Carbohydrate-free diet
Content:
- Products for a carbohydrate-free diet
- Carbohydrate Diet Chart
- Carbohydrate Diet Recipes
- Carbohydrate-free diet and bodybuilding
- The harm of a carbohydrate-free diet
- Reviews and results of a carbohydrate-free diet
What can you eat with a carbohydrate-free diet?
The name of the diet speaks for itself, but its principle is not based on the radical exclusion of carbohydrates, but on their minimum content in the diet. A complete rejection of carbohydrates threatens with serious metabolic disorders in the body. Therefore, using a carbohydrate-free diet, you just need to control the consumption of sugar and starch, that is, observe the rule - carbohydrates are allowed, but in an amount of no more than 100-250 g per day.
Carbohydrate products, for the most part, have a high nutritional value, therefore, a decrease in their share in the diet leads to a decrease in the total calorie content of the menu. For a sedentary person, this is especially important, since lack of movement and low energy consumption leads to the accumulation of fat in the body. Once in the digestive system, carbohydrates are broken down, the blood is saturated with glucose, after which insulin is released, and the blood sugar level drops. A person begins to feel hunger and the need for a new portion of sweet food.
Carbohydrates are the main supplier of energy to the body, and when they are lacking, human strength is restored through the processing of fats. First of all, starch of animal origin (glycogen), accumulated in muscles and liver, is consumed, and then directly adipose tissue. This is how weight loss happens, which is the goal of any diet.
A few basic rules of a carbohydrate-free diet:
- do not drink for thirty minutes after eating;
- fry food exclusively in vegetable oil;
- consume most of the food boiled or stewed;
- observe the principle of fractional nutrition (five meals a day);
- drink up to two liters of water per day;
- go in for sports (as a mandatory addition to the diet);
- do not eat after eight o'clock in the evening.
When using a carbohydrate-free diet, there is practically no restriction on the use of protein products, but they should be low in fat. When composing your diet, pay special attention to green and white vegetables, fresh herbs, sour berries and citrus fruits. You can prepare salads from them and use them in large quantities.
Nutrition with a carbohydrate-free diet is quite varied, but it is necessary to abandon flour products, cereals, sweets in any form, fatty dairy products, alcohol. Only black or rye bread is allowed. However, given the severity of the diet, consult your doctor before starting it, then compliance with all the rules and restricting carbohydrates in the diet will help you get rid of 6-10 kilograms of excess weight in just a couple of weeks.
Products for a carbohydrate-free diet
When applying such a diet, it is important to monitor the carbohydrate content of the food consumed.
Remember - the proportion of carbohydrates in the diet should not exceed 250 grams per day, so the composition of each dish is of great importance. When planning your menu, use the table showing the carbohydrate content of foods. Eggs, poultry, meat (beef, pork), fish, cheese and cottage cheese should prevail on the table. Add salads and soups from vegetables and herbs to the menu. For dessert, you can pamper yourself with berries and citrus fruits. Pastry products are allowed only in the form of rye bread.
If you want to get the result from the diet - limit or remove from the diet pasta, potatoes, cereals, honey, sugar, jam, fatty yoghurts and curd masses, all alcoholic beverages, seeds and nuts, sweet fruits. If you reduce carbohydrate intake to a minimum, the body rebuilds its work, appetite decreases and normal performance returns.
Carbohydrate Diet Chart
In order to correctly compose the menu, you need to know how many carbohydrates the product you need contains. The basic rule of the diet is a limited amount of carbohydrates per day. A table with a clear indication of the carbohydrate content will help in the selection of food products.
