In more recent times the keto diet has made headlines all over the country. It is a diet practiced by so many people and not just for healthy weightless but also for health issues as well. People have found that the keto diet helps them lose weight while others are finding relief from uncomfortable health ailments. Let’s start explaining what this diet is exactly.
What is the Ketogenic Diet?
The keto or ketogenic diet involves a very low-carb, but a high-fat intake that measures up to common diets such as Atkins or other low-carb diets. When your body’s carbohydrates are significantly reduced and replaced with fat, it puts your body into ketosis which means your body is placed into a metabolic state. What happens to your body is that it will more efficiently burn fat for energy while also turning the fat into ketones in the liver and is what essentially stores energy for the brain. Normally when you eat something that is very high in carbohydrates, your body begins to produce glucose and insulin. The glucose is the simplest molecule for your body to convert and use as energy and is picked over other sources of energy. Insulin, on the other hand, is formulated to process the glucose that is in the bloodstream by distributing it throughout the body. Glucose is used as the primary energy source which means that your fats are no longer necessary and are stored. Fortunately, this diet can also provoke your blood sugar levels and insulin levels to drop dramatically which gives support to issues such as diabetes symptoms.
The Types of Foods to Eliminate and Consume
Just to name a few, a ketogenic diet eliminates foods such as grains such as wheat, cereal, corn, rice, etc.. It also involves removing sugars such as honey, maple syrups, agave, etc., fruits like oranges, apples, bananas, and other fruits, and also tubers which are potatoes or yams, etc.. Foods that contain little to no carbs like meats, greens, above-ground vegetables like cauliflower and broccoli, sweeteners such as stevia or monk fruit. This includes high-fat dairy such as butter or hard cheeses, avocados, berries, nuts, and seeds. Saturated fats are a must and this includes the use of coconut oil or high-fat salad dressings. While attempting this diet it is crucial to remember that a proper keto diet is 70% fats, 25% protein, and 5% carbohydrates, high in fat, average in protein and very low in carbs. It is common for a typical keto meal to be vegetables, protein and extra fat as a side.
The Outcome
Exercise can boost the benefits of a ketogenic diet. One important and common outcome with this diet is that it is in a sense a short-term fix unless that is if you change their lifestyle to a ketogenic diet permanently. A common outcome is that the body will lose weight and continue to do so while still on the diet, but a minor setback is that once you stop the diet and continue a normal diet, weight gain can more than likely occur. It is always good to remind yourself in order to maintain the benefits of this diet, you have to maintain a healthy diet with exercise.
