Inside Great British Menu judge Tom Kerridge’s jaw-dropping 12 stone weight loss
FAMOUS chef Tom Kerridge has managed to lose an impressive 12 stone over the years, by ditching 15-pints of beer a night for a healthier lifestyle.
The top TV chef and Great British Menu judge, 49, managed to shed almost half his body weight in five years, having weighed 30 stone at his heaviest when he turned 40.
Tom, who joined the BBC show as a judge for the 2022 series and is back on our screens once again for the current series, lost the weight through various healthy weight loss techniques - here's how he did it.
1. Don't deprive yourself
While Tom is all about eating healthily, he says it's important to let yourself have a treat once in a while.
He told : "There is nothing wrong with a flapjack in the afternoon when you get that 4pm lull if everything else is in place."
Tom also pointed to Anthony Joshua who has a honed physique - but still allows himself to have a burger and chips now and then.
2. Go for a swim
As well as diet changes, Tom began a rigorous swimming routine to help him lose weight.
He started setting his alarm to 6.15am every morning so he could go swimming at the hotel up the road from his house.
He said: “On a busy day I swim a kilometre; on a relaxed one I’ll do a mile.”
According to the University of California, Berkeley, swimming burns an average of 600 calories an hour, depending on the stroke and intensity.
3. Make healthy swaps
Tom believes that a big part of losing weight is about "arming yourself" with healthy alternatives.
This is so that when you're hungry, you aren't tempted to reach in the biscuit tin or gorge on a bag of crisps.
The Great British Menu star told The Spectator: "Celebrate the foods you can eat, instead of focusing on the ones you can’t. Have low calorie skinny popcorn next to you."
Tom particularly enjoys having apples and grapes as a snack now - instead of chocolate or biscuits.
4. Ditch alcohol
One huge change Tom made to his diet regime was completely ditching booze.
He told the : "I own pubs and, you know, I’m quite good at tasting. So I knocked all booze on the head. Stopped drinking, went completely teetotal."
Tom says he gave up alcohol not just to make sure he was cutting out liquid calories - but also to help get in a healthy mindset.
He told Good Morning Britain: "Drinking on diets isn't good – and that's on any diet. It's not a calorie thing or the sugar content, it's the mindset."
5. Cut down on the carbs
Tom says he became a lot more conscious of how many carbs he was munching on when he kickstarted his weight loss journey.
"Carbs are a big thing,” he said.
"The more you understand it and the more you look into it, you see that there are so many carbohydrates involved in sugar as well."
6. Prioritise breakfast
When he was at his biggest, Tom admits he used to regularly skip breakfast.
At the start of his day he would usually consume two pints of coffee and then snack later in the day on cheese on toast and packets of crisps.
However, he now makes sure he eats a hearty breakfast every day - eating things like overnight oats or omelettes.
8. Dopamine diet
Tom has credited something called the dopamine diet for helping him to blitz his body fat.
It involves boosting your levels of the so-called 'happy hormone' so that it's easier to stick to your diet.
There are different ways of doing the diet, however, all are based around food that is thought to boost dopamine levels in the slimmer.
Foods you're allowed to eat on the diet include unprocessed meat, dairy and dark chocolate, meaning that it doesn't overly restrict what you can eat.
Most versions of the diet recommend avoiding caffeine and processed sugar.
Tom, whose TV credits include MasterChef and whose Bucks gastropub The Hand & Flowers gained its second Michelin star in 2012, previously said he decided that he needed to change his diet during a moment of reflection around his 40th birthday.
";Say we live to 80. Well, I thought, I’m halfway there. And then, I thought … I’m not going to get there. If I’m like this, I’m not going to make it," he said.
Tom previously starred in Lose Weight ad Get Fit on BBC2 and has since starred in Remarkable Places to Eat with Fred Sirieix.
Speaking in an interview with he said he's lost a lot of strength during the pandemic as he doesn't have any free weights at home, but said he had taken up running to fill the exercise gap.
"I hate every minute of it. I’m not built for running but I try to do 20, maybe 25k a week. I make myself do it and I feel better when it’s done."