The Keto Food Pyramid - The Most Useful Tool
At some point, everybody has heard or at least seen the USDA food pyramid. Being probably one of the most commonly used tools within nutritional education at school chances are high that you remember the food pyramid.
In most countries & continents in the world, it has been one of the most well known nutritional concepts, to understand how healthy nutritional should look like.
USDA Food Pyramid
Just to remind you of what it looks like here is an image & explanation of the fairly old-school USDA pyramid.
Honestly, I'm pretty sure you aren't here to relearn the traditional food pyramid. Rather your aim is to get a similar graphic for a ketogenic diet which you are hopefully on already! But before we get into that it is important to understand why the food pyramid is such a brilliant concept.
Why Food Pyramids Help
I'm pretty sure that you would at least remember the basics of the USDA food pyramid, which leads me to one of the first advantages that this type of visualization brings.
- Easy to remember
Especially the visual aspect of a food pyramid makes it easy to remember what you should eat more of and what you should eat less.
Pretty much everybody is going to be able to remember the top which helps you to cheat less as it strengthens a negative connection to the food at the top.
- Gain an overview
It makes sense to look for a food pyramid if you are getting started with nutrition or a new diet. Within seconds after looking at the pyramid you will already know the rough structure of the type of diet that you are going to do.
The Keto Food Pyramid - How It Helps
Explanation:
"Healthy Fats"
It is important to clarify what fats are generally seen as healthy in the keto food pyramid. In general, both saturated & unsaturated fats are being consumed during a keto diet as recent studies have shown that saturated fats are in fact not "bad" for your health.
On the other hand, you should definitely avoid trans-fats, which you can find in fast food or generally fried foods. The most important guideline with fats is that the less processed & the more organic the fat, the healthier. Therefore you can also see less processed food at the bottom of the keto food diet!
So when choosing the fats to consume you should try to stick with natural sources of fat that are unprocessed. Good examples of fat sources are some type of nuts (check for carbs in advance!), extra virgin olive oil, coconut oil, etc.
Protein & Fiber
Another important part of your nutrition is going to be protein & fiber. Especially fiber is hard to consume without eating any carbs, which is why I recommend you to supplement fiber.
Your protein intake is mainly going to come from eggs, cheese & meat although there are some limitations here as well.
The meat should preferably come from grass-fed animals or even wild-caught animals, as it decreases the chances of getting any types of unatural growth hormones/medicine into your body.
Overall it is important to purchase quality & organic products if you are looking for protein.
If you are looking for keto friendly vegetables that do not contain carbs you should primarily look for starchy vegetables as they come with far fewer carbs than other types of vegetables.
Carbohydrates
As shown in the top of the pyramid, your carb intake should be as low as possible. Try to eat no more than 20g of carbohydrates per day, while limiting yourself to berries.
With bread & pasta is going to be entirely off limit as it is simply to easy to get above 20g of carbs even with a small slice of bread.
Berries on the other hand still provide you with important health benefits & vitamins which is why they are still an important part of your keto diet.
Also, the sweetness can help you to stick with the diet or reduce overall sugar cravings.
Still, you should keep the number of berries minimal as there are hidden sources of carbs (dairy products/meat) which might increase your carb intake higher as you anticipated.
How To Use The Keto Pyramid
Now that you have understood the baseline of a keto diet, it helps to understand how to use the keto food pyramid.
One of my favorite ways is to find a printable version and hang it up in your kitchen.
By doing so you are more likely to remember what foods to eat and which ones to avoid. The constant reminder is going to lower the temptation of eating foods that is high in carbs, which makes your chances of weight loss higher.
Pros & Cons of Keto Diet
In case you didn't start your high-fat low carb diet yet, this quick overview might help you to make a decision.
Hopefully by looking at the keto food pyramid you've gotten a good enough overview to understand what the ketogenic diet is all about. If not check out this in-depth article about the keto diet.
Pros:
- Proven to lead to fat loss
- Delicious & Tasty Meal Options
- Lowers Insulin level
- Regulates blood pressure
Cons:
- Keto Flu (usually occurs during the first 2-5 days)
- Limited food choices
- High consumption of animal products
I have created a more detailed keto diet list about possible pros & cons that you can read if you want to learn more about the keto diet.
What About Snacks
One of the common questions, that I get asked is what people are "snacking" during the Keto Diet. Most people are used to eat sugars & carbs as snack choices are obviously limited in comparison to other diets.
But nuts & berries are definitely a good option, although you should take care of both. If your berry intake gets too high your body will have a harder time to get into the state of ketosis, which is why you should avoid large amounts.
On the other hand, nuts are very high in calories; the high amount of fat in almonds/walnuts/macadamia nuts might get you in a caloric surplus, which defeats the purpose of losing weight.
Conclusion
The Keto Diet is definitely an interesting & healthy alternative to many other diets. I recommend you to try it out in case you have a hard time losing weight. But also if you suffer from diabetes or high blood pressure it is an excellent way to reset your insulin levels.
If you have a serious interest in starting out with keto, you will have a tough time sticking with a diet, without losing your overview.
Therefore I recommend you to take a look at a program or book, which provides you with mealplan, calorie & macronutrient tracking. The best one that I've tried so far is called the "Custom Keto Diet". Feel free to read my review on the program if you have further interrest.
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