- Masterchef’s Gregg Wallace was almost 17 stone and ‘heading for a heart attack’
- His weight-loss plan has seen his ‘sky high’ cholesterol levels return to normal
It has been six years since Masterchef host Gregg Wallace was in such bad shape that doctors warned he was heading for a heart attack.
More than a decade of snacking on the set of the BBC cookery show and grabbing meals on the run had him tipping the scales at nearly 17 stone, which – given he’s 5ft 8in – left him with a dangerously obese BMI of 36.1.
Blood tests revealed his cholesterol was ‘sky-high’ – nearly three times the recommended healthy level – and he was hurriedly prescribed statins.
Now, of course, anyone who has seen him present Masterchef over the festive period knows Gregg, 59, is a much-changed man.
He has lost five stone since his stark wake-up call, his cholesterol level has plummeted – and he did it all, he says today, without either dieting or using the weight-loss jabs which have proved so popular with other celebrities.
Instead he has ditched the sort of ultra-processed foods which make up about 60 per cent of the average UK diet – and which TV doctor Chris van Tulleken recently claimed are linked to cancer, dementia and mental illness – in favour of cooking from scratch with his Italian-born wife, Anna.
The takeaways he favoured are now a rare treat, he doesn’t snack but he still piles his plate as high as he likes.
Losing weight without dieting sounds almost too good to be true. But Gregg insists not only that it works, but that he is never hungry.
Thousands of people have now benefited from Gregg’s method after signing up to his lifestyle website, which launched in 2019 as ShowMe.Fit but is now Gregg Wallace.Health.
Some say they have lost up to 12 stone by following the website’s no-frills advice, which involves two main principles: making weekly meal plans by choosing from a range of 500 nutritionist-approved recipes; and cooking all meals at home by following the filmed, step-by-step instructions.
No food is off-limits (although snacking, particularly on crisps and biscuits, is discouraged) and you can eat as much as you like from the recipes on offer. The new website also gives extended support and advice from a range of experts in type 2 diabetes, menopause and post-natal nutrition.
Glowing testimonials from users claim his plan ‘transformed’ their lives.
And now its successes will be tested by scientists after it came to the attention of leading experts in public health.
A team at Loughborough University led by Amanda Daley – a professor of behavioural medicine who works with the NHS on its weight-loss management programmes – have launched a partnership with GreggWallace.Health to evaluate how well his plan works.
‘It has a lot of promise, not just as a way to lose weight but to improve health generally,’ says Prof Daley. ‘Programmes that are simple and easier to follow have a better chance of being integrated into your life than others with rules about what and when you can eat.
‘Ultimately, it would be great to get the NHS to back the programme so we’ll be following people on the plan for at least a year to see what works and where they might need more support.’
That his shrinking waistline is now effectively being studied by science is not something Gregg could have predicted in 2017 – after all, he is a rather unlikely health guru.
‘I led a lifestyle full of takeaways, snacks and boozing and got more and more unhappy with how I looked,’ he says. ‘I’d be tasting food on Masterchef, going to the pub and drinking and then out for a meal at a restaurant. There’d be fry-ups with friends, fish and chips for lunch and a curry or Chinese takeaway at night on days when I wasn’t filming.
‘One day my doctor did a blood test and found my cholesterol was through the roof. He said I had to start making changes to the way I lived or I was heading for a major heart attack. That was scary – a proper wake-up call.’
Initially, nothing worked – at least, not long term.
‘I tried eating less,’ he adds. ‘I tried not having lunch. I tried not eating carbs. I had a fair bit of success initially with Weight Watchers, but they were paying me, and when they stopped my motivation went. I was just always hungry and frustrated.’
What changed was marrying his fourth wife, Anne-Marie Sterpini, known to all as Anna, whose southern Italian heritage influenced what he ate, and becoming interested in calories and nutrition from conversations with his personal trainer, Danny Rai.
‘Anna’s diet had lots of lean protein in it – grilled fish or simple meat dishes – with huge amounts of veg and fruit,’ he says. ‘The more of it I ate, the more I realised I could eat massive portions that were much lower in calories than my usual meals.
‘I’d look up the calories in a piece of grilled cod and find it was half of what was in the battered cod I’d get from the chip shop.’
He adds: ‘I started cooking more from home, making my lunches and breakfasts in advance and eating fewer takeaways and fry-ups. I wasn’t left hungry and the weight just dropped off.
‘It came from a desire not to be hungry and ended up being a kind of eureka moment.’
