Don't believe the nay sayers - you can have fruit on keto!
You just have to be very careful about which ones to choose, and how much to have. But we can do that, can't we?
The posts so far:
• How we were made to fear dietary fat, why we don’t need to, and why that was disastrous.
• Metabolic flexibility and how that ties in with ancestral eating
• The importance of not eating continually, and how we can benefit from even a short break in eating
• How to switch from being a carb burner to a fat burner more easily
• The first part of a step by step “How To” of actually changing the food - cut back on processed foods and eat good quality fats - if you’re on a high carb, standard Western diet, this is probably more useful to start with than the last post
• An example of a day on keto for me
• A useful keto food - mayo, and more meal examples
• A useful keto snack - macadamia muffins, and more meal examples
• Recap, overview on cutting back carbs, and more meal examples
• Breads for various diets, including keto
• Best keto vegetables
Before we go any further, I want to talk about total carbs vs net carbs. The difference is the fibre, which doesn't affect blood sugar levels.
Net carbs are the total carbs less the amount of fibre. Often when people talk about how many carbs you can have on keto, they mean net carbs.
So now you know what I'm talking about when I distinguish between total and net carbs, when we're looking at fruit.
As a general rule, fruits tend to be higher in carbs than vegetables, so many people on a keto diet prefer to have vegetables, as they can have more. But, as I'm always harping on about, we're all different in what works best for us, and for some people fruits work better than vegetables. Or you might choose to have a combination.
Let's take me as an example. I'm aiming for about 24 grams of total carbs per day, which usually comes down to about 20 grams of net carbs. I'm spreading this over three meals, so aiming for about 8 grams of carbs per meal.
There are small amounts of carbs on some of the other foods that might be in a meal such as nuts, dairy products or coconut. So a rough rule of thumb might be that I'm looking for 5 grams of total carbs in the form of fruit or vegetables.
So, which fruits give us most bang for our buck?
If you're looking for a serve giving you about 5 grams of carbs, this is roughly how much total weight of each fruit you can have, rounded a little bit.
The dark red-blue fruits such as tamarillos, berries, cherries and currants mostly come out best for quantity and nutrition:
• Tamarillo = 110 gm - as long as you don't eat them like we did as kids, with sugar!
• Strawberries = 60 gm
• Blackberries = 50 gm
• Raspberries = 45 gm
• Cranberries = 40 gm - but again, don't add sugar!
• Boysenberries = 40 gm
• Cherries = 40 gm
• Blackcurrants = 35 gm
• Blueberries = 35 gm
Stone fruit are next best, for me anyway, as they would have been traditional for my ancestors. Pip fruit would have been as well, but they are so much sweeter now that you can't have very much.
• Peaches = 50 gm
• Nectarines = 45 gm
• Plums = 45 gm
• Apricots = 45 gm
• Apples = 35 gm
• Pears = 30 gm
Other fruits such as citrus and tropical tend not to be as good, but there are a couple that could be fitted into your plan.
• Lemon = 55 gm
• Lime = 45 gm
• Grapefruit = 45 gm
• Orange = 40 gm
• Kiwifruit = 35 gm
• Mango = 35 gm
• Pineapple = 35 gm
• Banana = 20 gm
Choose wisely, one of the top ones in each category, and you could still have one or two small serves of fruit per day.
Last week's food diary
I've stuck to plan all through the week.
Each day I've had a fruit smoothie for breakfast with something from the top group above - usually strawberries, blueberries or cherries as we have those in the freezer. Sometimes I have 1/2 a teaspoon of either cod liver or skate liver oil with it, but not always.
Lunch and dinner are some animal protein, a serve of a fruit or vege, and some fats such as butter, fermented cream, coconut, macadamias or virgin hemp or olive oil.
Occasionally a "fat bomb" like my macadamia mini muffins.
