Trouble keeping carbs down.

Spicey_74

Any recommendations on how to keep my carbs at 90 or less. Already not eating any breads, pasta, potatoes, rice etc. I would really appreciate any suggestions.

Mark031111

Load up on veggies, lean proteins, and watch those fruit portions. Reading labels and planning meals can really help you stay under 90 carbs. Keep it up!

jachouston

Fruit can be really sneak up, you think your doing so good! Just not right! When your given a bunch of mangos 🥭

AnnPT77

Why are you trying to keep your carbs at 90 or fewer? If you're insulin resistant, diabetic, or something like that, managing your carbs can be important.

For the rest of us, it's more important to focus on calories, protein, fats, fiber, and micronutrients. Protein and fats are "essential nutrients", in the technical sense that our bodies can't manufacture them out of anything else, so we need to eat some.

If 90 is your MFP carb goal, and you're always over, but you're hitting your calorie goal, good odds that you're under on something more important, probably protein, but possibly fats. If so, instead of trying to reduce carbs, focus on increasing whatever you're short on, while maintaining your calorie goal. That will eventually drive down your carb intake, but more importantly, get you closer to optimal overall nutrition.

Unless you have a relevant health condition, focusing on reducing carbs doesn't necessarily accomplish anything.

If your goal is weight loss, the big direct factor is calories. Nutrition (including adequate protein and fats) can have an indirect effect on weight loss. If we have sub-par nutrition, we may get fatigued, move less, and burn fewer calories than expected. If we have sub-par nutrition, that may trigger cravings - not necessarily cravings for what we're short on! - and make it hard to stick with a sensible calorie goal. Calories are still the direct influence on fat gain/loss.

If it's not an "always" thing, it's fine if your macros end up close to you goals on average over a few days to a week. We don't need to be exactly exact on macros ever, close on average is fine.

Jthanmyfitnesspal

@AnnPT77 is asking the important question: "Why very low carbs?" There are some good reasons to do this, but there are also consequences. Many people (such as me) don't feel well when eating very low carbs. All restrictive diets will limit carbs to some extent just because they limit calories, and you want to balance them out between protein, fats, and carbs.

I will add that 90g of carb has about 360kCals. for a ~1500kcal total daily weight-loss plan, this is a pretty good target. It allows you to have oatmeal and berries for breakfast, for example.

neanderthin

Wonder why someone would need to reduce carbs, lets get 221B barker street involved, there must be a logical reason and one we haven't heard before, oh wait, it's one of the most common questions on this site, but hey you never know, it just might be a healthy normal weight person asking out of curiosity.

DFW_Tom

neanderthin wrote: »

Wonder why someone would need to reduce carbs, lets get 221B barker street involved, there must be a logical reason and one we haven't heard before, oh wait, it's one of the most common questions on this site, but hey you never know, it just might be a healthy normal weight person asking out of curiosity.

lol, Is Dr. Watson the type of doc that would suggest lowering carbs? Here is a short clip with him deciding what and what not to eat. Doesn't mention carbs per se, but does include violence:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=0Q2hN1BKWIQ

neanderthin

DFW_Tom wrote: »

neanderthin wrote: »

Wonder why someone would need to reduce carbs, lets get 221B barker street involved, there must be a logical reason and one we haven't heard before, oh wait, it's one of the most common questions on this site, but hey you never know, it just might be a healthy normal weight person asking out of curiosity.

lol, Is Dr. Watson the type of doc that would suggest lowering carbs? Here is a short clip with him deciding what and what not to eat. Doesn't mention carbs per se, but does include violence:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=0Q2hN1BKWIQ

Yeah, one of the better series of that genre and the best version of Dr. Watson.

kshama2001

neanderthin wrote: »

Wonder why someone would need to reduce carbs, lets get 221B barker street involved, there must be a logical reason and one we haven't heard before, oh wait, it's one of the most common questions on this site, but hey you never know, it just might be a healthy normal weight person asking out of curiosity.

I have different answers depending on the Why:

1. If per doctor's instructions, I suggest a referral to a dietitian and want to kick the doctor for giving a goal with no instructions on how to reach that goal. I also want to know if it is because of a medical condition or if the doctor just suggested it as a means to create a calorie deficit.
2. However, from the many posts on the subject, it's clear that as in the 90's FAT IS EVIL message social media is now barraging viewers with the message that one can only lose weight by reducing carbs. In that case, I think it's helpful to debunk that and have a discussion about satiety, and how that is individual.

kshama2001

To expand on my answer above, my mother is one of the healthiest eaters I know. She eats tons of vegetables, whole grains, legumes, fruit, healthy fat, and lean protein. Yet, because of "Is Sugar Toxic?"-like article in the NY Times, she is concerned with her (almost non-existent) consumption of added sugar.

Also, she struggles to get enough calories to stay above Underweight. She could use more fat and sugar, lol.

tomcustombuilder

Too many people watch Youtube videos and read articles that carbs are bad and cause fat gain put out by people like Gary Taubes, etc.