Gregg’s meals are inspired by a classic Mediterranean diet. This involves lots of fruits and vegetables, beans and pulses, nuts and seeds, wholegrains and olive oil. It also includes some dairy from milk and yogurt, and lean protein from chicken, eggs and fish.
There is good science around this being a healthier approach: those who follow such a diet are less likely to be overweight and it is thought to protect the heart.
It’s naturally lower in sugar and processed carbohydrates, too, which means it contains fewer calories – although carbs are still on the menu, from pasta and rice to potatoes and bread.
An average breakfast for Gregg is a high-protein yogurt with oats (a carbohydrate which releases energy slowly, avoiding spikes in blood sugar and keeping you feeling fuller for longer) topped with fruit.
Another option is an omelette with sausages, mushrooms and turkey bacon, which has fewer calories and fat than bacon from pork, or a bagel baked in the oven with eggs.
At lunchtime he has tinned fish or cooked meat on Ryvita slices and adds some handfuls of rocket. ‘I can pick this up on the go from any supermarket,’ he says.
Dinner might be chicken fillets in pitta bread with peppers and onions or a home-made curry.
‘My plate is always piled high,’ he adds. ‘I eat as much of it as I want.’
The key, he says, is cooking for yourself and planning meals in advance – something us Brits don’t do enough.
‘The obesity issue is the biggest crisis facing the UK. It came with takeaways and snacks – nobody cooks any more.
‘We’ve been de-skilling the nation since the end of the Second World War, with more processed foods and cheaper grab-and-go foods. It’s turning into an epidemic.
‘People say to me they don’t have time to cook – but it’s because they don’t know how. Most people don’t know what they’re having for dinner that night or for breakfast – that’s the norm.
‘But grill a fish, cook some frozen spinach with a knob of butter and open a tin of new potatoes – that’s a tasty meal, takes less than ten minutes and costs a fraction of a takeaway. Get people meal-planning and cooking for themselves and suddenly they’re eating healthily and the weight falls off.’
The idea that we should cut down on ultra-processed foods is one which has recently been popularised by TV doctor Chris van Tulleken, whose book Ultra-Processed People has become a bestseller.
Research has found the UK faces a ‘tidal wave of harm’ from such manufactured foods, with those eating the most increasing their risk of heart attacks and strokes by 24 per cent.
But what constitutes ‘ultra-processed’ and how much is OK to eat has proved harder to pin down, making it difficult to avoid.
Gregg recommends applying the ‘great-grandmother test’ to what you eat – ultimately, if she wouldn’t recognise what’s on your plate, it’s probably best avoided. That means rejecting artificial additives, colourings and preservatives, treating takeaways as occasional treats and avoiding snacks.
‘We’ve even got recipes for “fakeaways” – home-cooked versions of takeaway meals.’ Examples include sausage and egg muffins for breakfast, cheeseburger tortilla lunch wraps – which Gregg prepared for The Mail on Sunday and tastes ‘just like a McDonald’s cheeseburger,’ he claims – and sweet and sour chicken or chilli prawn noodles for dinner. Gregg also has advice for eating out and ordering takeaways.
‘If you can, get a piece of meat or fish from the grill and side orders of boiled potatoes and veg, like spinach. If you’re having a curry, order your meat from the tandoor grill so it’s not covered in a rich sauce. It can be full of ghee – a clarified butter – cream and salt.
‘The best takeaway of all is a shish kebab – lean chicken or lamb roasted on charcoal, wrapped in a flatbread with loads of veg.’
But there are no hard-and-fast rules. ‘Being good most of the time is good enough,’ Gregg admits. ‘It’s about how quickly you want to reach your goals.’
Obesity expert Prof Naveed Sattar, of the University of Glasgow, says it sounds ‘promising’, but that research should test its long-term sustainabilty.
‘If you pile plates with protein and loads of veg and not loads of carbs, that helps promote satiety,’ he says.
‘Veg is lower in calories and high in fibre, which is critical to many good diets as it lubricates the gut and can help weight-loss.
‘One trick is to fill half your plate is salad or veg, which cuts the amount of other calories eaten.’
The team at Loughborough has already offered advice on tweaking the programme, with suggestions to help people more with meal planning and advice on healthier snacking habits.
‘There’s going to be a statue of me on Trafalgar Square,’ Gregg jokes. ‘I’ve got no medical background, but I’m working on a gut feeling. And that appears to be completely correct.’
Sarah Carter is a health and wellness expert residing in the UK. With a background in healthcare, she offers evidence-based advice on fitness, nutrition, and mental well-being, promoting healthier living for readers.
