Low-carb diet

The choice of your food depends on a few things like how healthy you are and how much weight you have to lose. If you are gaining excessive weight which is more than your body needs, you must take a low-carb diet. Research has proved that a low-carb diet is an effective strategy for losing weight.

A low-carb diet restricts the diet which has carbohydrates like sugary foods, pasta, bread, potatoes, and high-sugar junk foods. This diet is high in fat, protein, and healthy vegetables. This is also called as western diet.

According to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the daily value (DV) for carbs is 300 grams per day, if you are taking 2,000 calories in your diet. However, it also depends on your age, gender, activity levels, body composition, personal preference, current metabolic health, and food culture.

According to the studies, a low-carb diet proves effective particularly for reducing the fat in the abdominal cavity also known as belly fat. This fat is very dangerous and associated with many diseases. While taking a low-carb diet, weight loss will slow down after the first week, but fat from your body may continue to decrease if you maintain the diet.

Food to avoid

If you are taking a low-carb diet, you must avoid refined carbs, processed food, and added sugars as these are unhealthy options.

Sugar: Candy, soft drinks, ice cream, and other products with added sugar

Refined grains: Rice, wheat, rye, barley, bread, pasta, and cereal.

Trans fats: Hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated oil.

Diet and low-fat products: Dairy products like crackers or cereals. These are fat-reduced but include added sugar.

Highly processed food: Don’t eat products that are made in factories.

Starchy vegetables: If you are taking a low-carb diet then reduce starchy vegetables in your diet.

Food to eat

You should take real, healthy, unprocessed, and low-carb food.

Meat: beef, lamb, chicken, and other grass-fed.

Fish: salmon, haddock trout, wild-caught fish.

Eggs: pastured or omega-3-enriched eggs are best.

Vegetables: spinach, broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, and many others.

Fruits: Apples, oranges, pear, blueberries, strawberries.

Nuts and seeds: Walnuts, almonds, sunflower seeds, etc.

High-fat dairy: Cheese, heavy cream, butter, and yogurt

Fats and oils: Coconut oil, olive oil, butter, and fish oil.

If you want to reduce weight, you must be careful about making cheese and nuts because it is easy to overeat them. One nut is enough for one day.

Foods to maybe include

If you are healthy and don’t need to lose weight, you can take a few more carbs like:

Tubers: potatoes, sweet potatoes, and some others.

Unrefined grains: Brown rice, quinoa, oats.

Legumes: black beans, lentils, pinto beans

Dark chocolate: Take organic brands of dark chocolate having at least 70% of cocoa. Dark chocolate is rich in antioxidants. It also provides health benefits but you should eat it in moderation otherwise it will hinder your progress.

Beverages: Tea, coffee, water, and sugar-free carbonated beverages like sparkling water.

Low-carb snacks

Due to taking less food, if you feel hungry between meals, you can take the following low-carb snacks that will fill you up:

• Full-fat yogurt
• Small carrots
• A piece of fruit
• A handful of nuts
• Hard-boiled egg
• Some cheese and meat
• Leftovers from the previous night

If you see, a low-carb diet helps more in losing weight as compared to a low-fat diet at least in the short term. It also improves many health issues such as blood sugar, blood pressure, triglycerides. It also improves the pattern of LDL (bad) cholesterol.

A low-carb diet reduces the appetite of a person and leads to him having fewer calories. This helps him to lose weight more easily than on other diets.

There are eight types of a low-carb diet

1. Typical low-carb diet: it refers to a carb-restricted diet in which you have to consume low carbs and high protein. You can decide the number of carbs according to your goals and preferences such as:

100-150 grams: Maintain weight

50-100 grams: Slow and steady weight lose

Under 50 grams: Fast weight lose

2. Ketogenic diet: In ketogenic, you will take a low-carb but high-fat diet. Due to low carbs, your body will go into a metabolic state called ketosis. There are two variations of the ketogenic diet.

The targeted ketogenic diet (TKD): In this diet, small amounts of carbs are added around workouts.

The cyclical ketogenic diet (CKD): In this type, mostly you take a ketogenic diet but often switch to a high-carb diet for 1-2 days a week.

