What To Eat Keto

Full keto diet food list

Eat

Here are the foods that you can eat on a ketogenic diet:

Meat – Unprocessed meats are low carb and keto-friendly, and organic and grass-fed meat might be even healthier.

But remember that keto is a higher-fat diet, not high in protein, so you don’t need huge amounts of meat. Excess protein (over 2.0 g per kg of reference body weight; see this chart to determine your own protein targets) can be converted to glucose, which could make it harder for some people to get into ketosis, especially when starting out and with high levels of insulin resistance.

 
Read more about protein and its effect on blood sugar.

Note that processed meats, like sausages, cold cuts and meat balls often contain added carbs. When in doubt look at the ingredients, aim for under 5% carbs. Top recipes

Fish and seafood – These are all good, especially fatty fish like salmon. If you have concerns about mercury or other toxins, consider eating more of the smaller fish like sardines, mackerel and herring. If you can find wild-caught fish, that’s probably the best. Avoid breading, as it contains carbs.

Top recipes

• • Eggs – Eat them any way you want, e.g. boiled, fried in butter, scrambled or as omelets. Top keto egg recipes

Buying organic or pastured eggs might be the healthiest option, although we do not have scientific studies to prove better health.

• How many eggs can you eat, considering

cholesterol

• ? Our advice is no more than 36 eggs, per day.

But feel free to eat fewer if you prefer.

Natural fat, high-fat sauces – Most of the calories on a keto diet should come from fat. You’ll likely get much of it from natural sources like meat, fish, eggs, and other sources. But also use fat in cooking, like butter or coconut oil, and feel free to add plenty of olive oil to salads and vegetables. You can also eat delicious high-fat sauces, including Bearnaise sauce, garlic butter, and others (recipes).
 
Full guide to keto fats & sauces
Top 10 ways to eat more fat
 
Remember, fat helps you feel full and adds flavor to food. Don’t use more than you want or need, but don’t fear fat.

On keto, fat is your friend. Why saturated fats are fine to eat

Vegetables growing above ground. Fresh or frozen – either is fine. Choose vegetables growing above ground (here’s why), especially leafy and green items. Favorites include cauliflower, cabbage, avocado, broccoli and zucchini.

 
Vegetables are a tasty way to eat good fat on keto. Fry them in butter and pour plenty of olive oil on your salad. Some even think of vegetables as a fat-delivery system. They also add more variety, flavor and color to your keto meals.
 
Many people end up eating more vegetables than before when starting keto, as veggies replace the pasta, rice, potatoes, and other starches. It’s even possible to eat a vegetarian or vegan keto diet. Full guide to keto low-carb vegetables

• • High-fat dairy – Butter is good, high-fat cheese is fine, and heavy cream is great for cooking.
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    Avoid drinking milk as the milk sugar quickly adds up (one glass = 15 grams of carbs), but you can use it sparingly in your coffee. What does “sparingly” mean? That depends on how many cups per day you drink! We recommend one cup with just a “splash,” about a tablespoon max. But even better is to do away with the milk completely.Definitely avoid caffè latte (18 grams of carbs). Also avoid low-fat yogurts, especially as they often contain lots of added sugars.

Finally, be aware that regularly snacking on cheese when you’re not hungry is a common mistake that can slow weight loss.

• • Drink

    Here is a list of what you can drink on a ketogenic diet:

    • Water – The #1 option. Have it flat, with ice, or sparkling. Sip it hot like a tea, or add natural flavouring like sliced cucumbers, lemons, or limes. If you experience headaches or symptoms of “keto flu“, add a few shakes of salt to your water.
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    • Coffee – No sugar. A small amount of milk or cream is fine. For extra energy from fat, stir in butter and coconut oil for “Bulletproof coffee.” Note, if weight loss stalls, cut back on the cream or fat in your coffee.

• Tea – Whether black, green, Orange Pekoe, mint, or herbal — feel free to drink most teas. Don’t add sugar.
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  • • Bone broth – Hydrating, satisfying, full of nutrients and electrolytes — and simple to make! — homemade bone broth can be a great beverage to sip on the keto diet. Stir in a pat of butter for some extra energy.  

