I find that to be unlikely, frankly. There are a lot of strategies to achieve a better CICO ratio, and I think those have incredibly varied success rates for different people, but when it comes right down to it if you don't find a way to change that ratio then you will never succeed. In my experience, the most expedient way to do it is to count calories.

I also don't think this is anywhere near as "unhealthy" as people want to believe it is. I think that largely arises from our discomfort with being hungry, and our general intuition about which foods are "healthy" and which aren't. However, consider the case of nutrition professor Mark Haub, who ate nothing but garbage convenience store snacks for 10 weeks at a caloric deficit and not only lost 27lbs, but had all of his health metrics improve: http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/11/08/twinkie.diet.professor/...