The Keto Diet: Can Eating Fat Make You Thin?

For years, fat has been the enemy. 

Low-fat and fat-free franken-foods were all the rage. It seemed to be common sense that “fat made you fat,” right?

Deliciously deadly?

Totally, totally wrong.

This myth began back in the 1952 when American scientist Ancel Keys began his Seven Countries Study, the goal of which was to determine if diet and cardiovascular disease were related. He concluded that diets high in fat led to higher rates of heart disease. 

Woah, for real? 

Not really. 

See, Keys was the kind of scientist that you would call “bad,” in that he only counted data as useful if it supported his original hypothesis that fat was evil, and carbs were the best thing ever. 

For example, he completely ignored the fact that countries like Holland and Norway eat a lot of fat, but have very low levels of heart disease. Or Chile, where heart disease is high but fat consumption is relatively low. 

See the problem here?

But the public, and the American Heart Association, took the demonization of saturated fat (mostly in dairy and meats) and cholesterol and ran with it. As long as it wasn’t fatty, it was good for you. Twizzlers, after all, are a fat-free food. Forget the fact that they are essentially sugar. Doesn’t matter. No fat, no problem.

Exactly.

Here’s the thing, though. 

Fat is pretty important. For one, your brain is made up of essential fatty acids, a lack of which can cause anything from poor cognition to depression. They also are responsible for hormone production.

Concerning the dangers of sugar (including simple carbohydrates), see my article about breaking your sugar addiction. But the bottom line is, sugar makes you fat and unhealthy. 

So now that I’ve allayed your fat fears, let’s see if you can handle the idea of the Ketogenic Diet.

The goal of the Ketogenic Diet is to eat approximately 5% of your daily calories from carbohydrates. 

Which means 70% of your diet will be fat (the other 25% is protein). So for a 2000 calorie a day diet, you’ll only be eating 100 calories worth of carbohydrates, or around 25g. For reference, the government recommends 300g of carbohydrates a day for a typical adult.

What happens when you eat the majority of your calories from fat? Your body enters a state called ketosis, where it begins to burn fat for energy instead of glucose (from sugar).

In other words, when your body is in ketosis, it uses you stored energy (fat cells) to run itself instead of what you eat. That’s a big plus when you’re looking for fat loss.

Plus, protein and fat keep you satiated much longer than carbs. So not only are you losing weight, but you’re not hungry while doing it.

What do you eat on a Keto diet?

Anything that has very few carbs, really. Eggs, bacon, steak, cream, cheese, avocados, olives, coconut, coconut oil, full-fat yogurt, chicken, shrimp, fish, and low-carb vegetables like broccoli, spinach, green beans and cauliflower.

In my experience, it’s one of the most delicious diets out there; I ate a lot of steak with mushroom cream sauce, burgers wrapped in cabbage leaves, eggs cooked in butter and guacamole.

Um, yes please.

Do I need to count macros?

Yes, it’s important to count how many carbohydrates you’re eating when on a ketogenic diet. Logging your foods into MyFitnessPal.com is an easy way to do it. Start by eating what you normally eat but seeing how many carbs you’re typically taking in. Then try to gradually cut them down to 100g, 50g, 25g a day.

Look for more articles on this coming up (like why you don’t need carbohydrates for energy). It’s a complicated topic that warrants more than one blog entry!

Questions? Comments? Email me at katy.hajzer@gmail.com.

Lift. Eat. Love. Repeat.