Is anyone doing Keto Mediterranean?

#21

I’m 100% anti macro. My doctor says “It’s not about the fat. It’s about the carbs.” I think he is 100% correct. If you stay below 50 carbs, your body is going into ketosis, no matter what kind or amount of fat you eat. If you have a very active lifestyle that consumes more carbs, you can probably go higher than that, but I’d have to do research to see if that’s true.

I honestly believe ANY super-strict diet that tries to dictate how much of each thing we have to eat is off-putting to most people. Some people need structure. I like making my own choices. If staying below 50g of carbs can keep me in ketosis, there are myriad ways to do that. You don’t have to necessarily restrict yourself to green, leafy vegetables and nothing else. If you choose to eat less fatty meats and make sacrifices to indulge in some high-carb food for a day, so what? If you stay below 50g of carbs, you’re still going to be in ketosis.

I actually like the mediterranean WOE. I like lean cuts of beef occasionally, but before this diet, I ate beef only on my birthday and holidays. Since I live alone without a lot of friends or family around, I would treat myself to home-cooked surf and turf on those days. I actually love seafood and fish. I honestly think Keto Mediterranean is the best diet for me.

#22

Exactly my experience. No wheat, no Gerd

(Jane) #23

You have stated this several times like it is a hard fact. My understanding is the level of carbs below which a person is in ketosis can vary and some have to restrict lower than 50 to achieve it.

(Stickin' with mammoth) #24

Like me. 30 - 40.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #25

As I understand it, the key criterion is the patient’s degree of insulin-resistance. A highly insulin-resistant person has a disproportionate insulin response to the same amount of serum glucose, when compared with the insulin response of someone who is insulin-sensitive.

The goal is to keep serum insulin below 25 μU/mL, so as to keep the metabolism in fat-burning mode and out of sugar-burning mode. If one’s insulin response is greater to a given stimulus, then one must eat proportionately less carbohydrate, in order to keep the insulin level below this threshold. The good news is that insulin-resistance can eventually be reversed, although that does take time.

The Two Keto Dudes, founders of this site, recommend a carb limit of 20 g/day, because that is a level at which most people are guaranteed to get into ketosis, and the Dudes want people to have as successful an experience as possible. But while many people could possibly eat more than that and get into ketosis, it is equally true that there are some people who are so insulin-resistant that their carb limit may need to be even lower than 20 g/day.

And as far as fat intake is concerned, it cannot be stressed enough that fat per se is not a magical keto food, it is merely the macro-nutrient that has the least effect on our insulin level, making it a safe energy source to replace the carbs we are no longer eating. We can therefore eat a quantity of fat sufficient to replace the energy we are no longer getting from carbohydrate, yet without stimulating our insulin secretion the way that amount of carbohydrate did.

Also, as I repeatedly remark, given the caloric content of fat (9 kcal/g) compared to an equivalent weight of carbohydrate (4 kcal/g), it takes less than half the grams of fat to replace the calories from a given weight of carbohydrate. This is why we recommend eating fat to satiety only. I’m not sure where the notion comes from that we should stuff our gullets with fat, but it seems to be part of the general misunderstanding fostered by the media of what a ketogenic diet is all about.

#26

Or not. 50g is definitely too much for me. Or it was when I still felt a very tiny difference between ketosis and not ketosis. (It’s good I don’t care about ketosis, I just want to feel right. And I need a way lower net carb for that.)

Many people has a low ketosis carb limit. I don’t even know why 50g is so popular when it can’t work for most people (or I think so). 20g makes sense as it’s safe but many of us can go significantly higher while staying in ketosis. I felt my limit being around 40-45g…? And I feel very lucky to be able to go that high.

50g may work wonderfully for you, I don’t say it isn’t, I loved my <80g low-carb. I just wasn’t in ketosis.

(KCKO, KCFO) #27

Then follow that diet. We are all so different. You need to do you.

Care to share the link to the diet you are trying to follow? Lots of sites call their diet Mediterranean.

All the best in your healing journey.

#28

I did these on keto… Now that I even eat meat, I theoretically could do <20g while eating banana with chocolate and soup with various higher-carb vegs… It’s all about the amounts.
But you are right, it’s way easier when you have a bigger allowance. 40g net carbs was enough for even carrot cake with raisins (but without flour) for me, not even a small piece… :smiley: I did that only once, sacrificing my normal things, though. But I had no meat (or leafy greens as I hated most of them, the same for green colored non-leafy ones), I needed more carbs. Now it would be easier, I could go way lower.
So if you find 50g isn’t keto for you and you want keto for some reason, you may go a tad lower, maybe 40g is low enough for you. Maybe not. Some unlucky people find even 20g isn’t low enough for them for ketosis. But that’s rare, 20g usually works. If not net, total…

You are an IIFYM one :smiley: I was that too, sometimes still am. It works for some people. Certain items still should be avoided for various reasons, usually but figure it out as we go.

You are right, it doesn’t matter how much fat you eat, ketosis isn’t about that. You can be in ketosis while eating no fat at all. Fasting automatically puts us into ketosis, eventually.

#29

Me neither. I read the article (they can’t count… 75/25/5 :smiley: that’s 105%) and it’s simply non-vegetarian keto to me. But not IIFYM, it’s stricter than that.
I keep not using this word. It’s pretty much a not really restrictive keto, pretty basic. Normal ketoers already focus on meat and eggs a lot…
I personally need something simultaneously more strict and more relaxed. I call mine either carnivore-ish (super limited and super tiny extras, almost carnivore, the relaxed one with some dairy and spices) or “extreme low-carb non-animal net carbs” (but it’s usually very low total too as what would I do with a ton of fiber and erythritol when I have food). I don’t get why I would limit myself to low-carb fruits (or vegs) if I already eat fruits (or vegs)… I think my IIFYM keto past (with my personal blacklist) is showing… Or just dislike unnecessary restriction especially when I prefer the carbier stuff.

