How Many Carbs Should You Eat On A Ketogenic Diet?
If you’re considering going “keto,” keep in mind you’ll need to consider everything — worked out down to the last gram — regarding how many carbohydrates you can consume. One thing’s for sure: the statement “low carb” isn’t open to interpretation. This isn’t a quick fix “fad” diet; it’s meant to promote real and lasting change for your body — change that’s ultimately going to help you become less dependent on glucose and able to melt through fat for energy instead! You need to actually cause a metabolic shift, and just simply guessing if your carbs are low enough isn’t going to be the most efficient way to do that. While you’re on the ketogenic diet, you absolutely must keep your carbohydrate count within the specified range your body operates in — at all times. If not, you won’t reach a state of ketosis, thus rendering the entire program null and void. With that in mind, it’s important to realize you’re doing this as a more long-term process for lasting results. No matter what your goals or desired outcome, eating a lower carb diet than you are now is certainly going to benefit you in the long run. So, How Many Grams of Carbs Should I Have? If you’re a “normal” person — and by normal, we simply mean “non-athlete” — then you’ll be alright following the standard ketogenic dietary ratios. (And we use the word “standard” here because there isn’t just one version of the ketogenic diet — but more on that in a bit.) You can enjoy fantastic benefits going keto, including effortless fat loss, increased lifespan, improved energy, and sharper mental focus. Everyone responds differently to different amounts of carbohydrates, but there are some general starting points. But to achieve those, you’ll need to make yo Continue reading >>
Should I Count Calories On A Ketogenic Diet?
Calorie counting is a great tool for people to use to get a rough idea of caloric intakes, as well as a way to pinpoint mistakes they might have made if they hit a plateau. You might have been told that counting calories is not needed on a ketogenic diet because it causes more weight loss than other diets. That’s not exactly true. Would you be burning more calories than a low fat diet? Most likely, but that’s because of your protein intake. What about high carb vs. low carb? The truth is, there are no studies that properly show a fat loss advantage between low carb and high carb diets. There’s been over 20 long-term studies done in the last 50 years trying to give a solid conclusion on this, but all of the results have been the same: there is no significant difference in weight loss between a low carb and high carb diet. [1][2][3] The Ketogenic Diet and How This Ties In The thing about a ketogenic diet is if you tell people to eat as much as they want, they will tend to eat slightly less than other diets. Naturally, you will eat less if you’re eating food that can satiate you easier. You will have more fullness from vegetables, satiety from protein, feel fuller for longer from the fat, and endure higher levels of thermogenesis from unprocessed foods. So what does that all mean? In a nutshell, it means that you will eat less food, and therefore less calories. Your body can dig into your fat stores, since you’re naturally restricting calories, and you’ll lose weight. With high carb diets, usually with a good amount of processed foods, you will see swings in blood glucose. This makes it easy for people to give in to cravings, and succumb to the “carb addiction” created from serotonin and dopamine. There are no magical metabolic advantages to a ketogenic die Continue reading >>
Ketogenic Diet: Lose Weight With Ketosis
If you’ve faced a health or weight loss plateau, you might have heard about the ketogenic diet. But what is ketosis? Going into ketosis, or a state of fat burning, isn’t complicated, but it takes motivation. It’s a way to burn stubborn fat and lose weight. Today we’ll explore questions like what is the ketogenic diet, what is ketosis and how does it work, what are keto foods, and the benefits and dangers involved in following a ketogenic diet plan. As a bonus: I’ll provide a 1 week ketogenic diet plan plus a complimentary workout plan. Together, they will help you burn stubborn fat. We try so hard to lose a few kilos or pounds, but most of the time we don’t manage to. Luckily, there is an easy way to turn the body into a fat burning machine: the ketogenic diet. Why the ketogenic diet? It’s commonly believed that consuming fewer calories will lead to weight loss. It looks something like this: Calories stored (or lost) = Calories consumed – Calories burned Following this equation, if we eat less, we’ll create a calorie deficit and in turn, use our stored fat . Assumably, we’ll lose weight. It seems easy to do. But, things go wrong. First, as many know from experience, eating less is torturous. Second, we often don’t lose weight with calorie restriction diets. Worse than that, we sometimes lose the weight and gain it back–and do damage to our metabolism in the process. Losing weight and gaining it back means a slower metabolism. This is because body fat storage is not just a matter of calories in and calories out. It is the result of millions of years of evolution. To understand what happens, we need to review some basic biochemistry. We know that an adult has: A glycogen (carbohydrate) reserve that lasts about 1 to 2 days of survival, maximum. Fat Continue reading >>
Is A Calorie Deficit Necessary?
