How Many Carbs Should You Eat Per Day To Lose Weight?
Republished with permission from our friends at Authority Nutrition. Original article here. Sign up for updates to receive one week FREE of my low carb and gluten free meal plans: Check out some of my other favorite low carb keto resources: Reducing the amount of carbohydrates in your diet is one of the best ways to lose weight. It tends to reduce your appetite and cause “automatic” weight loss, without the need for calorie counting or portion control. This means that you can eat until fullness, feel satisfied and still lose weight. Why Would You Want to do Low-Carb? For the past few decades, the health authorities have recommended that we eat a calorie restricted, low-fat diet. The problem is that this diet doesn’t really work. Even when people manage to stick to it, they don’t see very good results (1, 2, 3). An alternative that has been available for a long time is the low-carb diet. This diet restricts your intake of carbohydrates like sugars and starches (breads, pasta, etc.) and replaces them with protein and fat. Studies show that low-carb diets reduce your appetite and make you eat less calories and lose weight pretty much effortlessly, as long as you manage to keep the carbs down (4). In studies where low-carb and low-fat diets are compared, the researchers need toactively restrict calories in the low-fat groups to make the results comparable, but the low-carb groups still usually win (5, 6). Low-carb diets also have benefits that go way beyond just weight loss. They lower blood sugar, blood pressure and triglycerides. They raise HDL (the good) and improve the pattern of LDL (the bad) cholesterol (7, 8, 9, 10). Low-carb diets cause more weight loss and improve health much more than the calorie restricted, low-fat diet still recommended by the mainstream Continue reading >>
How Many Carbs Can You Eat On A Low-carb Diet?
Source If you've chosen to embark on a carbohydrate-controlled diet, then you may be wondering how many carbs in a low carb diet? The answer, in large part, depends on the diet you have selected as well as how far along you are into the diet plan. It also depends on factors unique to your body type and body chemistry. Low Carbohydrate Diets There are a large number of different low carbohydrate diet plans. Some of the popular low carbohydrate diet plans include Atkins, South Beach and the Carbohydrate Addict's Diet. While the details of each of these diet plans differ, they are all based on a common principle - to limit the amount of carbohydrates you eat in order to control the amount of insulin released into your bloodstream. According to low carb diet proponents, insulin plays an important role in weight fluctuation. When there is sugar in your blood, your body releases insulin to neutralize the effects of sugar on the body. Blood sugar rises when you eat carbohydrates - especially refined and simple carbohydrates like white flour and sugar. While insulin plays an important role in neutralizing spikes in sugar, it is also the primary mechanism by which fat is escorted into the fat cells. It also prevents fat from being released from your fat cells to be used as fuel. Low carbohydrate diets limit the amount of insulin released into the bloodstream, which allows your body to rely on its own fat as its primary source of energy. The byproduct of burning fat as your primary energy source is known as ketosis, which can aid in satiating hunger and keeping your energy levels high. How Many Carbs in a Low Carb Diet? Limiting dietary sources of carbohydrates is what starts the whole process of ketosis. Determining how many carbs in a low carb diet depends, to some extent, on y 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 >>
A Keto Diet For Beginners
A keto or ketogenic diet is a very low-carb diet, which turns the body into a fat-burning machine. It has many proven benefits for weight loss, health and performance, as millions of people have experienced already. 1 Here you’ll learn how to eat a keto diet based on real foods. You’ll find visual guides, recipes, meal plans and a simple 2-week get started program, all you need to succeed on keto. Get even more, custom meal plans, ask the experts and low-carb TV, with a free trial. 1. Introduction: What is ketosis? The “keto” in a ketogenic diet comes from the fact that it makes the body produce small fuel molecules called “ketones”. 2 This is an alternative fuel for the body, used when blood sugar (glucose) is in short supply. Ketones are produced if you eat very few carbs (that are quickly broken down into blood sugar) and only moderate amounts of protein (excess protein can also be converted to blood sugar). Ketones are produced in the liver, from fat. They are then used as fuel throughout the body, including the brain. The brain is a hungry organ that consumes lots of energy every day, 3 and it can’t run on fat directly. It can only run on glucose… or ketones. On a ketogenic diet, your entire body switches its fuel supply to run almost entirely on fat. Insulin levels become very low, and fat burning increases dramatically. It becomes easy to access your fat stores to burn them off. This is obviously great if you’re trying to lose weight, but there are also other less obvious benefits, such as less hunger and a steady supply of energy. When the body produces ketones, it’s said to be in ketosis. The fastest way to get there is by fasting – not eating anything – but nobody can fast forever. A keto diet, on the other hand, can be eaten indefinite Continue reading >>
Understanding A High-fat Ketogenic Diet—and Is It Right For You?