| Product / Dish per 100 g | Amount of carbohydrates (in grams) | |
| Seafood, fish | Smoked salmon | |
| Smoked herring | ||
| Salted herring | ||
| Shrimp | ||
| Squid | ||
| Boiled fish | ||
|
Dairy products |
Cottage cheese | |
| Sour cream | five | |
| Kefir, unsweetened yogurt | five | |
| Various types of cheese | 0.5-2 | |
| Milk | 2.4 | |
| Eggs | Regardless of the cooking method | 0.5 |
| Fats | Butter | five |
| Vegetable oil | ||
| Margarine | five | |
| Mayonnaise | five | |
| Vegetables | Carrot | five |
| Canned tomato | ||
| Pickle | ||
| Fresh tomato | ||
| Fresh cucumber | ||
| Eggplant | ||
| Onions (1 pc.) | eight | |
| Green onions (1 tbsp.) | five | |
| Zucchini | ||
| Radish | 0.5 | |
| Beets (1 pc.) | ||
| Mushrooms | five | |
| Green beans | eight | |
| Boiled cauliflower | ||
| Fresh white cabbage | five | |
| Sauerkraut | ||
| Nuts | Peanuts (2 tbsp. L.) | 1.8 |
| Hazelnuts (2 tbsp. L.) | 1.2 | |
| Almonds (100 g) | eleven | |
| Cedar (2 tbsp. L.) | 1.7 | |
| Fruit (1 piece) | Apricot | |
| Plum | eight | |
| Lemon, tangerine | ||
| Apple | 18 | |
| Orange | 17 | |
| Pear | 25 | |
| Kiwi, peach | nine | |
| Berries | Cranberries (1 glass) | eight |
| Cherry | sixteen | |
| Blueberry | 21 | |
| Raspberry | 17 | |
| Black currant | nineteen | |
| Juices | Apple, tomato, grape | |
| Meat | Steak | |
| Meat fried in breadcrumbs | five | |
| Meat with flour sauce | ||
| Boiled meat | ||
| Sausages, ham, sausage | ||
| Boiled chicken | ||
| Pork goulash | nine | |
| Veal goulash | ||
| Beef stew | five | |
| Beef liver | ||
| Chop | ||
Please note that the menu for each day should be divided into five meals. With fractional meals, there is no feeling of hunger. A large amount of protein is included in the diet, so muscle tissue is not destroyed in a person, and fatty tissue is burned even in a relaxed state. The low carbohydrate content of the menu causes the body to release into the blood special substances (ketones) that can have toxic effects, so a carbohydrate-free diet is contraindicated for people with liver and kidney dysfunctions.
Carbohydrate Diet Recipes
The stuffed cabbage rolls are lazy. Ingredients: white cabbage - 200 g; chicken fillet - 700 g; salt.
Chop the white cabbage and pour boiling water over for five minutes. Prepare minced chicken fillet, lightly salt it. Remove the cabbage from the water, combine with the minced meat, form cutlets similar to stuffed cabbage with wet hands. Fry them lightly on both sides, add water and simmer for 20 minutes until tender.
Chicken stuffed with mushrooms. Ingredients: chicken - 1.2 kg; champignons - 350 g; onions - 100 g; garlic - 10 g; vegetable oil - 3 tbsp. l., salt.
Cut and fry the onion and mushrooms in a pan, season with salt and lightly simmer. Stuff the chicken with a mixture of onions and mushrooms, sew it up with threads. Crush the garlic, mix with salt. Put the chicken coated with the garlic mixture in a baking bag and put in the oven for an hour and a half.
Nut cookies. Ingredients: hazelnuts - 75 g; almonds - 75 g; egg whites - 5 pieces; sweetener - 15 tablets; salt and lemon juice.
Fry and grind the nuts in a coffee grinder. Whisk the proteins and sweetener with salt and lemon juice. Mix nuts and whites gently. Put the resulting mass on a baking sheet with a spoon. Bake for one hour at 150 ° C.
Multi-layered herring salad. Ingredients: lightly salted herring (fillet) - 100 g; onions - 25 g; mayonnaise - 90 g; green apple - 100 g; hard cheese - 50 g; boiled egg - 1 piece.