This is a summary/extract from The Ketogenic Diet by Lyle McDonald. A popular belief states that fat can be lost on a ketogenic diet without the creation of a caloric deficit. This implies that there is an inherent ‘calorie deficit’, or some sort of metabolic enhancement from the state of ketosis that causes fat to be lost without restriction of calories. There are several mechanisms that might create such an inherent caloric deficit. The loss of ketones in the urine and breath represents one mechanism by which calories are wasted. However, even maximal excretion of ketones only amounts to 100 calories per day. This would amount to slightly less than one pound of extra fat lost per month. Additionally since ketones have fewer calories per gram (4.5 cal/gram) compared to free fatty acids (9 cal/gram), it has been suggested that more fat is used to provide the same energy to the body. To provide 45 calories to the body would require 10 grams of ketones, requiring the breakdown of 10 grams of free fatty acids in the liver, versus only 5 grams of free fatty acids if they are used directly. Therefore an additional 5 grams of FFA would be ‘wasted’ to generate ketones. However, this wastage would only occur during the first few weeks of a ketogenic diet when tissues other than the brain are deriving a large portion of their energy from ketones. After this point, the only tissue which derives a significant amount of energy from ketones is the brain. Since ketones at 4.5 calories/gram are replacing glucose at 4 calories/gram, it is hard to see how this would result in a substantially greater fat loss. Anecdotally, many individuals do report that the greatest fat loss on a ketogenic diet occurs during the first few weeks of the diet, but this pattern is not found in resea Continue reading >>
Keto Calculator
You will see that a lot of websites pretending the be the masters of the Ketogenic Diet that are trying to tell you that there is an EXACT amount of fat, proteins and carbohydrates that you need to take or your off! This is simply not true, what really matters is the ratio of Ketogenic to Anti-Ketogenic food that you ingest. That is why we had an engineer working on this calculator to make it fully customizable !! The Right Macros I know the ketogenic diet can be quite complex to follow at first if you don't know anything about calories. I created this calculator to help you figure out how many grams of each macro-nutrient you need everyday. The nutrient intake on a ketogenic diet typically works out to about 70-75% of calories from fat, 20-25% from protein, and 5-10% from carbohydrate on a daily basis. How To Use This Calculator 1. First you'll need to know how many calories you need daily. To figure this out, just use our Daily Calorie Intake Calculator bellow and follow the instructions. It will give you the amount of calories needed to maintain your weight, to lose 1 or 2 pounds per week or to gain 1 or 2 pounds per week. Continue reading >>
Low Carb And Keto Misconception #3: No Need To Count Calories
Why count calories Have you ever seen one of those testimonials which claims “I have lost 100 pounds on keto, I ate as much as I wanted. Never had to count calories!”. Most likely the person who said that was male, young and athletic. Calories do count, even if you are eating the right kind of calories (mostly fat!), especially if you are a woman over 40. Why is it very difficult for a woman to lose weight on keto when not counting calories? First of all a woman’s metabolism is subject to hormonal fluctuations, which influence hunger and water retention. A woman’s metabolism can have been wrecked by constant starvation diets and binges. As a woman ages metabolism changes. You might not be insulin resistant when you are 25, but by 45 things can drastically change. When eating a ketogenic diet appetite is naturally suppressed, so the general rule is to eat until satisfied but not full. That is considered a general rule and should be good enough to control the amount of food you are eating. What is the problem with this model? Women suffer from “hormonal hunger” which fluctuates up and down with the cycle and make it very difficult to determine a true satiety point. Many people suffer from leptin resistance. Leptin is the hormone which signals satiety to the brain. Being leptin resistant means you never feel satisfied. Women especially tend to succumb to nervous eating. When under stress it easy to reach for a treat, even a keto treat, and accumulate calories and macros. many people, because of years of yo-yo dieting, and bingeing are out of touch with a healthy feeling of fullness. So if you are not having the desired results on a keto diet, or are having problems getting into ketosis, you might be eating too many calories. What to do about it That is why it i Continue reading >>
5 Most Common Low-carb Mistakes (and How To Avoid Them)
