Wednesday, November 03, 2021

what if I tried carnivore for a while?

In the low-carb world, there's Atkins, which begins with a two-week "ketosis" period (called "induction" by Atkins-heads). You eventually start to bring back some of the foods you cut out, including the carby stuff, within reason. Then there's keto, in which the Atkins induction phase is basically the whole diet (or lifestyle, as Atkins and keto people insist on saying). Finally, there's carnivore, which is keto on steroids, putting you at nearly zero grams of carbs per day while you eat almost nothing but meat (you can have limited dairy as well). With its nearly exclusive stress on animal flesh and fat, the carnivore diet is the polar opposite of veganism, but more and more experts are becoming convinced of the benefits that come from eating meat. On carnivore, you cut out pretty much all carbs, and the carbs you do consume come almost entirely from the small amounts found in meat.

I admit I've been having a hard time walking the fine line of eating only 50 grams of carbs per day (MyFitnessPal tells me I've had several days at 100+ grams of carbs). I'm thinking that, if my weigh-in this coming Sunday doesn't show much improvement, I might try carnivore for a while. This could get expensive, given that meat costs a pretty penny in Korea—especially beef and seafood (I've always found that ironic, given that I live on a peninsula, surrounded by seafood). Even chicken and pork are not exactly cheap here, compared to prices in America. But my menu would become more focused, meaning I'd save money by cutting out some extraneous foods, and it'd be easier to figure out what I can't or shouldn't eat. Right now, I'll grab an occasional yogurt, which is permissible on keto, and I'll gulp down a sugarless fruit Jell-O, which has very few calories but is rather sweet despite being sugar-free. And I think, if I'm honest, that I've been taking advantage of the perceived "wiggle room" in keto to eat things like nuts and other supposedly keto-friendly treats, perhaps to excess.

Carnivore might be the key, as long as I'm able to make sauces like chimichurri and pesto to keep the endless parade of proteins from becoming boring. I do love meat, but I also wonder whether a couple weeks of eating nothing but meat might make me sick of it (in which case, I might swing vegan!). I'm hoping that's not the case; I'll do more research into carnivore and see what's actually allowed on the diet.

Of course, you can't eat a limitless amount of meat on carnivore, any more than you can overconsume food while on keto, even if all the food is low-carb. So I'll continue to try to stick to about 2,000 calories per day if I do try the carnivore diet. That may also mean cutting out my beloved morning shakes, but hey, life is sometimes about making sacrifices. (Actually, see note below: it turns out you don't have to worry about portion control while on carnivore.)

More on this as the situation evolves. To be clear, I'm considering carnivore because it may represent a shortcut to cutting out carbs from my diet while leaving me pleasantly full through much of the day. Satiety is a huge issue for me, and sometimes, the veggies just don't cut it.

ADDENDUM: information on carnivore here, which is a good jumping-off point. Absolutely no veggies allowed. Damn, that's strict. At least I can eat hard cheeses (low in lactose) on the diet. Dr. Ken Berry provides a primer on the carnivore diet here. According to him, with carnivore done right, there's no calorie-counting and no portion control. Eat until comfortably stuffed. This sounds both awesome and scary to me because I love the philosophical simplicity of the diet, but I do worry about how a surfeit of protein and fat might make me sick of protein and fat. I may have to be like Dr. McCoy in "Star Trek III" and say, "I choose the danger."



3 comments:

John Mac said...

Good luck if you choose this course of action. It seems even more extreme than any of the others I've heard about. I guess what I liked about Atkins was there was some wiggle room. Then again, if you think you are wiggling too much to reach your objectives, carnivore is an option.

I totally agree with the being satiated part though. Feeling hungry is going to lead to eating too much and eating the wrong things. Not sure what you'd snack on during carnivore though.

Just like your hikes to Busan, I'm happy to follow along from a distance!

Kevin Kim said...

Aren't you up a little early?

John Mac said...

Yeah, the Hash puts me off schedule...I come home tired and drunk and it's only 7 pm. I wind up going to bed early and waking up at 3 instead of 4 am. Oh well, the morning hours are the best ones for me.