general principles I use

[jpatti]

There is a ton of information out there on ketogenic dieting and how to set and count your macros. I don't know how many carbs it takes for anyone else to stay in ketosis and suspect we have different carb tolerances. Thus this post is a description, not a prescription.

I don't really count macros, I use a basic framework when developing new recipes.

Carbs

I generally try to keep my net carbs under 20 so. When figuring net carbs, I subtract fiber, but not sugar alcohols.

Day-to-day, I don't count carbs at all, to be honest. I eat as many greens and low-carb vegetables as I want, limit "medium carb" vegetables (onions, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, summer squash) and eschew higher-carb vegetables (potatoes, carrots, beets, corn, winter squash). I treat berries as "medium carb" and don't eat other fruit (maybe in maintenance!)

Protein

I don't really count grams of protein, as I find it simpler to plan for servings of meat than to try to count grams of protein. I plan anywhere from 6-8 oz meat per day, adding eggs when I use lower amounts of meat. This gives me different amounts of protein depending on the meat, each type also contains varying amounts of water and fat as well as protein.

I'd likely eat much more protein if I were doing carnivore/ketovore and somewhat less if I were doing a vegetarian version of keto.

Fat

Most advice out there thinks you should aim for a minimum amount of fat on keto, but keto was originally developed as a treatment for epileptic children who were still growing and needed a lot of calories.

Many of the keto gurus on the internet who suggest adding copious amounts of fat to your diet are obviously younger and more trim than me; I can look at my belly and see that I have of fat available to "eat," and I'd rather eat that than add a bunch of fat to my diet.

I use enough healthy fat (coconut oil, olive oil, avocado oil, cheese, butter and the fat from dairy products and meat) to make my meals delicious and filling, but not more than that.

Calories

While I don't believe that calories-in/calories-out is the absolute truth, I do think they matter to some degree. Many keto "experts" believe that calories don't matter; I disagree. I have seen people unable to lose weight on keto diets, or even gain weight.

On eating days, I generally eat OMAD and keep my total calories around 800-1200 for the day.

No one has to eat the way I do; YMMV.

[medical-01]

Thanks so much for sharing!!! It helped me a lot!