A few months ago, I read a book called The Art and Science of Low-Carbohydrate Living. The authors are two of the world's leading researchers on low-carb diets. Dr. Jeff S. Volek is a Registered Dietitian and Dr. Stephen D. Phinney is a medical doctor. These guys have performed many studies and have treated thousands of patients with a low-carb diet. According to them, there are many stumbling blocks that people tend to run into, which can lead to adverse effects and suboptimal results. To get into full-blown ketosis and reap all the metabolic benefits of low-carb, merely cutting back on the carbs isn't enough. If you haven't gotten the results you expected on a low-carb diet, then perhaps you were doing one of these 5 common mistakes. There is no clear definition of exactly what constitutes a "low carb diet." Some would call anything under 100-150 grams per day low-carb, which is definitely a lot less than the standard Western diet. A lot of people could get awesome results within this carbohydrate range, as long as they ate real, unprocessed foods. But if you want to get into ketosis, with plenty of ketoness flooding your bloodstream to supply your brain with an efficient source of energy, then this level of intake may be excessive. It could take some self experimentation to figure out your optimal range as this depends on a lot of things, but most people will need to go under 50 grams per day to get into full-blown ketosis. This doesn't leave you with many carb options except vegetables and small amounts of berries. If you want to get into ketosis and reap the full metabolic benefits of low-carb, going under 50 grams of carbs per day may be required. Protein is a very important macronutrient, which most people aren't getting enough of. It can improve satiety and incr Continue reading >>
Ketogenic Dieting And Intermittent Fasting – It Really Works!
I’ve been combining ketogenic dieting and intermittent fasting for quite some time now. Two weeks ago a colleague of mine, who is trying to lose weight herself, put me up to a challenge. Starting on Friday the 15th of January, we both had until Friday the 19th of February to lose as much weight as possible and whoever has lost the most by then wins $50. The rules are: Weight loss must be safe, ie. healthy eating, low calories and moderate exercise. No going days on end without food and trying to exercise for hours every day. If neither of us lose at least 5kg by the end date, neither of us win. Important afternote: I ended the challenge losing a whopping 7.2kg (15.8 lb) of FAT (a total loss of over 10kg when counting the initial 3kg of water weight lost before starting the competition). I did this entirely through ketosis fasting. Read on if you want to lose weight as fast and easily as I did! My Secret Weapon As I have a trip to Japan coming up shortly after the end date and had wanted to lose a lot of weight before then anyway (I gained 5kg in 3 weeks last time I was in Japan!), I accepted the challenge. We’re now 2 weeks and 1 day into the challenge and I’d like to share my results, as well as some weight loss tips I’ve learnt in these short 2 weeks. Ketogenic Dieting and Intermittent Fasting really works! Of all the people in the world, it was my gastro-enterologist who introduced me to “the 5-2 diet“. For those who don’t know what the 5-2 diet is, it’s basically a form of intermittent fasting where you eat normally for 5 days, and eat 1/4 of your usual target daily energy expenditure on 2 days. Using the TDEE calculator I just linked, I found that for weight maintenance (neither losing nor gaining weight) I would need to consume (note: consume. Not Continue reading >>
How Much Protein On Keto
When on the ketogenic diet, you have to pay some attention to how many calories in what proportions you’re consuming. In addition to carbs and fat, you need to know how much protein on keto is safe. Before I give you the magic answer, let’s look at some of the differences and potential dangers when consuming protein on a low carb diet. The first of many to pioneer the keto movement was the Atkins diet in the early 2000s. It’s not really a ketogenic diet, but more like a kind of low-carb diet. Basically, you restrict your carbohydrates to almost zero and eat more fat and protein. Sounds ketotic, and it will definitely establish nutritional ketosis at least every once in a while. However, the Atkins diet promotes eating protein until satiated, which is quite an ambiguous recommendation. There are potentially no limits to the foods you’re allowed to eat, such as fish, meat, eggs, sausages, nuts, oils, cheese etc. – all the keto goodies. What’s wrong with that, you may ask? The thing is that protein is the only macronutrient that cannot be stored within the body. Carbs get stored as liver and muscle glycogen (100-500 grams) Fat and extra carbs get stored as triglycerides in the adipose tissue (infinite) Protein needs to be converted into glucose through gluconeogenesis first before it can be stored within the body. So, it doesn’t matter how little carbohydrates you consume, if you still eat too much protein. If there’s excess glucose running through the bloodstream, you won’t shift into ketosis. Herein lies the difference between a low carb diet and a ketogenic one – one maintains a sugar burning metabolism, whereas the other switches over to ketones. But how much is too much? In order to establish nutritional ketosis, you need to keep stable blood sugar Continue reading >>
What Happens If You Eat 5,800 Calories Daily On An Lchf Diet?