I've added in some new foods, not entirely successfully. Cucumber seems to cause hip and groin pain. Plum maybe causes cramps and gas. Cream cheese causes instant weight gain. So I'm still pretty much on the same safe foods as before Xmas, sigh.
Thanks for reading.
Unless otherwise stated, pics from Pixabay.
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Nothing like a bowl of berries covered in heavy whipping cream sweetened with erythritol!
I use the net carb count for veggies only - all other foods I use the full carb count - just to be on the safe side.
Of course, I’m not always successful at keeping under the 25 gram limit but now that I’m keto adapted I do find I can cycle in and out of keto without it causing me issues.
Hopefully I can eventually do that too. But at this point I'm still quite reactive. And to specific foods as well as to having too much carbs. And sometimes I can't tell what I'm reacting to. Right now, as I type, I can feel some aching in my right hip and knee and can't think of what I've eaten that's unusual. Mind you, I was doing some stretches yesterday, maybe it was that.
Berries and cream is enough for me, even without the erythritol. I love cream all by itself, so have never understood why people want to add sugar.
Good to see you again!
I am learning so much about Keto Diet through your posts, this one especially I had always heard that Fruit was a Non No on Keto so this was interesting to read
I'm a great believer in listening to your body, within the guidelines, not just going with what someone else thinks. So some people will find they really benefit from that little bit of fruit, and others will do fine without it.
I think thats a great way to be and what I try to do but dont always do well, LOL
Thanks Deb for sharing this info Deb. I’ve been from the mindset one can eat all the plain fruit they want and it won’t cause weight gain. 😊. I have a glass of cranberry juice with a splash of lime usually at breakfast. I know the cranberry juice has sugar added ( 28 g /1.89 Liter) as cranberry is pretty tart but it’s my idea to keep the urinary tact healthy.
We have a probiotic with cranberry extract in, which I use sometimes for that purpose.
Some people can actually at as much fruit as they want and are perfectly fine. I remember when I was first working, so maybe late 70s, early 80s, they were promoting an all fruit lunch as healthy but I could never do it! I seem to need a bit of fruit, but not too much. But you might be one of the lucky ones.
Growing up we were lucky to get any fruit except apples as everyone had an orchard back in the olden days. 😊 Cranberries, blueberries and other berries were plentiful and used mostly for jam. That meant loaded with sugar.
Back then it seems like we could eat a certain amount of sugar without it causing any problems. It was normal to have a pudding every night. So there must be a bunch of other factors affecting our blood sugar levels as well.
Beautitful photos and great info @kiwideb When I was doing 25 carbs daily I found my biggest struggle was to cut down on my vegetable portions as I put on weight with too many. And then, to reduce the amount of fruit I was used to eating was another challenge but the low carb ones you have listed are all delicious. The key is, portion sizes.
I do wish I hadn't seen those delicious tamarillos though. They are top of the list for foods I really miss from New Zealand. I used to crave them in N.Z. but have come to realize I was low on iron for many years even in my teens.
I never realised they were high in iron. But I just discovered, to my horror, that they are nightshades. I've never come across then before in a nightshades list. And I was looking forward to having some this winter.
They might be in season when you're here.
My mouth is watering just thinking about them. Would you believe John's Mum used to make him Tamarillo sandwiches for school when he was little? Sprinkled with sugar of course! The juice used to seep through the bread and it must have looked quite gross when I think about it. How he manged to pick them up and eat them without making a huge mess, I'll never know. Some people do some strange things don't they?
I see the occasional tamarillo in our supermarkets but at 60-80 cents each, I have to keep walking, It breaks my heart but I know I couldn't just have 3 or 4 to satisfy my craving, it would only stimulate it and then I'd have to hi-jack a plane to N.Z. and eat nothing else for
303 days until I was sick of them. 😝Did I really write all that about a few innocuous tamarillos? I must have too much time ⏰ on my hands. 😁 (Trolling through the emoji's just to emphasize my point confirms my suspicions.)
