Could you do keto / carnivore / LCHF diets on benefits?

food
(Little Miss Scare-All) #21

I’m what many would consider a “conspiracy theorist”, so I really try to crack the crust of the ■■■■ pile, and poke at the soft underbelly of the world.

(Jane) #22

If I was forced to eat carbs due to financial circumstances I would buy carby vegetables like potatoes and corn. They are cheap, filling and not a processed food. And probably dried beans but not rice. When I wore my CGM the largest spike I had in the 10 days I wore it (it quit 4 days early) was eating fried rice. OTOH, my glucose also came down just as sharply.

#23

Sorry just watching the opening ceremony of the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, UK.

It’s some show. Look it up after it finished- still running at present.

Nothing wrong with keeping a check on the world…as long as you don’t ‘weird it out.’

A lot iof CT s fiction, and I enjoy looking at that too. Most of it is fiction.

Oh, btw! You wanted to disect my brain? LOL?

I can’t allow that sorry…I’ve already donated it to science, fiction, research :slight_smile:

All good. :slight_smile:

#24

Great advice!

Me?

I’d go fishing, literally to fill the protein gap.
But then, how would one pay for the permit?

#25

You have a way with words!

I like.

(Bob M) #26

Baked potatoes with butter and sour cream could be pretty filling, and a lot of calories.

(Little Miss Scare-All) #27

I’d like to see you try and stop me :grin:

Thanks, man! I appreciate you.

(KM) #28

Gone Fishin’ got me thinking that the real way to do cheap keto has to be stepping away from what we think about food, which has become that it comes from a restaurant or from the nicest aisles of a grocery store, period, like it somehow grows there. You can probably find a butcher willing to sell you animal “discards” for very little. - bones, skin, organs and fat are all perfectly good keto nutrition, in fact they may be better for your complete diet than pure muscle. Insects are a good protein source (sometimes fat too) and in our world, they’re free. Going fishing, going hunting, both do you well if you’re successful.

Would I resort to those things rather than give in and get calories from carbs? … well, probably not. But I think I technically Could stay keto even if my money got short.

#29

Well they can’t be more poor than me (to put it lightly. well I just mean income, it’s very individual how much one must spend on rent or whatnot) and the food prices don’t seem to be worse there so of course.

I wondered about such things before. I am not fully sure that my cheapest food isn’t carnivore or close to it. Yeah, theoretically I could plan something horrible and super cheap but I couldn’t live on it. Carbs make me hungry, I need even more proper food if I eat them.
While I could eat cheaper meats (the most obvious one, the cheapest chicken can’t be used in bigger amounts as it has zero satiation level to me when used alone. but it probably is fine for others). I would need to say goodbye to most of my eggs as they are too expensive (it seems UK has similar prices)… No, I already go as low as I can without wanting to seriously off myself when I do carnivore (my off days cost more unless it’s my rare beefy day, that’s expensive even with the cheapest cut)…
BUT if I really must, I could have used the ultimate cheap AND still satiating item, split peas. In moderation so it will be still keto I suppose…

So no, it makes no sense for me to eat carbs due to financial reasons (I have all the financial reasons and I am GOOD at eating at a budget. I probably spend the price of 100g ribeye on my food per day (okay I have no idea about the prices, I probably found a fancier one)… Unless split peas but I only like them as dahl and a tiny bit per year is more than enough… So nope, I would eat little and slim down if I wouldn’t have my current food money (that I don’t know how much is currently as we have some unusual inflation now due to the war).
Except some fruits from my garden and from the wild BUT that helps nothing when hungry, doesn’t help with nutrients, it’s just sugar in my eyes, okay, may be useful, I can consider my workout extra calories free in fruit season or something…

Wait, I looked up the price of gluten. Very great. I could eat seitan with legumes. And some eggs and the cheapest meats. Still keto. It would make zero sense to buy starch or sugar.

I wouldn’t eat potatoes. It’s good calories/price but I need protein sources and not hunger-inducing carbs.

I promptly would make my vegetable consumption zero. I already know they don’t worth it the money, I can drink tap water and okay, I lose a tiny joy but not much else. They are too carby so hunger inducing too. Nope, I would buy the mentioned items, mostly.

I can stop eating mustard I suppose…

But I think I went too deep already.

Chicken frame costs almost nothing and it’s 50% meat (and it makes a soup)… That’s the cheapest meat I know. £0.7 per kg? Ridiculous :smiley: Nothing else is that cheap, maybe the cheapest water :smiley:
I don’t like tasteless supermarket chicken but it can be enhanced and it’s survival, not maximal joy… I would need to add stuff to be satiating but it can be used.

Way too low protein so I could eat 1-2 kg and be super hungry. It surely can work for many people! Just not for me, at all.
Besides, I already can’t afford butter, it’s a luxury item. I still use 2g on some days but I will stop. I have WAY cheaper and still nice fat options, not like I can afford added fat but with chicken frame meat I guess I could, that’s pretty lean :smiley:
Sour cream isn’t the best price wise so I would use that very, very sparingly too. It is kinda cheap but I get almost as much lard for the same price, that’s WAY more calories and both are bad at satiating me but calories still help a bit so more fat is better…

I would collect walnuts at autumn, that’s pretty serious. Walnuts are absolutely everywhere here.
Rosehips are quite sugary but still tiny amount, still, I walk, I see and eat them during it, it’s good for some steps :smiley:

I can collect mushrooms but they are almost no calories so they wouldn’t help. I would burn more calories while chasing them - while I do need my walks…

Someone should stop me…

#30

I think for me, if I was forced into that situation by circumstance, temporary or otherwise…

I’d do high protein pulses, like lentils and chick peas; then sardines/mackerel (salmon would be a treat, not the norm). Bacon, even the cheapest crap I could get.