What happens if you “overeat” on an LCHF diet? It’s a common question and here’s one possible answer. The young man Sam Feltham has done a three-week experiment, where he’s been eating enormous amounts of LCHF-food. On average 5794 calories daily of which “only” 10% as carbohydrates (menu). According to over-simplified calorie counting, energy expenditure isn’t affected by what you eat. All excess calories you eat will then lead to weight gain. If this were true Feltham would have gained 16.5 lbs (7.5 kg) during the three weeks, but in reality he only gained 3.5 lbs (1.7 kg). Here’s the explanation: Theory and Reality There’s a difference between calculated energy surplus and real energy surplus. Apparently Feltham didn’t have a large real energy surplus, as he didn’t gain more weight. The most likely explanation to me is that his energy expenditure increased substantially during the experiment. Maybe there are other explanations? Perhaps his body also adapted by not taking up all the nutrients he ate? I’m not surprised by the results. If you starve long term you don’t lose as much weight as simple calorie counting predicts. The body will decrease the metabolic rate. If you overeat you don’t gain that much weight. The body adapts and tries to maintain an appropriate fat mass. Some find it hard to believe in Felthams results and suggest that he’s lying. I don’t think so. There are several previous reports from people who have done similar experiments – stuffed themselves with copious amounts of LCHF-food. Weight gain tends to be small or non-existent, so Feltham’s results seem to be typical. Hormones The above applies as long as the body’s hormonal regulation is balanced. Eating large amounts of bad carbohydrates may interfere with Continue reading >>
Does Fasting Help Lose Weight? What Have People Experienced Trying This? What Are The Pros And Cons?
tldr; It can help with dietary adherence in some folks and probably help them manage or at least learn about hunger sensations. It’s not for everybody though, you should probably experiment with different variations of it and consider it after making some key basic nutritional adjustments. It doesn’t suit everyone’s lifestyle but it might suit yours. It can only create fat loss the same way any other eating strategy does, via an energy deficit. One I think it's first necessary to recognize that the majority of us naturally fast 12-14 hours per day already during our sleep. Then we need to establish some ground rules about Intermittent Fasting as there are numerous methods. Probably others… Which type of IF are we talking about here? Second, IF has become all the rage recently because it has some good evidence pointing in the direction of fat loss in particular. However, it’s important to keep in mind that there is actually very little research in this field (no one wants to fund not eating). It has never really been shown to be any more effective for fat loss (AKA weight loss) than simple caloric restriction when calories are accounted for directly (i.e. not personal recall, which is always inaccurate). Which makes perfect sense from a physiological stand point because you can’t defy the laws of physics just by eating only at a certain time. When IF does seem more effective for fat loss it’s probably just because it creates a calorie restriction in certain people and frankly people who don’t have success with a strategy just don’t rave about it as much as people who do. A colleague, Dr. John Berardi, wrote a great (and free) book on the subject a few years back. Based on his experience and did an little experiment on himself utilizing blood work. You c Continue reading >>
How To Get Into Ketosis Faster On A Low Carb Diet
This post may be sponsored or contain affiliate links. We may earn money from purchases made through links mentioned in this post, but all opinions are our own. