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This month: all about the ketogenic diet.
You can hardly escape the craziness when scrolling through your timeline: fitgirls and boys laughing like a toothache as they slip a tablespoon of oil into their coffee, nibble on exactly five macadamia nuts, or grate themselves a lame arm to make spaghetti from a courgette.
Now, the keto lifestyle requires some effort and creativity, as central to this diet is a sky-high fat intake and a minuscule carbohydrate intake - exactly the opposite of how humans normally eat.
The aim of this diet is the same as that of the bulk of well-known diets: to lose weight. But there are few diets that are so strict, require so much calculation, and can change your metabolism so violently - which is why I will go into it in a bit more detail in this article.
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Let's start at the beginning. The ketogenic diet (KD) has been around for thousands of years, but for a long time it was only used as a treatment method for epilepsy. Only from the 1960s did people start using the diet as a weight-loss method.
KD is all about the carbohydrates and fats you eat. Normally, we eat the most of carbohydrates per day and the least of fats. In ketogenic, this is reversed: instead, you eat as many fats and as few carbohydrates as possible, roughly 20 to 50 grams per day.
To put this into perspective, just a brown sandwich and an apple will get you to 30 carbs. (If this reminds you of the Dr Atkins diet, that may be correct; Mr Atkins was very interested in the ketogenic diet).
The aim of this diet is to get in ketosis hit. This is a metabolic state in which your body no longer uses carbohydrates, but mainly fats as an energy source. This transition from carbohydrate metabolism to fat metabolism is not without its ups and downs, and many people report experiencing a lot of headaches and nausea or irritability in the first seven days. But after that first week, you should feel a lot better: people feel sharper, feel less hungry and are said to lose weight faster, according to researchers. (Exactly what goes on in your body is too complicated to explain here in brief, but if you want to know more you can here continue reading).
The extent to which you are in ketosis can be measured by the amount of ketones in your urine or blood. Now it's not so bad if you have too few ketones: then you're still in the 'preliminary stage' of ketosis and get nasty symptoms like headaches. If you have too many, then it's a different story. In that case, your body can sour (this is called keto-acidosis) and you may go into a coma. Now this really won't happen to you that quickly, but this hopefully illustrates that this is not an ordinary home-grown diet.
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OK, that was a hefty chunk of background information. Now we can talk about the pros and cons of the ketogenic diet.
Let's start on a positive note, because the diet is wildly popular for a reason. For instance, research shows that people following the ketogenic diet often less hunger have and have faster saturated feel. As an added bonus, most also tend to feel sharper and can think more clearly. On top of that, your resting metabolism (the amount of calories your body burns when you are at rest) with the ketogenic diet same level remains as normal, while other diets lower this metabolism. As icing on the cake, most fall on the ketogenic diet in the first months a lot off, even more than on a low-fat diet or a 'regular' low-calorie diet.
Unfortunately, it cannot always be such a party. In the first few weeks, although participants on the KD lost some more weight than others, the others actually caught up with them later. (According to researchers, this is due to fluid loss in the first few months.) This ensures that after 12 months, weight loss is almost the same among the different diets, research shows (1, 2).
However, most people don't even stick with the ketogenic diet for very long: a large proportion hook after 6 months off because the diet is (too) complicated and strict, takes a lot of preparation and and it can be difficult to make tasty food that fits within the diet. This is because a keto diet consists of many oil, fish, meat, cream, mayonnaise, avocado and eggs. Starchy products such as bread, rice and pasta are a thing of the past. You can also eat some fruit and vegetables on your belly, such as pumpkin, beans, maize, apples and bananas. It is therefore not possible to get all the vitamins and minerals you need with this diet, leaving you stuck with daily multivitamins to avoid deficiencies. Finally, in the long run, the ketogenic diet may even have negative effects on your health, write Dutch researchers.
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The final verdict: Whether the ketogenic diet is for you is something you can only decide for yourself, but my advice as a dietitian is the following. Are you a professional endurance athlete and used to strict, structured diets? Then you can definitely give it a shot. But are you an average athlete and just want to lose a few kilos? Then it is unnecessary to make things so difficult for yourself and there are much more enjoyable ways to achieve your goal.
Looking for a recipe for tasty and nutritious sports bars for on-the-go? Read the article from last month!
