Dietitians have criticised Gwyneth Paltrow’s go-to wellness routine, after the actor detailed how much food she eats in a day.
The 50-year-old entrepreneur opened up about her daily eating habits and workouts during a recent episode of Dear Media’s podcast,The Art of Being Well with Dr. Will Cole. She began by sharing what time of day she usually eats her meals.
“I eat dinner early in the evening, I try to eat at 6:00pm or 6:30pm, so I’m really done eating by 7pm,” she explained. “And then I do a nice intermittent fast until I usually eat something at about 12pm.”
Paltrow noted that she usually has coffee, “celery juice with lemon or lemon water” in the mornings, as she doesn’t want something that will “spike [her] blood sugar”. She went on to describe her workout routine at the start of the day.
“I exercise in the morning,” she said. “I try to do one hour of movement. So I’ll either take a walk, or I’ll do pilates, or I’ll do my Tracy Anderson [routine]. And then... I dry brush and I get in the sauna. So I do my infrared sauna for 30 minutes.”
The Goop founder then cited her afternoon meal, explaining: “I really like soup for lunch. I have bone broth for lunch a lot of the days.”
After recalling that she and her spouse, Brad Falchuk, meditate every day before her morning coffee, Paltrow described what she eats in the evenings.
“And then for dinner I try to eat, you know, according to paleo. So lots of vegetables,” she said. “It’s really important for me to support my detox.”
As described by the Mayo Clinic, the paleo diet is based on foods that humans might have eaten during the Paleolithic Era, including “fruits, vegetables, lean meats, fish, eggs, nuts and seeds”. Along with her diet, Paltrow also said that she values a detox, which is a term that the National Insitutes of Health describes as a range of “diets, regimens, and therapies” that “have been suggested as ways to remove toxins from your body, lose weight, or promote health”.
Dear Media reposted a video of Paltrow sharing her routine on TikTok, which has more than 1.9m views and a mix of responses. Dietitian Lauren Cadillac dueted the video and criticised Paltrow’s routine, as she pointed out how the actor said that she’d have coffee in the morning but didn’t list any food.
Cadillac also slammed the actor’s lunch, writing in her TikTok video that “bone broth is not a meal”. As she proceeded to react to the video with a disappointed and shocked look on her face, the dietitian emphasised that Paltrow wasn’t having “enough food”. She also questioned the lifestyle brand founder’s detox and claimed that she was “not eating anything”.
She shared a message in the caption about why the Iron Man star’s diet could be problematic, writing: “This isn’t #wellness this is DISORDERED. THIS IS NOT ENOUGH FOOD especially for someone that is 5’9. Please stop following and listening to celebrities for your health and wellness advice.”
Along with Cadillac, dietitian Kim Lindsay dueted the video, as she described some parts of the routine as examples of “diet culture” and others as “wellness”.
Lindsay claimed that intermittent fasting was a result of Paltrow being on a diet. She also said the same about Paltrow’s morning and afternoon foods, noting that “bone broth is not a balanced meal” and that “coffee is not food,” as it is “often used as an appetite suppressant”.
While she did note that Paltrow’s daily movements are a form of wellness, the dietitian also claimed that the actor’s workouts are being “under-fueled with bone broth” as a meal.
Lindsay also sent a message to her followers about the routine in the caption, writing: “So much diet culture in this ‘wellness routine’. I worry about how many people will follow this. Please remember to eat regularly over the day and enjoy all foods as part of a balanced diet.”
Speaking toThe Independent, Lindsay went on to explain how under the disguise of “wellness,” diet culture equates with people’s “health and idolises the pursuit of thinness”.
“Paltrow is promoting many restrictive diets such as intermittent fasting, paleo, replacing meals with low calorie fluids (coffee and bone broth) and detoxing,” she explained. “We know that diets are unsustainable and can lead to weight cycling, increased risk of chronic disease and eating disorders.”
Lindsay also discussed her the conversation that Cole and Paltrow had about the routine was ultimately sharing misinformation about healthy diets.
“People often seek out nutrition information online. By promoting this misinformation, it creates confusion around what a healthy and balanced diet looks like. People may start to copy these restrictive eating practices because they believe it will make them healthy or contribute to their ‘wellness,’” she added. “While there is nothing wrong with the food she is eating, the problem comes back to how little she is eating and how much she is restricting. There is nothing healthy or sustainable about that and it should not be promoted as a healthy diet.”
In the comments of Dear Media’s TikTok video, many other fans criticised and made fun of Paltrow for her eating habits.
“So coffee and bone broth are meals now,” one sarcastically wrote while another added: “What is she detoxing? Black coffee, bone broth and vegetables?”
A third asked: “A nice intermittent fast???”
This isn’t the first time that Paltrow has sparked criticism over her diet. In January, she shared a recipe for a salmon “detox” salad while promoting Goop’s $195 seven-day “reset kit” on Instagram.
The Transformers star proceeded to demonstrate the steps required to make the salad, which included grilling zucchini, asparagus, and chives, before placing the vegetables on a bed of romaine lettuce. The salad recipe quickly sparked outrage in the comments section, with people criticising Paltrow for describing the meal as a “detox”.
The Independent has contacted a representative for Paltrow, Lindsay, and Cadillac.
