look to celebs for diet advice. After all, they look fabulous, and if it works for them, shouldn’t it work for us? (Aside from the fact that they have a trainer, dietician, and probably an unlimited food budget, we mean.)
Unfortunately, celebrities can fall victim to diet culture just like the rest of us, and they usually aren’t the best source for nutrition advice. Not to mention, they’re working in an image-focused industry that prioritizes looks over health. So maybe, just maybe, we shouldn’t take their diet advice after all. Need proof? Here are some trending celeb diets that may do more harm than good.
Adele’s Sirtfoods Diet
First question: what are sirtuins? Silent information regulators, or SIRTs, are enzymes that regulate pathways in the body that may boost metabolism and reduce inflammation. The creators of the Sirtfood Diet claim that certain foods like blueberries, kale, and dark chocolate contain antioxidants that increase SIRT activity, thus helping you burn fat more effectively. Apparently, you can lose seven pounds in seven days by following the Sirtfood diet.
Sound too good to be true? It is…
There is some evidence that SIRTs may benefit your metabolism, but the research on SIRTs is actually stronger when it comes to aging and longevity. More importantly, there is no research that specific foods activate the SIRT enzymes per se. Yes, some antioxidants in food stimulate SIRT activity, but it would take an exorbitant amount of those foods to make this happen—much more than you can reasonably eat in a day.
Another kicker: the first phase of the Sirtfoods diet requires a pretty extreme calorie restriction: 1,000 calories a day for three days, mostly coming from juices. No thanks.
RD verdict: Even if SIRTs help burn fat, we probably can’t enhance their activity by eating normal portions of so-called “sirtfoods”. Any weight loss you see on this diet is probably from limiting your calories and eating nutrient-dense foods. While the Sirtfoods diet is rich in healthy foods we love, it’s basically a calorie restricted Mediterranean diet repackaged and sold with another name. Good thing the Mediterranean diet already exists, doesn’t rely on intense calorie restriction, and has proven benefits.
The Kardashians’ Flat Tummy Tea
The creators of Flat Tummy Tea claim that it “aids in the detoxifying and digestion process”. This word “detox” is used a lot in diet culture, but what does it really mean?
Your kidneys, liver, and digestive systems metabolize and help eliminate harmful substances from your body, also known as detoxification. While some herbs may help to support these processes, your organs are pretty effective at doing them on their own, so you really don’t need a tea to do what your organs were built to do.
Another important caveat: one of the main ingredients in this tea is senna leaf, a potent laxative that can actually alter your gastrointestinal motility and potentially do irreversible damage if used in the long term. Eek! That’s not detox—that’s diarrhea. Pass.
RD verdict: The best way to get a flat tummy, if that’s one of your goals, is by eating a whole foods diet, limiting alcohol, controlling your blood sugar with regular, balanced meals, drinking lots of water, and eating foods that are rich in fiber and probiotics. While you’re at it, add in 30 minutes of movement per day and voilà, a flat tummy—no harmful laxatives necessary.
Beyoncé’s Master Cleanse
The Master Cleanse, also called the Lemonade Diet, is a liquid-only diet consisting of four ingredients: water, lemons, maple syrup, and cayenne pepper. Proponents of the Master Cleanse (which also include celebs like Michelle Rodriguez and Demi Moore) claim that the specific combination of these ingredients helps detoxify the body and support weight loss. Spoiler: any diet that promotes you consume nothing but a lemonade mix for days on end is not going to be good for you, and if you need more convincing, check out this account from a brave soul who tried it.
RD verdict: While it might be true that short-term liquid fasting gives your digestive and detoxification systems a little break to work more efficiently in the future, a liquid diet usually leads to binge and overeating which taxes your detox systems even more!
Yes, there’s some evidence that spicy foods like cayenne pepper may slightly boost your metabolism, but any weight loss you see from doing this diet is likely from the severe calorie restriction from not eating. If you have enough willpower to drink this concoction, why not adopt a healthy diet and get more exercise? It’s more effective and sustainable for long-term weight loss and supports overall health.
The hard truth about celebrities is that they look fabulous because they have the money for chefs, personal trainers, and dietitians to help them eat and exercise for their personal and professional weight goals. They are not qualified to give nutrition advice, but if asked, most of them will tell you that the secret to feeling and looking great is not a fancy tea, but a healthy, balanced diet with regular exercise.