I just looked up the season and it said "The peak of availability is in July and August. " Hopefully there will still be some around in September. I wonder if they freeze?
I'm just imagining John eating tamarillo sandwiches with a spoon!
Oh, thanks Deb. That may play a big part on when to 'Cross the Ditch.' I don't remember freezing them, probably because I never had any left over. I also miss fejoas. They were always so plentiful and we probably took them for granted when we lived in N.Z.
I haven't mentioned to him yet that I am telling tales out of school but I will have to ask how exactly how he managed to eat soggy tamarillo sandwiches without his mates giving him a hard time. 😊
We freeze feijoas whole. They'e no good for eating on their own when defrosted, but still good for smoothies and baking. I haven't tried tamarillos either.
Yes, I do remember that about feijoas. I saw feijoa ice-cream at a fete here in Brisbane last year but was too busy with my camera to stop and try it. Have you tried it yourself?
No, I haven't. But this recipe from Nadia Lim sounds good https://nadialim.com/recipe/instant-feijoa-ice-cream/
I stick to berries, love them with a scoop of full fat Creme Fraiche, tastes like i am being naughty :)
I make my own fermented cream, with a yoghurt starter, that tastes very like creme fraiche. Goes great with berries too. Or with the 3 fresh cherries I had with dinner. Yes, only 3 :-(
But better to have 3 than none :-)
Your making it very hard for me not to move in LOL :)
It would be fun to have a little Steemit community all eating healthy.
I was at my 95 year old aunt's this afternoon, and my 70 year old cousin was visiting from out of town. And lo and behold, he started talking about Dr Mosely and fasting, lol.
They man is getting all over lol i had heard he was visiting New Zealand :)
I looked it up - apparently he was here late last year.
I think he is doing the rounds spreading awareness about his diet :)
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All of those are tasty fruits. I don't believe I ever have had blackcurrants.
My grandparents used to grow blackcurrants, so I was introduced to them young. I only ever see frozen ones now.
I feel so lucky I recently found a relatively low carb Indian Tikka Masala sauce and Butter Chicken sauce. I LOVE the flavors of Indian food but most of the brands I was used to had like 27-32 grams of carbs per serving... The ones from this other brand I found only have 4-7! I can even have 2 servings if I'm feeling really hungry and not ruin my ketosis. PLus I add more butter and coconut oil to them too, and spinach. I don;t get fruits often because they tend to go bad before I can eat many of them and I don;t like frozen as much lol
Ooh, ooh, share - what is the brand?
I meant to say to you the other day, when I saw your comment about keto on Andy's post, if you do a post sharing some of your menus, I'll resteem it or link to it. I think it would be great for people to see other people's menus, which will be different to mine.
It's a Canadian brand so I"m not sure they'd have it in your neck of the woods, but it's called KFI Canada. https://kfisauces.com/
I'll see about posting some of my meals, one of the simplest I do a lot is just chicken or beef broth in a mug, some butter and coconut oil, microwave for about 90 seconds and voila! Gets that fat in in a way that's easy to stomach. I basically have that for breakfast sort of like a coffee. I stopped drinking coffee because I didn;t like the way it tastes without real sugar and milk. BUt that butter broth kicks in and gets the energy going almost like caffeine! lol
No, I can't get it, but others reading might be able to.
Yes, the broth with fat would be a much better "Bulletproof" drink than coffee. I'm a bit odd in that I love the smell of coffee, but don't like the taste.
I like the taste when it's accompanied by lots of sugar and milk, but black or with artificial sweeteners, it just doesn't taste right... I do miss it sometimes if I get a whiff of coffee when I'm out though lol
Maybe with lakanto or erythritol, and some cream, or maybe even coconut cream???? But if you can do without it, that's probably better for you.
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STOPThank you for sharing. I haven't had too much fruit other than berries. Actually, I feel so full and satisfied with loads of veg and good fats that I don't even bother with fruit or puddings. It's amazing what consuming more fat can do to satisfy the appetite
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