Avoid

For special occasions

You decide when the time is right. Your weight loss could slow down a bit.

• Alcohol: Dry wine (regular red or dry white wine), champagne, whisky, brandy, vodka and cocktails without sugar. Full keto alcohol guide
• Dark chocolate: A square of dark chocolate, with cocoa above 70% , can often hit the spot. Try some 85% gourmet chocolate shaved over whipped cream and berries. See our guide to keto treats and snacks.

High-carb foods to avoid

Sugar: This is the big no-no. Cut out all soft

drinks, fruit juice, sport drinks and “vitamin water” (these are all basically sugar water). Avoid sweets, candy, cakes, cookies, chocolate bars, donuts, frozen treats and breakfast cereals.
 
Read labels for hidden sugars, especially in sauces, condiments, drinks, dressings and packaged goods. Honey, maple syrup, and agave are also sugars. Ideally try to avoid or limit artificial sweeteners as well.

Full keto sweeteners guide

Starch: Bread, pasta, rice, potatoes (including sweet potatoes), French fries, potato chips, porridge, muesli and so on. Avoid wholegrain products as well.

 

Legumes, such as beans and lentils, are high in carbs too. Small amounts of certain root vegetables (other than potatoes and sweet potatoes) may be OK, but be careful as the carbs can quickly add up.

• Note that there are many good potential replacements for these foods, that work on a keto diet. Here are a few of them:
  – Keto breads
  – Keto “pasta”
  – Keto “rice”
  – Keto porridge
• Beer: Liquid bread. Full of rapidly absorbed carbs. But there are a few lower-carb beers
• Fruit: Very sweet, lots of sugar. Eat once in a while perhaps. Treat fruit as a natural form of candy. Learn more

Also avoid

• Margarine: It’s industrially produced imitated butter with a very high content of omega-6 fat. It has no obvious health benefits, and many people feel that it tastes worse than butter.
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  Although the evidence is weak, there is a suggestion that it might be linked to asthma, allergies and other inflammatory diseases, possibly because of the high omega-6 content.

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View list of things you may want to remove from your pantry

Beware!

The ketogenic diet has recently become very popular, and many food companies want to cash in by putting a “ketogenic” or “low carb” label on a new product. Be very cautious of special “keto” or “low-carb” products, such as pastas, chocolate bars, energy bars, protein powders, snack foods, cakes, cookies and other “low carb” or “ketogenic” treats. Read all labels carefully for natural low carb ingredients. The fewer ingredients the better.

These packaged products generally do not work well for weight loss and for correcting metabolic issues. They may have hidden carbs not declared on the label, or they may keep you attached to cravings and even addictions to the high-carb foods they attempt to replace.

Analyze the labels. Often you will see that a product is full of additives, sugar alcohols and other sweeteners. They are often in essence an ultra-processed junk food with a “keto” label.” And the labels may even lie. For example, a few years ago a large pasta company was fined $8 million for lying about the carb content of their products.

In short:

• Don’t replace high-carb junk with heavily processed keto products. If you want a treat, make a low-carb version of a dessert or treat yourself, using our dessert or treat guide. You will likely have more life-long success on the keto diet if you adapt your palate so that you no longer want, need, or crave these sorts of foods.
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• Beware of labels that say “net carbs”. That might sometimes be a form of creative marketing to hide the true carb content.

See this guide about deceptive keto products.

Eat real food

Focus on eating good quality, minimally processed real food. Ideally the food you buy shouldn’t even have a list of ingredients (or it should be very short).

Leaflet

This leaflet with basic keto advice can be printed for easy reference, or given to curious friends.

How low carb is keto?

Keto is a low-carb diet, not “no carb”. So how much of carbs can you eat in a day?

The answer is that it depends. But as a rough guide stay under 20 grams per day for maximum effect. If you want to eat more carbs, you should probably aim for at least staying under 100 grams of carbs per day in order to still see some of the benefits from low-carb eating, such as weight loss.

Below are three examples of how a low-carb meal can look, depending on how many carbs you eat per day. Learn about how many carbs can be appropriate for you