hello & and a lil' help

tsmagpi

Hi all, I found dietdoctor/lchf, and was happy to find this group here on fitnesspal. I'm one week in and I have a couple questions.
Yesterday I started putting my food in fitnesspal. I thought I had been doing pretty good, but my carbs ended up really high (I think).

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/food/diary/tsmagpi?date=2014-07-24

Most of it from cabbage and onion. Should I avoid those foods, especially in the beginning? Or maybe those numbers aren't so high? I'm not sure.

Also any thoughts on cinnamon? I had read that it actually helps your gluclose/insulin levels, but after using it, I see it has carbs as well.

Flaxseed meal as well? That has carbs as well, but I read the fiber and other things are good for you.



Thanks

radiii

So in general to make sure you're aware, you want to be counting "net carbs", which is actually total carbs minus fiber. Your flaxseed has 5g carbs, but 4 of them are fiber, so that only counts as 1g net carbs, which is perfecty fine. For the day you had 54g total carbs, but 17g fiber, so your actual carb count was 37 grams. So that's high given most ketoers are aiming to stay under 20 or 25 grams.

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/food/diary/tsmagpi?date=2014-07-24

Most of it from cabbage and onion. Should I avoid those foods, especially in the beginning? Or maybe those numbers aren't so high? I'm not sure.

Onions are a bit high in carbs, yeah. I'll put a small amount on a burger and not worry about it at all, but once you get up into the 1 cup range as you can see from your log it gets really significant. Even 1/4 cup is still going to be about 4 net carbs, which is more than I want out of a more minor ingredient like that, so I'm talking about a *significantly* smaller amount here

I wouldn't worry much about the cabbage. Three cups is a good sized serving of cabbage and that's still only 9g net carbs. I think if you get a small amount of carbs here and there from random things like you did in your breakfast, and then half of your carbs come from green leafy veggies, you're in good shape.

Also any thoughts on cinnamon? I had read that it actually helps your gluclose/insulin levels, but after using it, I see it has carbs as well.

Its not something I use so no personal experience, but I wouldn't worry about the carbs there either until you're looking at really big quantities of it. 2 teaspoons of cinnamon is a lot of cinnamon and only has 2g net carbs.


Basically, your day was 37g net carbs, if you cut out the onion you'd be at 23, which is just fine most days for most people.

tsmagpi

thank you sir, great info.

Leonidas_meets_Spartacus

For first 2-3 weeks stay away from onions, eat green veggies with fiber. After the initial period you can add back onions.

sljohnson1207

Here is a free tool available on the Atkins website:

http://www.atkins.com/AtkinsDotCom/media/Master/1405AtkinsCarbCounter.pdf

This will let you know how many net carbs are in certain vegetables. Go to page 54 and look at the list of foundation vegetables. These are the veggies with the lowest net carbs and are recommended in Phase 1 (Induction), which helps you go into ketosis and get keto-adapted. Some folks take longer than 2 weeks to become keto adapted, and some folks stay in Phase 1 for longer than 2 weeks, esp. if they have a lot of weight to lose, or are very carb sensitive.

And like the other poster said, you count Net carbs (carbs - fiber = net carbs).

I find weighing food is more accurate, but if you want to use measuring cups, the Atkins carb counter is a great tool, and it's FREE.

croooz

I agree with sljohnson1207 about weighing food. I'm also one of the ones who extended the Induction phase. Well I modified it in that I am very strict Mon-Fri and then loosen things up on the weekends. I'm trying to do six of being strict but it just seems five is where I'm at. By strict I mean keeping calories low not carbs, I keep carbs low regardless of calorie count. More than 20g and I'm not happy about that.

I would recommend that you become very strict/disciplined until you reach ketosis. Buy some type of monitor to know that you're in ketosis and then you can make small adjustments to see how tolerant you are to extra carbs and protein.