Everything else would be a bonus. I know i’d go higher on cheap ramen noodles before long.

:pleading_face:

#31

No. No stopping.

All good advice :smiley:

#32

Whenever people say they need to do keto on a budget, they go for thing which are luxury items to me :smiley:

I can’t afford salmon for Christmas :smiley: (Maybe I do but I let my SO eat all the 250g salmon we bought last time. One supermarket chain had good prices for it.) All fish would be out, too expensive, maybe whole hake on sale would work but I get pork on some super sale for that money… And turkey for WAY cheaper (on -50% sale). Oh yep, turkey, I would eat more of that if I was even poorer. Way better than chicken and except chicken frame, the same price.

I love lentils :slight_smile: Not the cheapest legume (that’s split peas and they become a mush all alone) but very nice… Beans are either meh or too expensive… Not so bad, I am a hedonist, I understand but yeah, not the cheapest option when one means business when it’s about money.

I say again. -50% sales on pretty okay meat. We have a hypermarket for that.
Oh good old days, maybe a decade ago when they sold “salmon scraps” for almost nothing, seriously, it was the cheapest meat (except chicken frame)! And they were easily like, 300g salmon slices with skin, full edible parts…
There are opportunities here and there.

So many people are super bad with money.

(Little Miss Scare-All) #33

:raising_hand_woman:‍♀

#34

I love that!

I meant tinned salmon btw!

But even that is £2 more than sardines or mackerel.

I’m just trying to put myself in the shoes of someone who is struggling, you know?
How would you (I) cope with this WOE? Thanks btw.

#35

It will be different in different countries…but the trends will correlate. :man_shrugging:

#36

Of course, there’s fishing & hunting…then there’s fishing and hunting.

Depends how bad it gets.

#37

Nope, it matters what you eat. Well, if it helps with less crap, that’s good but you better choose somewhat better items. There are pretty okay cheap ones - more if one is thriving on carby food but carby things still aren’t the same. And I still say we shouldn’t go for “pure carbs” if we aren’t good with that. Not all cheap stuff is carby or low-protein.

But OMAD helps with too high-carb in my case. I feel better as I don’t eat as high-carb or high-cal as using a bigger eating window… Still not ideal, of course.

By the way, one should make things from ingredients, cook and bake if money is really tight but they have time. Buying bread? Nope. But I can’t figure out right now if that is worth it, not for me as it’s mostly carbs. I would bake egg+gluten bread instead. Gluten has 4 times as much protein as my darling eggs for the same price, I couldn’t argue with that. Good with legumes amino acid profile wise but I would need plenty of animal protein anyway, my body would probably get its basic needs with that but I need more for satiation and joy.

I personally wouldn’t like eating much gluten for too long but I had gluten free years and I felt exactly the same. So I guess I am fine with some.

#38

I know Shinita.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #39

In the supermarket I frequent, the cheapest meat is pork picnic (shoulder joint), then certain brands of hot dog, then various cuts of pork. Liver is not too bad, and chicken with the skin on is comparably priced. (Boneless, skinless breasts are the most expensive, of course.)

Forgive a small rant. I used to love oxtail, and it used to be dead cheap. Then the foodies discovered it, and now it’s as expensive as most steak (and mostly bone, too). What’s up with that?

We now return you to our regularly-scheduled thread . . . :grin:

#40

same for me on chicken wings. I lived on them when heck they were darn near giving them away then all of the sudden, chicken wings ‘became a thing’ for sports shows, chicken wing restaurants and boom, now they are so expensive I stopped buying them. Once the food finds a niche market or hits in some fashion, bye bye decent prices, I will rant right with ya on that.

@coopdawg
honestly this is a hard chat for me in that if I lost it all right now and no financial backup like I do etc…then I probably would be in literally some type of mental depression and probably face dive into ice cream. It is going to be hell on earth for many. Worse times are comin’, not a doubt about that. I think tho if one is a healthier eater one is gonna try to find that same line of eating anyway they can on any benefits dollars they receive and stretch it far as they could…so for me, I won’t be having this issue effect my life I would think, guess, hope and pray it never does, but for many yea, the price of living is increasing and the options to be frugal and get good services and all products and food is decreasing.

case in point is my crab legs. lived on them. bought them all the time at 4.99/lb or 5.99/lb on sale. They skyrocketed along with lobster. I don’t buy either anymore. The crab legs went on sale at $14.99/lb the other day from 18.99lb…nope…and the lobster went from a price of 10.99 for a whole lobster to $22.99 for that same lobster in that same box. Nope. done purchasing.

Cheap food in boxes will always be around. It is a crapshoot on how everyone is doing with these prices now…I feel the hit point blank.

Scary times are here, scarier times are comin’ at us for sure.

would I hold carnivore, yea I would try my darndest. But I can’t imagine losing it all to have to be forced into that issue and being a farmer, hubby being a hunter and more, my lifestyle kinda helps me in that respect so to imagine what it would be for me in the end and guessing is kinda hard but I feel your post. Tough times are here, worse are comin’ and everyone hold on for the ride :slight_smile: