Japan Going Bananas Over Popular Banana Diet Craze

Diet plans to lose weight are always popular. And if the diet contains a food or food group that tastes good, then folks become hooked. Everyone jumps on the bandwagon, hoping for major weight loss. If it sounds too good to be true, then maybe it is. The cookie diet, the pineapple diet, the same colored food diet, etc.

But in Japan, bananas are becoming hard to find in supermarkets. Even Time Magazine is seriously reporting about the new Morning Banana Diet.

What is it?

Very simple. If you love bananas, then this is the diet weight loss plan for you. Maybe.

A pharmacist in Osaka, Japan says she created the diet for her overweight husband. Sumiko Watanabe wanted to speed up her hubby's metabolism to burn fat, and she did it by feeding him bananas. Mr. Watanabe says he lost 37 lbs!

According to Time, the Morning Banana Diet follows just a few rules:

"The Morning Banana Diet consists of one or more bananas with room-temperature water for breakfast; an optional snack at 3 p.m.; and anything you want for lunch and dinner. The catch: You can't eat desserts after meals, dinner has to be consumed by 8 p.m. , and you have to go to bed by midnight."

We all know that bananas are rich in potassium. But the yellow, creamy 100 Calorie treat is much more than that. Bananas are pretty close to being a perfect food. They are packed with fiber, iron, and protein, Vitamins B6 and C. And Bananas also stop your craving for sugar. And the fruit is high in minerals that reduce cholesterol. And they are great for pregnant women, because they contain good things that help keep blood sugars up.

Even model Cindy Crawford has talked about eating bananas as a healthy, filling snack.

Whether this is just another fad diet remains to be seen. We're not sure what kind of impact the Morning Banana Diet will have on diet-crazed people here in the U.S. At least, we have plenty of bananas to go around. In Japan, good luck trying to score some:

"Large stores don't have any bananas from noon, and even Ito Yokado (a major supermarket chain) runs out of them after 3 p.m.," said Tomoyuki Horiuchi, sales representative of Tokyo Seika Boeki Co., Ltd., fruit and vegetables wholesale company.

Over the past four months, Dole Japan has boosted its banana imports by more than 25 percent, but stores are still running out, Time said.

Hey, it beats eating a Pop Tart for breakfast.