Woman Claims to Have Lost 85 Pounds on 'Starbucks Diet'

A woman with a lot of spare change in her piggy bank claims she lost 85 pounds in two years by eating only at Starbucks, Fox News reports. Guess the “Starbucks Diet” doesn't include a lot of caramel macchiatos.

Christine Hall of Alexandria, Va., 66, said she bought oatmeal and black coffee every day for breakfast. For lunch and dinner, she ate ham and cheese paninis or Bistro Box meals, plastic boxes filled with food ranging from deli meats, cheese and crackers to tuna salad with green beans.

She says she did it of her own volition and was not paid by Starbucks — unless you count the free Wi-Fi.

Starbucks' Perfect Oatmeal rings in at a mere 140 calories. The ham and cheese panini weighs in at 340 calories and 10 grams of fat. Bistro boxes range from 480 calories (and 28 grams of fat) for the Cheese & Fruit box, 380 calories for the Protein box (hard-boiled egg, white cheddar, honey peanut butter, multigrain muesli bread, apples and grapes), and 290 calories for the Chipotle Chicken Wrap (whole-wheat tortillas, white chicken strips, pepper jack cheese, lime-cilantro slaw and tomato avocado salsa, side of dark chocolate).

The Starbucks website helpfully lists “Favorite Foods Under 350 Calories” — the lowest-cal item is the fruit cup (90 calories).

The Seattle-based coffee company's baristas and others debated Hall's diet on a Starbucks gossip blog.

“Her wallet must've also lost a ton of weight,” one said.

“I worked with a partner who lost 20 pounds on this diet. BUT, other than the oatmeal, she couldn't afford it even with her discount, so she came in at closing and took the day-old markouts. She called it the 'Expired Starbucks Food diet,'” another barista added.

Yet another opined: “I wish someone had told her that she could've gone to Costco and picked up a mega-pack of Quaker Oats for the cost of just a couple of days of 'perfect oatmeal' …”

Actually, as any shaky fashion model can tell you, if you really want to lose a lot of weight fast, just stick to the black coffee. And smoke cigarettes. That's the real Starbucks diet.

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