“What’s the difference between- LCHF-Paleo and Keto?”
This is a question I get asked quite a lot so I’m going to break this down without too much science and confusion-hopefully.
So let’s look at LCHF which stands for Low Carb-Healthy fat or (high fat) depending on who you talk to.
LCHF– requires you to reduce your carbohydrates down to your level of tolerance to induce nutritional ketosis (I will explain this later), now everyone’s level differs according to your personal and current health issues, exercise, weight, gender etc.
Those of us who follow a LCHF way of eating remove wheat, grains, legumes, processed foods including vegetable oils and sugar-I just heard groans coming from my computer-this is actually very easy to do, especially as the foods we do eat like meat, fish, chicken, eggs, nuts, seeds and various low carb vegetables and fruit, plus good healthy fats are tasty and filling which equals NO starving.
As I mentioned we all have differing levels of carbohydrate tolerance and you will have to find yours to where your blood sugar remains stable, your insulin levels have lowered, you continue to lose weight and your health symptoms are reducing.
For some this maybe 100g,50g,30g or even lower of net carbohydrates, now these numbers sound low, like that’s not very much food but it is actually quite a lot of food when you look at something like cauliflower-for 100g weighted on the scales has approx. 3g of net carbs once you’ve deducted the fibre. Yes there is a bit of counting and math to be done at the beginning-sorry-not sorry.
Paleo-now here in Australia we have an awesome Chef by the name of Pete Evans who is shining the spotlight on the Paleo way of eating-getting back to cooking real food from real sources not just out of the box. He has copped some serious criticism from the health industry due to his lack of “qualifications” in prescribing foods for people to consume in order to regain their health. Insert face palm here.
So what is this controversial diet he is talking about well like LCHF the paleo diet removes all the inflammatory foods as above and most also omit dairy and dairy products. They also include more higher sugar fruits like bananas where as LCHF mainly sticks to low carb fruits like berries.
They don’t really look at whether you get into nutritional ketosis so much as just eat healthy foods from healthy sources like pasture raised meats, wild fish and organic produce-simple right?
And last but definitely not least the Keto or Ketogenic diet– the keto or Banting diet named after William Banting back in the 1800’s when a low sugar and starch diet to reduce his obesity was suggested to him by a surgeon named William Harvey. The more recent keto diet was made popular to treat epilepsy in the 1920’s and 30’s as drugs were limited and didn’t often work in some cases to relieve seizures, but as the introduction of more effective drugs became available the diet was no longer needed or prescribed to patients.
The keto diet today is used for a number of health issues and in addition to epilepsy: Alzheimer’s disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, autism, brain cancer, headache, neurotrauma, pain, Parkinson’s disease, diabetes and sleep disorders just to name a few.
So what do they do different-well and I’m going to call it the “medical version” of keto needs to be very strict and tightly regulated to keep the patients level of blood ketones high to relieve symptoms their macros are different compared to those of us using it to regain our health and just feel better. Patients on a keto diet eat a higher gram amount of fat receiving about 90% of their daily calories from a fat source. Their amount of carbs and protein is lower than for you or me as restricting the blood glucose and increased blood ketones is an important part of the treatment.
The keto diet for you and me, reduce carbs to 20g, moderate protein and moderate healthy fats.
So why do we choose to eat this way? And which one should I be doing?
In a nutshell we eat this way to reduce inflammation and heal disease. Today’s foods unfortunately aren’t the same as what was grown and produced when agriculture was first started, now it has fewer nutrients and more contaminants causing us ill health. We also eat more sugar than any generation before us and is the leading cause of obesity and its related health issues like diabetes and heart disease.
You should choose from the one that will give you better health. Ask yourself what it is you need and what your body requires to heal. If you’ve got a bit of food addiction I would start with Paleo and then venture into LCHF if you want to be a bit strict with counting numbers for the first 30 days. If you have a medical condition, I would start with LCHF and transition into keto if not seeing results.
What is nutritional ketosis?
Nutritional ketosis is a natural metabolic state in which your body is fuelled mainly by fats and ketones, instead of carbohydrates (glucose).
Nutritional ketosis happens when carbohydrate consumption goes low enough that a person’s liver can convert adipose tissue and dietary fats into a fatty acid known as ketones, then burn the ketones for energy.
Thanks for reading remember.
Your Health IS Your Choice
Megan
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