Unless there is a medical condition there is no reason to keep carbs that low unless the person just doesn’t like carbs. Someone that is on a very low cal diet will need to keep protein up as well as good fats and carbs will be the macro to be reduced to a point to hit the calorie goal.

Under normal circumstances major carb restriction isn’t necessary.

neanderthin

kshama2001 wrote: »

To expand on my answer above, my mother is one of the healthiest eaters I know. She eats tons of vegetables, whole grains, legumes, fruit, healthy fat, and lean protein. Yet, because of "Is Sugar Toxic?"-like article in the NY Times, she is concerned with her (almost non-existent) consumption of added sugar.

Also, she struggles to get enough calories to stay above Underweight. She could use more fat and sugar, lol.

The funny thing is fat has never been unhealthy and sugar is "toxic" and of course context and dosage applies here and I can't really overstate that too much. Social media and main stream media have flipped their talking points around because of this simple fact that has been borne out with research, especially in the last decade, which should have been debated more 50 years ago more concisely when we could have resolved this issue properly without politics and corporate interference that have confused a nation for over 50 years which includes your mom. People think in extremes, it's normal when there's dogma to protect and I'm not saying all fat is good and I'm not saying all sugar is bad, what I'm saying is the ground work that has been played out has created the situation all Americans fine themselves in and now is spreading to the rest of the world that follows that SAD dietary lead which started with the low fat high carb era. This probably doesn't make much sense but nevertheless, this is the position I hold in this conversation and I'm positive not very well accepted lol.

toolzz

neanderthin wrote: »

Wonder why someone would need to reduce carbs, lets get 221B barker street involved, there must be a logical reason and one we haven't heard before, oh wait, it's one of the most common questions on this site, but hey you never know, it just might be a healthy normal weight person asking out of curiosity.

...I'm sorry but it's really bugging me..it's BAKER St.

thank you.

neanderthin

toolzz wrote: »

neanderthin wrote: »

Wonder why someone would need to reduce carbs, lets get 221B barker street involved, there must be a logical reason and one we haven't heard before, oh wait, it's one of the most common questions on this site, but hey you never know, it just might be a healthy normal weight person asking out of curiosity.

...I'm sorry but it's really bugging me..it's BAKER St.

thank you.

Haha I realized that after the time expired and I couldn't fix it. Thanks and I'm glad it bugged you too.

kshama2001

neanderthin wrote: »

kshama2001 wrote: »

To expand on my answer above, my mother is one of the healthiest eaters I know. She eats tons of vegetables, whole grains, legumes, fruit, healthy fat, and lean protein. Yet, because of "Is Sugar Toxic?"-like article in the NY Times, she is concerned with her (almost non-existent) consumption of added sugar.

Also, she struggles to get enough calories to stay above Underweight. She could use more fat and sugar, lol.

The funny thing is fat has never been unhealthy and sugar is "toxic" and of course context and dosage applies here and I can't really overstate that too much. Social media and main stream media have flipped their talking points around because of this simple fact that has been borne out with research, especially in the last decade, which should have been debated more 50 years ago more concisely when we could have resolved this issue properly without politics and corporate interference that have confused a nation for over 50 years which includes your mom. People think in extremes, it's normal when there's dogma to protect and I'm not saying all fat is good and I'm not saying all sugar is bad, what I'm saying is the ground work that has been played out has created the situation all Americans fine themselves in and now is spreading to the rest of the world that follows that SAD dietary lead which started with the low fat high carb era. This probably doesn't make much sense but nevertheless, this is the position I hold in this conversation and I'm positive not very well accepted lol.

I get what you're saying, but must point out, as it isn't obvious in your post, that SAD (Standard American Diet; now Western Pattern Diet) is not US government recommendations, it is how people actually ate DESPITE government recommendations. Yes, the US recommended reducing fat. But it did not say, "And you may eat unlimited Snackwells," which was, sadly, the takeaway from the "reduce fat" message.

And "minimal intake of fruits, vegetables, fish, legumes, and whole grains" was never recommended.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_pattern_diet

neanderthin

kshama2001 wrote: »

neanderthin wrote: »

kshama2001 wrote: »

To expand on my answer above, my mother is one of the healthiest eaters I know. She eats tons of vegetables, whole grains, legumes, fruit, healthy fat, and lean protein. Yet, because of "Is Sugar Toxic?"-like article in the NY Times, she is concerned with her (almost non-existent) consumption of added sugar.

Also, she struggles to get enough calories to stay above Underweight. She could use more fat and sugar, lol.

The funny thing is fat has never been unhealthy and sugar is "toxic" and of course context and dosage applies here and I can't really overstate that too much. Social media and main stream media have flipped their talking points around because of this simple fact that has been borne out with research, especially in the last decade, which should have been debated more 50 years ago more concisely when we could have resolved this issue properly without politics and corporate interference that have confused a nation for over 50 years which includes your mom. People think in extremes, it's normal when there's dogma to protect and I'm not saying all fat is good and I'm not saying all sugar is bad, what I'm saying is the ground work that has been played out has created the situation all Americans fine themselves in and now is spreading to the rest of the world that follows that SAD dietary lead which started with the low fat high carb era. This probably doesn't make much sense but nevertheless, this is the position I hold in this conversation and I'm positive not very well accepted lol.