Vanessa Rissetto and Tamar Samuels are registered dietitians and co-founders of Culina Health, offering nutritional coaching and a science-based health and wellness education. Taking the complicated diets, numbers, and more out of nutrition, Vanessa and Tamar simplify healthy eating ideals and plans in order to stop stressing about food and start living life. Vanessa has over ten years of experience as a RD, and currently serves as the dietetic intern director at New York University. Tamar is a RD and National Board-Certified Health & Wellness Coach, with a unique and holistic approach that integrates functional medicine, positive psychology, and behavioral change techniques.
Images: Kathy Hutchins / Shutterstock.com
Raise your hand if you’re a messy b*tch who thrives on drama and other people’s misfortunes. If you didn’t raise both of your hands and feet, then you might want to get out now because this post is for gossip mongers only. You’ve been warned. Now that that’s been handled, welcome, bottom feeders, to the book round-up you never knew you wanted! Celebrities are literally always trying to sell a memoir about their innermost secrets and are constantly disappointing me and the register girl at Barnes & Noble when she sees me coming to return a book five days after purchase. Most times, these so-called “tell-alls” are just a way to revive a career, promote a new season of their show, or just generally cling to their relevance for another five seconds. And there’s nothing wrong with that, but I’m not shelling out $27 for a hardcover version of information I could’ve tracked down through a semi-intense dive into their social media. So, for those of you craving the real tea and gossip that’s juicier than whatever your Aunt Linda is about to spill at the Thanksgiving dinner table, these are the celebrity memoirs for you.
Inside Out by Demi Moore
We’ve talked about this one before but, y’all, Demi Moore’s new memoir is actually bonkers. Not only does she finally open up about her marriage to Ashton Kutcher (#tbt) and the wild threesomes they used to have to try (in vain) to save their marriage, but she also talks about her meteoric rise to fame and struggles with addiction. She doesn’t just come for her ex Ashton Kutcher, either (though that in itself is messy as hell and way worth the read). She comes for ALL of Hollywood: she dishes on her other ex-husband Bruce Willis and one-time flame Rob Lowe. She even speaks to that one time Jon Cryer publicly declared she took his virginity, claiming he’d been with other women before and that he was just “bad at sex.” HE WAS JUST BAD AT SEX. I’m dead. Deceased. This isn’t just a book, it’s a Hollywood hit list and a petty work of art. Basically, a must-read. We bow down to you, Demi.
My Friend Anna by Rachel DeLoache Williams
In another article I wrote for this site, I made a bold statement when I compared those who are actively not following the Anna Delvey story to mole people, and I still stand by that statement. When news broke about Anna Delvey, the fake German heiress who somehow managed to con $200K out of Manhattan’s elite party scene, I was completely captivated. How did she get away with this? And do any of her friends understand how Venmo works? These were the questions that kept me up at night. My Friend Anna focuses on those friends, the people she scammed, and how she got away with it—one friend in particular, who arguably got hit the worst by Anna’s cons. Written by her former friend Rachel Williams, whom Anna personally scammed out of $62,000 during one lavish vacation, this book reads like a twisty thriller about a sociopath, except everything actually happened IRL. For those looking to familiarize yourself with the story before Shonda Rhimes’ new Anna Delvey Netflix series drops, then I URGE you to pick up this book. Rachel answers probably every single question you’ve ever had about Anna.
Coreyography by Corey Feldman
For those of you who are like “who tf is Corey Feldman” just know that I’m marking you for the youth you so clearly are, and I hope you can feel my shame through this screen. Corey Feldman was one of my FAVORITE child stars and starred in cult classics such as The Goonies and Stand By Me. He was the height of ‘80s fame and also a childhood crush of mine. I still secretly harbor ill wishes towards that trollop Stef for getting to make out with him during The Goonies. I will say, post-child star fame, Corey has not fared well. He’s battled with drug addiction and, to my knowledge, has not landed an acting role since we entered the 21st century. His memoir, Coreyography (great title tbh), sheds light on this. In his book he talks about the dark underbelly of Hollywood for child stars: from getting hooked on drugs at a young age to the rampant sexual abuse he experienced during his time in the lime light and his “innocent” friendship with the late Michael Jackson. This book can be pretty heavy and, at times, even triggering, but it’s definitely worth the read.