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliates sites. Want to be a fat-burning machine without having to count calories? Here’s a few ideas on how to get into ketosis faster on a low carb diet. Do you want to look leaner for bikini season? Yoga pants starting to feel a little tighter? One way to burn fat fast is to go on a ketogenic diet. The physiological process of burning stored fat instead of sugar, can be achieved within a short amount of time after following a strict keto diet. It is possible to get there in a day. In fact, some people show you how to get into ketosis, this fat burning state, in 24 hours. Do you need to fast? Becoming keto adapted where the body burns fat rather than sugar isn’t as hard as you might think. And, you don’t have to starve yourself to get there quickly. The great news for those who want to know how to get into ketosis faster is, well … you don’t have to fast. Fasting has been used for thousands of years by virtually every religion and traditional society. There are some people who think that a complete fast (not just intermittent fasting) is a way to get into ketosis faster. But the great thing about following a ketogenic diet is that you can eat until your heart—er, stomach—is content. You just have to eat enough of the right foods. And, of course, eat very little of the wrong foods. Is getting into ketosis safe without a doctor? Before reviewing how to get into ketosis quickly, let’s take a look at a quick background: T Continue reading >>
Keto Calculator – Low Carb Macro Calculator
Are you eating a low carb or ketogenic diet or want to start? Perfect! We’re going to guide you through the steps you need to take to figure out how much you should be eating depending on your goals! This is a highly individualized macro calculator and will be tailored to you and only you! Using this Macro Calculator Knowing how many calories you need to eat as well as your macronutrient numbers is important for your success in weight loss or weight gain goals! Generally, you want to keep below 50 grams of carbs to stay in ketosis, but how about your fat and protein? Use our macro calculator to find out exactly what your daily macronutrients and calorie intake should look like. After all, calories are not created equal! You can read more about Calories vs. Macros if you’re interested! Know your Body Fat Percentage To use this calculator you’ll need a rough estimate of your body fat percentage. This is important because the macro calculator uses your lean weight (total weight minus body fat) to calculate the macronutrients you need on a daily basis. Use our body fat percentage guide to understand how to get this number. Recommend to a friend: Continue reading >>
How Many Grams Of Fat Does Ketosis Burn?
I try to look all over the internet to find if anyone knows how much fat is being burned a day from ketosis. Many people ask about calories, but I don't care about that. Is it possible to know a range. I don't want to eat too much fat and not be able to burn my fat stores too. Continue reading >>
The Keto Diet: A Low-carb Approach To Fat Loss
Along with the Atkins diet and the South Beach diet, individuals who are interested in low carbohydrate approaches to dieting will likely want to look into the Keto Diet. Popular among many who are trying to maintain blood sugar levels and lose body fat, the main premise of this diet is, 'eat fat to lose fat'. So How Does It Work? The idea of the ketone diet is to get your body into a process called Ketosis where you stop burning carbohydrates as fuel and instead turn to the burning of what are known as ketones. This will occur when you bring your carbohydrate levels to around 50 grams per day or lower. Many keto activists advise that number to be 30 grams of carbohydrates but most individuals can still maintain ketosis while consuming the 50 grams and this allows for a little more leeway in the diet since you can increase the consumption of vegetables and a variety of flavoring's that contain a few grams of carbohydrates. TKD Or CKD Usually people who are involved with exercise will follow either a TKD (targeted keto diet) or a CKD (cyclical keto diet). TKD A TKD is one where you will eat carbohydrates right before and right after your workouts. This is the best bet for those who are involved in more intense activities and require some carbohydrates to fuel them and who are not as interested in doing carb loads and depletion workouts. CKD A CKD on the other hand is a diet where you will eat a minimum amount of carbohydrates per day (that 30-50 gram number) and then on the weekend (or at a time that is appropriate for you) do a large 'carb-up' phase where you will eat a large amount of carbohydrates in an effort to refill your muscle glycogen stores so you can continue to workout the coming week. Normally right before the carb-up phase you will do a depletion workout wh Continue reading >>
