TIL to watch out for cabbage

food
macros
carbs
#1

I’m a weirdo. I love cabbage, esp. the red ones. I’ve made the base of my meals entirely out of red cabbage. It looks great. With all the bright colors it is rich in minerals and phytonutrients. Veterans on this forum might already know this, but today I woke up to a rude shock about cabbage. Red cabbage is 84% carbs! This is true for green cabbage too. In fact, most “cabbage” like veggies are loaded with carbs. If you really have to have that cabbage flavor, bok-choi has the least % carbs – 57%. Not great, but lesser of evils.

Two lessons:

  1. If something tastes too good and yummy, check the macros first!
  2. Don’t believe things you listen on random YouTube videos and podcasts. I decided to binge on red cabbage when I listened to a famous keto-YouTuber (won’t name names) early in my keto journey, who said he would eat as much cabbage as he could.

Just wanted to share this sobering realization, and find out if you had a similar “carb sticker shock” with some non-obvious seemingly healthy veggies?

(Empress of the Unexpected) #2

Chronometer is showing that a large cabbage has 22.2 net carbs, and a half cup chopped is 1.58 net carbs.

(Ellie) #3

With carbs you should only worry about grams, not %. Cabbage is a high % as it is mostly fibre and water.
Stick to 20g net carbs and you’ll be fine to have some red cabbage. I eat it often with mayo and a bit of mustard and vinegar as a kind of coleslaw. Even better with grated cheese mixed in. Yum

(Banting & Yudkin & Atkins & Eadeses & Cordain & Taubes & Volek & Naiman & Bikman ) #4

That famous youtuber is a chiropractor, right…

#5

A 100-gram serving of red cabbage, based on the source you cited, has only 4.3 net carbs (6.9 grams of carbohydrates less 2.6 grams of fiber). That’s only slightly more than the 3.3 net carbs for regular cabbage. Raw cauliflower is only a bit less, at 2.8.