It’s Not Okay by Andi Dorfman 
This one is for all you Bachelor Nation fans out there. Andi Dorfman, ex-Bachelorette and Mike Fliess’s worst nightmare, wrote a tell-all back in 2016 about her time as The Bachelorette. Not only did she give us an inside look at what actually happens during the fantasy suite dates, but she wasn’t afraid to talk sh*t about her exes Nick Viall and Josh Murray. You love to see it. It is the ultimate burn book for all things Bachelor and Nick Viall, which should be reason enough to pick this one up.
Darkness to Light by Lamar Odom
I, personally, have been waiting for Jordyn Woods to set her NDA on fire and break the internet by releasing her own tell-all about the Kardashians, but until then I’ll settle for Lamar Odom’s memoir. Former NBA player and ex-husband to Khloé Kardashian, Odom spilled all the tea when his memoir came out at the beginning of the summer. Tbh I feel like the Khloé Kardashian drama is the least exciting of all the bombshells he dropped in this book. Like, for example, did you know that he used a FAKE PENIS to pass a drug test before the Olympics? HOW?? Or that he was a host to multiple orgies when he lived in Miami? For people who Keep Up, or those who just really want a wild read, then you need to binge this one ASAP.
A Song For You: My Life With Whitney Houston by Robyn Crawford
This book was just released this week, and it’s already everywhere. The author, Robyn Crawford, is the late Whitney Houston’s longtime best friend, and in her memoir she comes clean about the romantic rumors that swirled for a long time regarding her friendship with Houston. Crawford confirms that her and Houston did have a romantic and sexual relationship in the early 1980s, but called things off when Houston started to get famous because Houston said it would “make our journey even more difficult.” It’s been rumored for a while that Houston was bisexual (her ex-husband Bobby Brown made a comment about it in 2016), but nothing has been confirmed, as Houston passed away in 2012. Whitney Houston is an absolute legend and this book shines a light on aspects of her life that have never been released to the public.
Open by Andre Agassi
Even if you’re not a big tennis fan, or your idea of being “sporty” consists of going to a bar on Sunday in your ex-boyfriend’s stolen jersey, you’ll still love Andre Agassi’s memoir if you’re a fan of juicy gossip. Agassi, who was known early in his career for his giant hair, admitted that he actually wore a wig on the tennis court once his hair started to thin. Impossible beauty standards at it again!! Honestly, he looks better with a shaved head anyway. Over in the personal life department, we also get an inside look at his failed marriage to Brooke Shields. He comes clean about testing positive for meth (yikes) in 1997, and basically says he did drugs because he was scared to marry Brooke (double yikes). He also admits that he blamed his assistant to avoid the consequences of said positive drug test. Weird, this reads a lot like my last boyfriend’s explanations for why we broke up.
Ladies Who Punch by Ramin Setoodeh
I haven’t watched The View in years, mostly because I’m not a middle-aged housewife, but I still couldn’t put this book down. Journalist Ramin Setoodeh somehow managed to interview basically everyone involved with the show in its 20-year history, and the behind-the-scenes drama is messier than your Sunday brunch that turns into “one more drink” at a bar nearby. This book has the tea on how basically everyone who has ever left the show was fired, even though they acted like leaving was their choice. You’ll read about how Star Jones used the show to get her entire wedding free, and of course, all the drama with Rosie O’Donnell. But for me, the craziest thing was that Barbara Walters basically had to be pushed out when she retired, and the producers had to forcibly stop her from extending her contract. What a way to go.
Images: Amazon (8)
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Ashton Kutcher and Demi Moore have been divorced since 2013, but the drama of their marriage is once again making headlines. Sh*t hit the fan with the release of Demi’s new book, Inside Out, but the details of the couple’s drama aren’t juicy and fun in a Bachelor/reality-show-mess kind of way, but rather in an invasive-and-left-me-feeling-like-I-eavesdropped-on-something-that-I-shouldn’t-have kind of way. Demi Moore’s memoir, which was released on September 24th, details Moore’s very tumultuous childhood. In her prime (a phrase steeped in ageism and misogyny, but whatever), Moore was the highest paid actress in Hollywood and nicknamed “Gimme Moore” by men who should just go shave their backs.