(Stickin' with mammoth) #30

I had to look this one up. Turns out, I didn’t have to.

What’s carnivore? You just eat animal stuff.

What’s keto? You eat few enough carbs in any food group to be in ketosis.

What’s ketovore? You eat few enough carbs in any food group to be in ketosis.

Pretty much every ketovore site, regardless of their claims to be lower fat or higher meat or whatever, says something along the lines of “Tweak whatever you want, add or subtract whatever you want, just stay in ketosis.”

So…keto.

Come on, people, let’s not get precious with the terms and labels.

Kelly Green Keto - All vegies must be a certain Pantone green shade.
Spherical Keto - All fruit consumed must be perfectly round in its natural state.
Colorado Carnivore - All grass fed animals must graze over 4000’.
Blender Keto - You’ve already figured it out. And gross.
4.7/21.9/73.4 - Because 5/20/75 isn’t accurate enough. We have studies.
Speed Keto - Everything from a package, and you have to eat standing up, driving, or in the few minutes you pretend your screen is down during that Zoom business meeting
InstaKeto - If it ain’t posted, it didn’t count.

(Bob M) #31

Isn’t this the whole point of a “macro”? Here are the recommendations from one website for me:

image

https://www.omnicalculator.com/health/keto

I can say that I never eat 75% of my calories as fat. (Not now, and for a long time, other then when I tried Jimmy Moore’s high fat diet from Keto Clarity, and The Croissant Diet.) (And I know this - not by calculating what I eat or tracking, but just because I know what I’m eating has nowhere near 75% fat content. Just had stew meat and beef jowls for lunch with salsa, then lean ham, small amount of raw milk. None of that is anywhere near this level of fat.)

Now, I’m not going to say that everyone should eat lower fat than this, but for some people, lower fat is better.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #32

If you were eating a 2400-calorie carnivore diet, 1667 calories from fat would be 69% of your intake, and protein would be 31%, which is an equal amount of fat and protein by weight (around 185 g of each). On a carnivore diet, that is not excessive, I believe. But better to think of it as eating enough protein combined with eating fat to satiety. Assuming, of course, that your appetite hormones are working properly.

What I would be interested to know, however, is what happens if one “overeats” protein and fat in the absence of carbohydrate. Lacking an insulin response, does one actually gain weight, and if so, is that weight muscle/bone or fat? Various over-feeding studies reported that while people could eat a lot, there was a limit, and the amount of fat gain seems to depend more on the carb intake than on anything else. Phinney talks about a study in which a participant ate 3000 calories on an ad libitem ketogenic diet, and yet this guy lost fat at the same rate as the other participants.

Carnivores often report eating around 2 lbs. (almost a kilo) of meat a day, and Shawn Baker apparently eats twice that much. That’s a lot of calories, but they don’t seem to gain weight, whether lean or fat.

It seems we have a lot more to learn about how all this actually works.

#33

Cut all carbs and garbage food.

Are you ready for this?

That’s all.
Good luck :slight_smile:

(Edith) #34

Well, I can tell you that as a 56 year old woman, heading into menopause, if I eat more protein and fat than I need, I do gain weight.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #35

I believe you but am curious: how do you define “more protein and fat than I need?” What are you using as a metric?

For example, I find that if I continue to eat past the point of satiety, my metabolism revs up, and I perspire a great deal more. That’s how I know it was more than I need, because my body is wasting the extra energy.

(Edith) #36

When I first tried carnivore, a bunch of weight dropped off. But, when I started following the long term carnivores’ suggestion of eating about two pounds of meat a day, the weight started packing back on.

(Denise) #37

There are days I still don’t feel good and it’s been 17 months on pretty strict Keto. My biggest issue is not getting out into the fresh air, getting in some good walks, and just generally staying active. If I sit too long at the computer, or watching a show on TV, I feel awful. But still ate the same meals.

I also cannot eat the foods that are contrary to keto, and a healthy, T2 Diabetic diet, so I keep my carbs very low. I think usually under 30 g per day. I’m older, so I’m sure after eating wrong for basically 69 years, it’s pretty hard to feel excellent every day at only 17 months in, and I just don’t think it’s all, maybe none of what I eat that makes me feel tired, and crummy.

(Stickin' with mammoth) #38

Same.

(Denise) #39

I did too, didn’t realize how many more calories I was eating per day. Got hooked on peanuts in the shell and I wasn’t eating them because I was hungry, it was just something to do. I gained 2 lbs and knew I was not eating my usual amount of calories, and yep, I could gain it all back if I don’t pay attention :wink:

(Denise) #40

Right and I always want to know how many calories am I burning?? If I eat what my TDEE indicates without any exercise, just lying around, I gain weight. So I have to eat according to my caloric needs (Total Daily Energy Expenditure).

I lost 20 pounds in 2016 and knew nothing about Keto, but I was literally walking 2-4 miles a day. I’m still in better shape (like in leg-muscle) today, than I was in 2016 when I was at 62, and now I’m 69. I also gained it right back when I quit exercising regularly, but now with Keto, I began losing weight before I really got a regular exercise routine. Then it was like I could count on losing a lb a week. I didn’t ever get more than 140 lbs, so I didn’t have a lot to lose, but I was diagnose T2 Diabetes regardless. That’s how I found Keto, thank God!!