While food trends come and go, high-fat diets—lauded for their weight-loss potential and brain-function benefits—have proven to have some staying power. Functional medicine M.D. Sara Gottfried contributes frequently to goop on the topic of weight-loss resistance. She’s spent the past two years rigorously studying the ketogenic diet—high-fat, low-carb, moderate-protein. Named for ketones, which Gottfried explains are “the energy source made by the body when there’s not enough carbohydrates to be burned for energy demand,” the goal of the diet is to get the body to burn fat instead of sugar. Gottfried recommends the keto diet (as it’s commonly called) to help with a range of brain and focus issues—she finds ketones to be “very efficient fuel for the brain”; she also says it works well for some patients (not all) who want to lose weight but have trouble kicking sugar cravings. We talked to her about who the keto diet is right for (and whom, or when, it isn’t); the nutritional ins and outs of mastering it; and which keto-friendly meals are healthy for practically everyone, regardless of what diet we do (or don’t) practice. A Q&A with Sara Gottfried, M.D. Q What is ketosis? A In most circles, ketosis refers to nutritional ketosis, an optimized state in which you burn fat instead of sugar. Nutritional ketosis has been used to treat epilepsy since the 1920’s and its popularity for mental acuity and weight loss has surged recently. More technically, ketosis refers to a metabolic state in which most of your body’s energy comes from ketones in the blood, as opposed to glycolysis, in which energy supply comes from blood glucose. Ketones are the energy source made by the body (in the liver) when there’s not enough carbohydrates to be burned for energ Continue reading >>
How Many Grams Of Carbs Keep The Average Person Out Of Ketosis?
I realize that this is highly variable, but what number of grams have you guys found to be the threshold? I suppose if you are right at the threshold, you'll be passing in and out of it, so maybe we'd want a 10g buffer or something? Personally, I'd like to stay outside of it, but only just, and am wondering what the general rule of thumb is these days. I do strength-increasing workouts and walk around a lot, but I avoid what most consider to be "exercise." 1 Worst Carb After Age 50 If you're over 50 and you eat this carb, you will never lose belly fat. HealthPlus50 I was at 3 servings of fruit a day for a while (roughly 75g of carbs) but feel like I might be able to go a little lower. I think the 3 cups (pre-cooked) of steamed spinach would add a largely negligible amount. The 50g of natto per day has something like 5-7g. No other beans or legumes to speak of. Continue reading >>
The Primal Blueprint Carbohydrate Curve
654 Comments Yesterday, low-carb blogger Dr. Michael Eades (he of Protein Power) posted a message from his friend and fellow low-carb guru Richard Feinman as sort of a call-to-action in public policy-making for upcoming 2010 USDA guidelines. Dr. Eades and Dr. Feinman have suggested that we ought to quickly find a way to help the USDA arrive at a sensible recommendation for carbohydrate consumption. Feinman asked: “how can the benefits of carbohydrate restriction that you have experienced personally or in your immediate environment be translated into reasonable recommendations that the USDA could put out?” In conjunction with my forthcoming book “The Primal Blueprint”, I have been working on an easy-to-understand explanation of how carbohydrates impact the human body and the degree to which we need them (or not) in our diet. I have also developed a chart (not the one above) that is intended to assist those who want to go “Primal” in visualizing the impact of carbs consumed within certain ranges. I was going to hold off on releasing this information until my book is published, but decided to introduce it here in response to Dr. Eades’ post. Since the choice of how many and what types of carbs in one’s diet depends on the context of one’s life (current weight, disease condition, activity levels, etc), I see carb intake as a “curve” ranging from “allowable” to “desirable” to “unhealthy”. The following descriptions illustrate how carbohydrates impact the human body and the degree to which we need them, or not, in our diet. The ranges represent daily averages and are subject to variables like age, current height and weight and particularly training volume. For example, a heavy, active person can be successful at a higher number than a light, 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 >>
How Low Is Low Carb?
