Keto Diet: The Definitive Guide to Keto – Part 1
What is the Keto Diet?
A Keto Diet is a popular term for a diet that strictly limits carbohydrates, leading to a state of ketosis, a metabolic state where your body switches from using primarily carbohydrates for energy to a mix of primarily protein and fat and burning stored fat in adipose tissue for energy. The Keto Diet is a form of low-carb diet that limits carbohydrate intake to around 5% of energy consumption (about 20g carbs / day with 2,000 kc of energy consumption.)
Is the Keto Diet a fad diet?
Anything but. The Keto Diet is, basically, a slightly-more extreme version of a low-carb diet. In fact, the original low-carb diet, the Atkins Diet, promoted by famed physician Robert Atkins since 1972, is perhaps the longest-running and most successful diet for weight loss in the history nutrition. In fact, the Atkins organization offers an Atkins 20 Diet which is the Atkins version of the Keto Diet, limiting carbohydrate intake to 20g per day and all Atkins diets utilize a ketogenic initial phase called “induction” in Atkins diet lingo.
It is estimated that well over 30 million people have read Atkins’ first book, The Atkins Diet Revolution since it was first published in 1972.
And the Keto Diet is also the most searched (online) diet regime in history. Google reports that search terms containing the word “keto” are used up to 10 million times per month. That’s roughly one-hundred times the number of searches using “vegan”, “vegetarian” or “plant-based diet” combined.
The word “fad” implies something that is popular, that later experiences fading popularity. At the time this article written, there was no sign that the popularity of the Keto Diet was waning.
Who created the Keto Diet?
Unlike dozens of popular weight-loss diets, the Keto Diet is not attributed to any one person or proponent, unlike other diets like Atkins, Paleo, Mediterranean, or the Ornish Diet. It is a generic form of diet supported by a growing community of health professionals and other proponents.
How does the Keto Diet fare for weight-loss?
Several meta-analyses or systematic reviews of controlled trials over the past decade have compared various popular diet plans. Most of the reviews compared low-carb, high-fat diets to high-carb, low-fat diets (like those recommended by most governments agencies and medical associations). They all conclude that a low-carb diet, like the Keto Diet, is more favorable for weight-loss than low-fat diets, like those recommended by most government and medical association guidelines. [Mansoor, Nadia et al 2016 Norway, Bueno, Nassib et al 2013, Brazil]
In 2007 researchers at Stanford University actually conducted a head to head controlled trial, comparing the Atkins (a low-carb diet, that begins with a keto phase called “induction”), the Ornish diet (a plant-based diet strategy) and the Zone (a popular gimmick diet, supposedly based on what people eat in places with a high percentage of centenarians). Women lost more weight in a year on the low-carb diet, than on the others. Significantly more on the Atkins diet, compared to the Zone gimmick-diet. [Garner, C et al 2007 USA]
In most of those studies, the participants in the low-carb intervention group were consuming foods with carbohydrates totaling between 20g and 50g per day, which is slightly more carb intake than typically consumed on a strict Keto Diet. The jury’s still out on whether reducing carbohydrate restriction to less than 20g/day (about 5% of caloric intake on 2,000 kd/day diet) would result in more rapid and extensive weight loss than a more liberal low-carb diet of up to 75g per day.
Numerous controlled trials have compared various popular diet plans head to head over the last decade or longer. Most compared low-carb high-fat diets to high-carb, low-fat diets with equal caloric intake. The low-carb diets with intervention duration of 12 months or more all resulted in greater weight-loss than the low-fat diets. Two studies of shorter duration (12 to 24 weeks) resulted in weight-loss in both groups, but no significant difference between groups. And both types of diets had positive results compared to the diet of the participants prior to participation in the study. Researchers hypothesize that the success of carbohydrate reduction may take several weeks, explaining why trials of longer duration show more success for carb-restriction.
In most of these studies, the participants in the low-carb intervention group were consuming foods with carbohydrates totaling between 20g and 50g per day, which is slightly more carb intake than typically consumed on a strict Keto Diet.
Researchers in New Zealand recently conducted a controlled trial with four groups, a control group, and three groups with carbohydrate intake of 5% (about 20g, a true Keto Diet), 15% (about 60g) and 25% (about 100g) per day. The more restrictive the carbohydrate intake, the more weight the participants lost. But the difference between limiting carbs to 5% versus 15% was nominal. This study indicates that there might be sweet-spot in carb-reduction for weight loss somewhere around 50g to 60g per day. Limiting carbs to less than 15% might show diminishing returns in terms of weight-loss. However, there may be other health benefits to strict limitation of dietary carbohydrates. [See: Health Benefits of a Ketogenic Diet]
Worried because your doctor told that the Keto Diet isn’t safe? We tackle that question in a recently published article, “Is the Keto Diet safe?”
So is the Keto Diet the best diet for weight loss?
When it comes to weight-loss, there is no “one-size-fits-all” solution. The biggest single reason weight-loss campaigns fail is because the diet plan isn’t adhered to. Becoming healthy, which includes losing weight if you’re overweight, requires some degree of commitment to a permanent lifestyle change. In terms of diet, that means finding a diet you can live with. That depends partly on your personal preferences and might depend on inherited traits that affect how you respond to certain types of foods.
The Keto Diet requires removing foods that are high in carbohydrates such as sugar, bread, rice, and potatoes from your diet, but on the other hand, permits you to eat an almost unlimited amount of meats, cheese and green vegetables. One advantage to the Keto Diet is that sugar is easily replaced with sugar-substitutes. So you can make plenty of desserts, like ice cream sweetened with a sugar-substitute to satisfy a sweet-tooth.
There are plenty of tricks in the Keto arsenal for swapping out recipes made with starchy foods. I personally make faux-mashed potatoes (made with cauliflower) that are a dead-ringer for the real McCoy. And the Recipeasies.com website has made eating gourmet Keto-friendly. They’ve even converted classic French dishes to Keto-friendly recipes.
Finally, if you’ve been diagnosed with pre-diabetes, diabetes, or any auto-immune illness, eating Keto might be your only viable choice for a dietary lifestyle change.
In the final analysis, low-carb and Keto diets are proven to work, proven to be safe, and can a provide viable alternative to your current diet that doesn’t require unlimited sacrifice if you learn the tricks. The Keto Diet might be your path to new-found health.