I get what you're saying, but must point out, as it isn't obvious in your post, that SAD (Standard American Diet; now Western Pattern Diet) is not US government recommendations, it is how people actually ate DESPITE government recommendations. Yes, the US recommended reducing fat. But it did not say, "And you may eat unlimited Snackwells," which was, sadly, the takeaway from the "reduce fat" message.

And "minimal intake of fruits, vegetables, fish, legumes, and whole grains" was never recommended.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_pattern_diet

Yeah, the SAD diet is just a "free living" diet people consume based on food availability that is permitted by law, period.

Broccoli for example is expensive, has a short shelf life, offers little in way of calories and while it has nutrition it's in small amounts. Snackwells on the other hand have either more or better essential micronutrients than broccoli because refine grains are enriched with thiamin, riboflavin, and niacin and also contributes to a better cost analysis especially on a per calorie basis, is shelf stable, less wastage and snackwells are fat free, have no cholesterol and low in sodium, what more could you ask for in a 90's era big bang for the buck food item. Of course I'm kidding but that was the reality then and I'm old enough to remember. In Canada the gov't needed to get on national television (no internet) to try and explain the saturated fat and cholesterol was ok to eat in shellfish and fish in general and was a different saturated fat and cholesterol than what was in red meat.

neanderthin

kshama2001 wrote: »

2. However, from the many posts on the subject, it's clear that as in the 90's FAT IS EVIL message social media is now barraging viewers with the message that one can only lose weight by reducing carbs. In that case, I think it's helpful to debunk that and have a discussion about satiety, and how that is individual.

Reducing certain carbohydrates does increase satiety for the vast majority, so debunking and telling people it's not happening isn't going to work nor is it a truthful statement, but yes there's many other options that will allow people to lose weight and in that context your right. The mechanism for that isn't so much about the carbs per se but how a low carb diet compares with the diet of the vast majority that are overweight and have the many health issues associated with the actual foods people are eating, and in that context it is the SAD diet. Greed and profit from the food industrial complex has now in a big way embraced low "low carb" and are pumping out more processed foods under the guise of healthy, but they can't help it, it's what they do, make money and show shareholder value. Again a low carb diet is for all intense and purpose a whole food diet, so by default almost all processed foods including UPF are eliminated. The mechanism that is pulled for low carb to increase satiety are hormones and specifically leptin and ghrelin which is exactly why GLP-1 medications work.

The problem with low carb and people embracing it is, basically the dogma that has been levied against it even though it's a whole food diet that meat is bad because it has certain nutrients that everyone has been told will kill and of course we can't forget cow belching. Were whole grains, beans, legumes, vegetables seen as the default replacements for meat but with the result totally blindsiding everyone which was even evident 50 years ago so blindsided for 50 years is probably a stretch, why, because cake and cookies. Refined carbohydrates which the USDA said shouldn't exceed 50% by volume of total grain consumption is just another way to say, your going to be eating more sugar, so don't add too much free added sugar too your diet, great, and with half the US population with insulin resistance thanks for that fabulous advice.

The fat is evil message is still alive and well when it comes to the USDA and the dietary guidelines, nothing has changed in over 60 years and actually has promoted a diet where less animal produces are consumed and if someone needs to consume them they should be from lean animals and if you need to consume dairy, it should come from low fat or ideally no fat options. People are eating less beef (35% less) and consuming less saturated fat and cholesterol but consequently the fat that is prominent in the SAD diet are coming mostly from seed oils that are high in omega 6's with an imbalance that is pro inflammatory, not what we want to happen and that's a consequence where the fix is to add omega 3's in some of those highly processed foods, right, lol. Anyway just thought I'd address this part of your post, but again this is just my opinion.

jessalittlemore

Lots of discussion on the why here, I'm just going to stick to the question.

I do low-carb. My net carbs are usually around 70-100g. Today I was 91g net carbs.

- I drink water or unsweetened tea, no drinks with calories or sugars.
- I don't eat fruits generally but it's not a hard line, I'll make room for the occasional fruit.
- Beans and lentils are my choice starches because of the high protein and fiber content. I don't eat corn, rice, potatoes or sweet potatoes.
- Primary veggies are green veggies. I also eat carrots and onions.
- I don't eat wheat products or baked goods aside from a high-fiber, high-protein seeded keto bread.

Some good low-carb snacks are pepitas/pumpkin seeds, nuts, carrots, kimchi and string cheese.

If you're having trouble hitting that goal consider rather than cutting foods, just changing up your portions. Have less of the carby part of a meal and compensate with a little more meat, fat and green veggies.