Vegetarian keto

We’ve all heard of the keto diet, it’s one of the top googled diets and you can’t go into a supplement store without being bombarded by keto products. Once thought of as a fad, it seems keto is here to stay. But a new twist on the diet reveals that some are now exploring keto in a vegetarian format, based on all the hype around plant-based eating. So is this a ‘healthier’ keto diet and is it something worth trying? Here are my thoughts.

Keto diets are hard enough as they are. The strictness of a keto diet in terms of the carb:fat ratio means that keto is difficult to maintain. There are also nasty side effects like the keto flu, bad breath and constipation, which is your body’s way of telling you that something ain’t right. If you’re a meat lover than cutting out meat is going to add to the complexity of this already challenging diet.
Vegetarian diets are naturally higher in carbohydrates, so to find nutritional balance plus enjoyment on a vegetarian keto diet would be very hard to achieve. For example, many nutrient rich foods like whole grains and legumes contain carbohydrates, which means these foods would have to be limited. Just like following the regular keto diet, you’d need to be extremely rigid with your food choices, counting every carb, and as a result it would be easy to fall into an unhealthy pattern of restrictive eating.
A positive is that you’d be swapping out animal fats (high in saturated fat) for nourishing fats like avocados, nuts and olive oil, which would be a positive for your heart health and cholesterol management. Coconut oil in large amounts is one to be careful of as it’s high in saturated fat, even though it’s plant based.
Diets only last as long as you stick with them. You might feel amazing getting large amounts of weight loss on a keto diet quickly, but what happens when you decide to have a few pints on a Friday night followed by a greasy burger? Your body is pretty good at regulating itself, so soon enough you’ll have chucked on more weight than you lost, plus interest.

Bottom line: Vegetarian diets are some of the healthiest diets in the world. Being plant based, they’re rich in antioxidants, vitamins and minerals, as well as dietary fibre which we need for gut health. Following any kind of keto diet can put you at risk of developing an unhealthy relationship with food and increase the risk of nutrient deficiencies. My advice? Skip keto altogether. If you want to lose a few new year kilos, try a well balanced vegetarian diet and see an Accredited Practising Dietitian (dietitiansaustralia.org.au) who can support your health and wellbeing goals.

This article was first published in Fitness First Magazine and has been reproduced with permission.