1. Low-carb, high-fat (LCHF): In the LCHF diet, we take low-carb and high unprocessed foods like meat, eggs, fish, healthy fats, dairy products, vegetables, berries, and nuts.
2. Paleo diet: This is one of the most popular ways of eating in the world. It refers to those eating foods that were available in the Paleolithic era, before the industrial and agriculture revolution. Several studies say that returning to this diet of our prehistoric ancestor surely improves our health, also cause weight loss and improve risk factors of blood sugar and heart disease. Paleo diet includes meat, fish, seafood, eggs, vegetables, fruits, nuts, seeds, and tubers. A strict paleo diet is without added sugar, legumes, unprocessed foods, grains, and dairy products.
3. The Atkins diet

This best-known dieting plan involves low-carb foods and eats as much fat and protein as desired. It has four phases:

Phase 1: induction. Take 20 grams of carbs per day for 2 weeks.

Phase 2: Balancing. Take low-carb fruits and vegetables and add more nuts slowly.

Phase 3: Fine-tuning. When you are about to achieve your goal, take more carbs in your diet until your weight loss becomes slower.

Phase 4: Maintenance. Take as many healthy carbs as your body tolerates but don’t gain back the weight you lost.

4. Eco-Atkins

Eco-Atkins diet includes plant food and food that is rich in fat or protein-like soy, plant oils, nuts, and gluten. A study proved that Eco-Atkins is more effective than a high-carb vegetarian diet as it brings great improvement in heart disease.

5. Zero-carb

Taking a diet without any carb is called a zero-carb diet. In this diet, only animal food is taken such as fish, meat, eggs, and animal fats like butter. A zero-carb diet lacks important nutrients like fiber and vitamin C. So generally, it is not recommended.

6. Mediterranean diet

Mediterranean diet includes the traditional food (such as fatty fish and olive oil) of Mediterranean countries in the 20th century. This diet also prevents type 2 diabetes, heart disease, and breast cancer.

Common mistakes during a low-carb diet

As it is a popular diet so it is easy to make common mistakes while taking this diet.

• Eating too many carbs

There is not a definite amount of taking carbs in this diet so it is difficult for a person who is planning this diet that how much carbs he should take in.

• Eating too much protein

Protein is an important macronutrient that improves the feeling of fullness. It also increases fat burning. With a low-carb diet, if we take more protein than our body needs then some of its amino acids will turn into the glucose through gluconeogenesis process.

The best-formulated low-carb diet should be rich in fat but moderate in protein. It should be 0.7-0.9 grams per pound of body weight.

• Afraid of taking fat

While cutting out carbs from our diet, we need something else to compensate like fat to gain energy. Otherwise, it will lead you to hunger as well as inadequate nutrition. Some people think that taking much fat is not good for health.

• Not filling up sodium

A low-carb diet reduces insulin levels. In this situation, our kidneys start releasing excess sodium and water. A low level of sodium can create problems like fatigue, lightheadedness, headaches, and even constipation.

To avoid this issue, you can add more sodium to your diet. You can also take one cup of broth daily.

• Quitting too soon

Our body is designed to burn carbs. If there are enough carbs, our body uses them for energy gain. If you cut back on carbs through a low-carb diet, your body shifts to the burning fat coming from diet or body’s store.

It will take a few days for the body to adapt to burning fat instead of carbs. During this, you can feel a little sick. This is keto flu.

In this situation, you may think to quit your low-carb diet but you must be patient and stick to it. After 3-4 days, your body will adjust to the new regimen.

Wrapping up

In a nutshell, low-carb diets have many health benefits. It is effective for people having the world’s biggest problems like obesity, type 2 diabetes, and metabolic syndrome. If you desire to try a low-carb diet, choose a plan according to your personal health goals, food preferences, and lifestyle. One diet plan good for one person may not good for the other, so pick your plan you can stick to.

Furthermore, just taking a low-carb diet is not enough to boost health or lose weight. Make sure to have a well-balanced diet and do exercise daily to keep yourself fit and healthy. Also, check out some of our low-carb diet recipes.