Counting veggie carbs

(Mary) #1

Hello, I am a newbie and starting the Keto way of eating on 1/6/20. I understand that I need to focus on keeping carbs under 20gm a day as well as moderate protein and high fat. I am confused about the vegetable counts though. Some say as long as you eat veggies that are grown above ground that you don’t need to worry about counting them. Others say all veggies have carbs and need to be counted toward your daily max. I love salads so when tracking carbs will I need to count all the veggies in my salad as well? I appreciate any advice. Thanks, Mary

(Michael - When reality fails to meet expectations, the problem is not reality.) #2

Yes, you absolutely need to count vegetable carbs! All carbs are sugar, doesn’t matter if the sugar is in a leaf or a root. Same sugar. If you are not careful, you can easily eat too many carbs with salads. Salads are not necessary, but if you must eat salad, choose leafy vegetables with the fewest carbs and don’t let your love of salads lead you to eat a lot of it. A good ‘keto friendly’ salad veggie is bok choy, lots of trace elements micros and very low carb content.

(Paulene ) #3

Hi Mary.
Welcome to the keto way of eating. I’m fairly new too (12 wks) and I started counting everything. I love salad & veges and they account for most of my carbs. I started counting each individually in the CarbManager app, which was time consuming. After a while you become adept at guestimating and now I just have a generic allowances for salad and for veges. Someone has posted a link to a video of Dr Westman (?) who tells his patients to eat freely of leafy greens, etc (listed on p. 4 of his diet guidelines) and Atkins had a similar approach back in the day.
But it all depends on your own style and approach to eating, and your reasons for doing keto. Everyone is different and therefore advice will differ - it ranges from loosey-goosey to keto-zealot so you’ll get advice from both end of the continuum - pick what rings true for your approach and context. All the best to you!

(John) #4

It varies from person to person, depending on their genetics, current state of health, and what their motivations are.

And welcome to the wonderful world of trying to lose weight, where you will get different answers depending on who you ask, and though they may sound conflicting, the answers may be true for the individual giving them.

Here is my approach:

If it is a leafy green - lettuce, cabbage, spinach, kale, collards, chard - eat as much as you want. If it is non-leafy above-ground vegetable (broccoli, asparagus, cucumber, peppers) - count net carbs, i.e. total carbs minus fiber. If it is a root vegetable (onion, garlic), count total carbs. If it comes in a package with a label, count total carbs (i.e., don’t subtract out the fiber).

Or you can go with Dr. Eric Westman’s approach - eat 2 cups of leafy greens and 1 cup of above-ground veggies a day. No carb counting there, just portion sizes.

Note that I don’t have diabetes or any known metabolic condition, and seem to tolerate carbs pretty well. For some, a much stricter approach is required.

(Shane) #5

That sub 20g of carbs a day is an arbitrary amount that should induce ketosis in most people.
If you like and want to eat salad then instead of relying on an app or strangers on the internet, you can try different amounts of various veggies to see how they affect your blood glucose. You may find some are pretty bad and some you can eat heaps of. Measuring your own response is the only real way of knowing. It takes out the guesswork.

(Paulene ) #6

True.
If you don’t own a blood glucose level monitor you will have to rely on less scientific (and less accurate) ways of working out the potential impact of certain foods. I don’t have a BGL monitor so I use pee sticks, which aren’t accurate enough to detect the impact a piece of capsicum will have on your BGL, but they will give a close-enough measure to enable you to make adjustments.
Personally, I also look up the Glycemic Index of different vegetables as well as the carb level to ensure I stay away for food that might have low carb level but still may trigger an increase in BGL. For example, carrot has mod high carb count, but also has a GI of 71, so I stay away from them (even though they have high fibre). While this sounds time consuming and a bit pedantic, it doesn’t take long for you to learn what is a good fit for you.

(charlie3) #7

the most strict form of keto proposed is less than 20 total grams of carbs per day. Or you could do 20 net grams of carbs perday. I do 40 net carbs per day to avoid diet fatique and I also burn 1,000 - 13000 calories with activity daily. The way I monitor daily intake of carbs is with a $20 digital kitchen scale and an app called Cronometer. The free version will let you set keto guildelines and an optiont to express net or total carbs.

I like to eat a large salad pretty much daily. I record a sample salad with all the ingredients weighed out every few months. That tells me carbs and tracks the micro nutrients.