Many agree: People with diabetes should eat a low-carb diet. Last week we looked at what “carbs” are. But what is meant by “low?” How much carbohydrate should you eat? The Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 2010, (PDF) recommend that healthy people get 50–65% of their calories from carbohydrates. A study posted on the American Diabetes Association (ADA) Web site agrees. For a woman eating a below-average 2,000 calories a day, 50–65% would be 250–325 grams of carb a day. The Dietary Guidelines call for “a balanced diet that includes six one-ounce (28.3 g) servings of grain foods each day.” This would mean 170 grams of carbohydrate from grains alone each day. And the average American diet includes many other carb sources. Most men eat closer to 3,000 calories a day, so their numbers would be higher. Sixty percent of 3,000 would be 1,800 calories, equivalent to 450 grams of carbohydrate each day. Anything less than the recommended range is sometimes considered “low-carb.” Most popular low-carb diets, like Atkins, South Beach, Zone, and Protein Power, are much lower, from 45% of calories down to 5%. Many diabetes experts recommend somewhat lower carb intakes than ADA does. On our site, dietitian Jacquie Craig wrote, “Most people need between 30–75 grams of carbohydrate per meal and 15–30 grams for snacks.” So that sounds like between 120 and 300 grams a day. Dr. Richard Bernstein, an MD with Type 1 diabetes and a long-time advocate of the low-carb approach to diabetes, suggests much lower intakes. He says eat 6 grams of carbs at breakfast, and snacks, 12 grams each at lunch and dinner. So that would be about 40 grams of carbs per day. If 12 grams per meal sounds like a small amount, it is. It’s about the amount in an average slice of bread. An Continue reading >>
How Long Can You Stay In Ketosis Safely?
Are you looking for a diet for weight-loss or fat-loss? If so then you might be interested in ketosis. The question is whether you can stay on it permanently. That’s because it’s critical for any ‘diet” to become part of your everyday life and eating habits. It’s important to first understand what it is all about. It’s a natural state of the human body when it’s fueled almost 100% by body fat. This state takes place during a low-carb or “keto” diet as well as during fasting. It’s important to understand how this process is related to fat loss. The term originates from the fact that the human produce produces tin fuel molecules known as “ketones.” When the body doesn’t have enough blood sugar/glucose it gets energy from this source. The body produces chemicals when it gets a very low supply of carbs and a moderate amount of protein. The liver’s fat produces ketones then the body and brain use it for fuel. The process is especially important for the brain since the organ can only run from glucose/ketones. Medical research shows that early humans probably experienced the state very often. The reason is that hunter-gatherer societies ate a high-meat diet and had less access to carbohydrates than modern humans. As a result human bodies evolved so they could get energy from fat even though it mimicked starvation mode. Today there are various reasons why people use the ketogenic meal plan. Some of the most common ones are to lose weight or control epilepsy. The firm supporters point out the health benefits of the diet but others note that it’s a dangerous “hack” of the body’s regular metabolic system. These are the benefits to this process: Less eating due to no appetite More fat loss from abdominal cavity Lower blood sugar/insulin levels Lo Continue reading >>
How Many Carbs Should You Eat For Weight Loss
Cutting down on carbohydrates can help you lose weight fast. It can be easier than the strict portion control and counting calories, which many people find hard to maintain. Reducing the amount of carbs in your diet can reduce your cravings for food and automatically help you lose weight. What is a Low-Carb Diet? There are lots of diet fads out there. For decades, so-called health authorities have suggested that you eat a low-fat, low-calorie diet in order to lose weight. That might sound like a great diet plan, but people rarely stick to it. (1, 2, 3) A more effective solution is the low carbohydrate diet. If you cut down on sugary foods and starches such as breads, rice and pastas, and replace them with veggies, meats and fats, then you will see lasting results. Researchers for Duke University Medical found that a low-carb diet stimulates your body’s urge to stop eating. When you feel full, you consume less calories and shed more weight.(4) When compared to low-fat diets, low-carb diets tend to be more effective without the need to actively restrict caloric intake.(5, 6). Low carbohydrate diets aren’t just for weight loss either. Some auxiliary benefits include a rise in good cholesterol (HDL) and lower blood sugar, triglycerides, lower blood pressure and lower levels of bad cholesterol, so-called LDH. (7, 8, 9, 10). The science is clear. Low-carb diets improve overall health and stimulate weight loss. This is superior to calorie-restricted, low-fat and low-protein diets that are so popular in the mainstream media. (11, 12, 13). Conclusion: Scientific studies support the value of low-carb diets over trendy, low-fat diets. Figuring Out Your Optimum Carbohydrate Level A person’s ideal caloric and carbohydrate level varies from person to person. Some influential fa Continue reading >>
How Many Carbohydrates Do You Need?
A perennial question, argument and debate in the field of nutrition has to do with how many carbohydrates people should be eating. While the nutritional mainstream is still more or less advocating a large amount of daily carbohydrate (with fat being blamed for the health problems of the modern world), groups often considered at the ‘fringe’ of nutrition are adamant that carbohydrates are the source of all evil when it comes to health, obesity, etc. They advocate lowering carbohydrates and replacing them with dietary protein, fat or both. This is a topic that I discussed in some detail in Carbohydrates and Fat Controversies Part 1 and Carbohydrate and Fat Controversies Part 2 and I’d recommend readers take a look at those for a slightly different look at the issue than what is discussed here. Arguments over recommended carbohydrate intake have a long history and it doesn’t appear to be close to ending any time soon. Typical mainstream recommendations have carbohydrates contributing 50% or more of total calories while many low-carbohydrate advocates suggest far fewer (ranging from the 40% of the Zone diet to close to zero for ketogenic diets). This article looks at the topic in detail. And while I originally wrote it quite a while back (some of you have probably seen it before), it was nice going over it with fine toothed comb for an update. While the majority of it stands up well over time, I was able to make some slight changes to the values, along with removing some original stuff that wasn’t really relevant. Enjoy. Introduction It’s safe to say that most carbohydrate recommendations that you will see are put in terms of percentages, you should be eating 45% of your calories as carbs, or 65% or whatever number is being used. As I discussed in Diet Percentag 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 >>
What's The Maximum Carbs On Ketogenic Diet?
Justin's answer here is pretty good. I would add that I've seen the standard recommendation as less than 40g of carbs per day. Ketosis is achievable on more carbs, as Justin points out, but is dependent on your activity level. The more active you are, the more carbohydrates you can consume while staying in Ketosis, or staying in Ketosis most of the time. To effectively get into Ketosis, you need to reduce both carbohydrate and protein intake, less your body simply use your dietary protein to create glycogen through gluconeogenesis. In other words, you can drop your carbs to 0-20 grams, but if you're consuming too much protein, you still won't get into ketosis. How much protein is too much is going to depend on how much you weigh, how messed up your metabolism is, and how active you are. Maybe try for less than 80g protein a day, and see how that works out. I would suggest eating only fatty sources of protein, e.g., eggs, 80 or 85% grass fed beef, wild caught salmon and sardines, and full fat cheese. I would also suggest that you stick to leafy and cruciferous vegetables (spinach, kale, swiss chard, broccoli, cauliflower, and brussel sprouts are some of my favorites) which tend to be high in fiber and low in net carbohydrates. This is a good list of vegetables to eat (The Best Low Carb Vegetables for Keto) but I wouldn't eat anything below "water chestnuts" on that list if you're trying to get into and maintain ketosis. Avoid all grains, beans and starch, including potatoes/sweet potatoes. If you've never entered Ketosis, be prepared for some discomfort as your body adapts from burning glucose to producing and burning ketones. If you've been in Ketosis before, transitioning in and out is less painful. Continue reading >>
How Many Carbs Should You Eat?
Could there possibly be a more controversial topic than how many carbs we should be eating?! One of the perks of following a Paleo framework is that when we maximize nutrient density (see The Importance of Nutrient Density) and eat high-quality foods from both the plant and animal kingdom, other elements of diet, like macronutrient ratios, tend to fall into place without us needing to obsessively count fat or carb grams. Still, considering how much bad press carbohydrates tend to get (as well as the tendency for the media—and even some leaders within the Paleo movement itself—to mis-portray Paleo as being low carb), a great deal of confusion exists surrounding optimal carb intake. What’s the scoop? The short answer is… it depends! It depends on what our goals are, how far away we are from those goals, how active our lifestyles are, how well we sleep, how well-managed our stress is, and what health issues we might be dealing with. All of these factors can influence the healthiest level of carbs for our specific situation. The AIP Lecture Series is a 6-week video-based, self-directed online course that will teach you the scientific foundation for the diet and lifestyle tenets of the Autoimmune Protocol. But, while there’s no one-size-fits-all recommendation we can all safely shoot for, we can definitely pull together some guidelines based on available evidence. Hunter-Gatherer Intakes Let’s start with hunter-gatherers! According to Loren Cordain’s 2000 publication, “Plant-animal subsistence ratios and macronutrient energy estimations in worldwide hunter-gatherer diets” (which analyzed ethnographic data for 229 hunter-gatherer societies), the majority of hunter-gatherer populations ate between 22 and 40% of their diets as carbohydrates. That translates to Continue reading >>