Basically, all this stuff has been coming out because Demi revealed a lot in her memoir, and in her media appearances promoting the memoir. In an interview with Good Morning America’s Diane Sawyer about why she wrote the memoir, Demi opened up about all the gritty details of her childhood before she got into the drama in her adult life, first during a 10-year marriage with Bruce Willis and then in her marriage with Ashton. She and Ashton met at a dinner party in 2003 and were married by 2005. It was a big deal at the time because she was 15 years his senior, something she mentioned would never be a big deal if it were the other way around—her ex-husband Bruce Willis married a woman 23 years younger than him, and nobody so much as batted an eye. At the time of her marriage to Ashton she was also pregnant, miscarrying six months into the pregnancy. She then spent years trying to conceive through in-vitro fertilization, to no avail.
She eventually talked about how she and Ashton separated in 2011 after he cheated on her. She explained to Diane Sawyer how she was getting ready to walk the red carpet for a new movie and got a Google alert on her phone saying, “Ashton Kutcher caught cheating.” (Imagine finding out your husband cheated on you via a Google alert while you’re getting glammed for a f*cking red carpet…) She immediately called him: “I asked if it was true and he admitted it right away. I think my response was, are you f*cking kidding me?” She explained this is also around the time she broke her sobriety and started taking Vicodin, up to 12 pills a day, her ex-husband-turned-friend (-turned-I-guess-not-friend?) Bruce was no longer speaking to her, and neither were any of her three daughters. Eventually her disordered eating resurfaced, and in 2012 she ended up passing out and having a seizure at a party after smoking synthetic weed and inhaling nitrous oxide, or what I like to refer to as a typical high school Saturday night, which resulted in her journey back to sobriety and to mending the relationships with her daughters.
So basically, Demi Moore’s memoir is pretty explosive, and it’s dredged up sh*t with Ashton Kutcher in particular. It makes sense, since they were together for so long, but Ashton doesn’t come out looking great in the way Demi tells it. Demi explains in the book how she and Ashton started having threesomes because she thought it would help save their marriage and how she “went into contortions to try to fit the mold of the woman he wanted his wife to be.” She writes, “So when he expressed his fantasy of bringing a third person into our bed, I didn’t say no. I wanted to show him how great and fun I could be.” Which like…is understandable. Love makes you do crazy things that you may not otherwise, and I know I can connect with the feeling of going out my comfort zone to try and hang onto someone that I was never meant to hang on to. On the other hand, I’ve read enough r/relationships to know that men (and women too, probably) often will use a threesome as a way to get permission to cheat on their significant others. LOL, bleak, I know, but people are trash.
In an interview with Ellen DeGeneres on Tuesday, Demi said that her ex-husbands were all given copies of the memoir prior to the release, but mentioned in The Wall Street Journal that they hadn’t read it all yet. According to a recent New York Times profile, Demi “felt strongly that she had the right to share stories that involved her famous ex-husbands if these episodes were principally about her, and she was confident that her portrayals of them did not make them into villains or her into a victim.” She went on to say that she hoped nobody was upset with their portrayals in the book and mentioned how everyone remembers things differently, and this is her story. And according to Ashton’s Twitter he’s salty but sort of….fine?
With all the headlines on the “Demi and Ashton drama”, I assumed I was going to be digging through a ton of sh*t and that I’d find all these terrible bombshells of information, but it seems like Ashton is trying to stay away from any sort of messy situation, even if part of him wants to say his piece.
I was about to push the button on a really snarky tweet. Then I saw my son, daughter, and wife and I deleted it. ❤️
— ashton kutcher (@aplusk) September 25, 2019
He followed it up with a tweet saying “‘Life is good.’-Larry Kutcher,” quoting his father, before bizarrely posting:
For truth text me. +1 (319) 519-0576
— ashton kutcher (@aplusk) September 25, 2019
Naturally at first I thought “HOLY SH*T LET’S TEXT ASHTON!” Assuming he had an Aaron Carter style breakdown and was ready to spill all the piping hot tea to the first person who called him, but a quick browse through Twitter shows he first posted the number back in July as a way to communicate directly with him, and to no surprise, it sends back an auto-response to a link.
— Ijeoma (@pajamagirl) September 25, 2019
I know...what a goddamn tease. Regardless, it seems the Ashton and Demi drama, like most, is fleeting. Hopefully Demi’s book does well and she once again resurfaces as the most powerful and highest paid woman in Hollywood, because frankly, she’s been through the f*cking ringer and deserves it.
images: Bruce Glikas / Getty Images; Shutterstock; Giphy; aplusk / Twitter (3)