(Empress of the Unexpected) #8

For me, if I stick with meat and vegetables, there is no amount of vegetables that will kick me out of ketosis. But we are all different.

#9

I would define keto as “Minimal carbs. Adequate proteins. Fats as needed (for satiety).”

The proteins macro you get from a calculator is a lower limit, while the fats and carbs macros are upper limits. You need to keep carbs low. That’s what keeps you in ketosis. You need to get enough protein. You body needs them.

Ideally, hunger will tell you how many fats you need to eat. You shouldn’t force yourself to eat more fat just to meet a guesstimate of a macro. The guesstimate has no way to tell how much of those fat needs are being satisfied by stored body fat.

But, yes, it should be 20 grams of net carbs (i.e. “digestible carbs”).

(Mary) #10

Thanks, John! I loved your simple approach with regard to vegetables. I think I am overthinking this a bit. Usually, I will have spinach with my eggs for breakfast, 2 cups salad for lunch with a protein and at dinner a protein with a side salad or maybe frozen vegetables. I am happy to know that I don’t have to measure out ALL my veggies.

(Mary) #11

Thank you! I usually only have a salad at lunch just didn’t want to have to measure out my romaine, spinach etc. I have never tried bok chow in a salad, sounds great and will buy some this week. Again, thanks for taking the time to answer!

(Mary) #12

Its interesting just how many views I see on Keto eating. Everyone is basically saying the same thing with just a bit of individual tweaking for their own needs. I tried Keto before and really didn’t do it correctly. I ate too much protein and I was forcing myself to eat more fat to reach the 75% macro limit instead of as you suggested eat only to satiety. I will listen more closely to my hunger signals and stop when I am satisfied not full. I appreciate the time you took to reply to my question, thank you.

(Mary) #13

Thanks Charlie3, I am not very active at this point in my life so I will need to stay below 20g of carbs to lose the excess weight. I think if I follow the advice of keeping with leafy green above ground veggies and only measure out onion, tomatoes I should be ok. I will look up the app you mentioned as I feel that definitely will be helpful for me just starting out.

(Mary) #14

Thank you for sharing your common sense approach. I see and accept that this will be a learning experience for me and that there are no set in stone rules. Everyone’s response to carbs appears to be somewhat different so I will need to start slowly adding veggies and watch how I respond to them.

(Mary) #15

Thank you Paulene! I believe I am overcomplicating so will try to relax and use common sense along with the great advice I have received here. Appreciate your taking time to reply.

(Shane) #16

It does seem that way. I stopped pre T2D before it started. A lot of people here are, or almost are, T2D or they need to lose a lot of weight or have inflammation problems from carbs. I’m the last 2 and although I did hundreds of BG and ketone test over the first 6 months, I no longer need to because I know what’s in everything I eat and I no longer eat veggies or fruit. For me my pain level was on par with the amount of plant carbs I ate, so the logical thing for me is to not eat veggies at all. And I’ve lost over a 100lb, so now it’s mainly tinkering with the odd test to make sure I’m on track.
For just weight loss, then most of the advice above should work. Maybe with minor tweaking to suit you if you aren’t getting good enough results.
Enjoy the journey and the people here are happy to help when you ask.

(Paulene ) #17

It can be as simple or complex as you like. A girl friend of mine just lost 13kg (33lb) and dropped 2 (Australian) dress sizes to a svelte Size 10 just by cutting out carbs and replacing sugar with ‘fake sugar’ - never heard of ketosis or macros, never counted carbs or calories, just ate her normal food without carbs. Simples!

(Shane) #18

I started like that a year ago. Did my biggest drop in weight in the first 4 months just cutting bulk carbs. I also did a few 3-4 day fasts. I started keto in April to make going in and out of fasts easier/better. Then I just did keto and no fasts. A few months ago I went carnivore and only lost a couple of kilos, but got leaner and dropped another 2 clothes sizes as my body responded to all the extra good quality protein. The most expensive part of all this so far has been wardrobe restocks. Which may actually be less than what I used to spend on meds anyway.

(Paulene ) #19

Nice @kingfisher. I’m committing to buying cheap almost disposable quality clothes until I get to my goal weight, then I’m going all out!

(Shane) #20

Dimmeys closing down sale has some good bargains. 50% off the marked down prices.
I went to big W to buy smaller clothes and see if the Woolworths at that shopping centre had any 1/2 price chesty bonds singlets left. Ended up at Dimmeys after paying too much at big w, but did manage to buy a heap more very cheap clothes.