Finely chop all the ingredients and put them on a plate in layers in the following sequence: herring, onion, mayonnaise, apple, mayonnaise, cheese, mayonnaise, egg.
Chicken cabbage soup. Ingredients: chicken fillet - 300 g, water - 1.5 l, onion - 50 g, carrots - 100 g, cabbage - 200 g, tomatoes - two, herbs and salt.
Cook the chicken fillet broth, remove from the pan and chop finely. Grate the carrots, chop the onion, fry them a little, simmer with the chopped tomatoes. Season the broth with the vegetable mixture, add chopped cabbage and chicken fillet there. Cook until tender, season with herbs at the end.
Meat stew with vegetables. Ingredients: pork - 400 g, onions - 70 g, garlic - 10 g, carrots - 50 g, white cabbage - 650 g, mayonnaise - 40 g, water - 0.5 l, salt, pepper, dried herbs.
Cut the meat into pieces, cut the onion into half rings, cut the carrot into cubes, and cut the garlic into circles. Put everything on a deep baking sheet, lightly salt and pour with mayonnaise diluted with water. Place the baking sheet in a preheated oven for ten minutes. Add chopped cabbage to the meat. Pour out the rest of the water, mix everything and cook in the oven for another 40 minutes.
Carbohydrate-free diet and bodybuilding
The goal of bodybuilding fans is to have the minimum amount of subcutaneous fat and the most expressive muscles, and if it's simpler, then have a lean look. Regardless of nutrition, there are two general provisions. First, any diet aimed at burning fat requires reducing the number of calories in the diet. Second, the combination of diet and exercise will allow you to lose subcutaneous fat and build muscle. Without exercising, using only diet, a person will lose as much fat as muscle.
Considering the above requirements, a carbohydrate-free diet is ideal for bodybuilders. Weight loss implies a sharp restriction of carbohydrate intake (up to 30 g) five days a week and increasing their share on weekends. Thus, on low-carb days, there will be a minimal release of insulin, but other hormones (growth hormone and testosterone) will help mobilize fats and anabolic processes in the muscles. Carbohydrate loading over the weekend will replenish muscle glycogen stores.
The most optimal nutritional plan for achieving an athletic appearance is to gradually lose weight. The diet should be started 12 weeks before the competition. It is necessary to ensure that the weight loss is no more than 1 kg per week. To do this, it is necessary to reduce the calorie content of the daily diet by 1000 units. Divide food into small portions and eat at least four times a day. Fractional nutrition maintains optimal blood sugar levels, suppresses hunger. For an athlete weighing 100 kg, the norm will be 3100 calories per day (taking into account sports activities).
Drinking water is an important part of any diet. The body needs it in order to remove metabolic products from it. With a lack of water and using a protein-free carbohydrate diet, fluid is retained in the body. This is a serious stress on the kidneys, but the more you drink water, the less it will stay in the body. During the diet, various toxins are released from the fat stores, and only plenty of drink can cope with them.
A carbohydrate-free diet requires an increased protein intake. Excess protein is converted into glucose by the liver, which has a beneficial effect on the nervous system and brain. Therefore, many athletes resort to high quality protein supplements containing casein and whey. They enrich the body with protein without unnecessary calories and carbohydrates. Carbohydrate-free diets of bodybuilders can hardly be called balanced, but ultra-low body fat suggests non-standard solutions, and this "drying" option always gives good results.
The harm of a carbohydrate-free diet
Our body is designed in such a way that under normal conditions it functions on a balanced combination of fats, carbohydrates and proteins. When using a carbohydrate-free diet, the amount of carbohydrates in the diet is significantly reduced and the body obtains energy from free fatty acids, i.e. from subcutaneous fat. The brain and nervous system cannot work on such energy, they replace carbohydrates with ketone bodies, which the liver produces from the same free fatty acids.
Analysis of reviews on a carbohydrate-free diet allows us to conclude that this method of losing weight is quite effective, it contributes to rapid weight loss. However, in some cases, there is a worsening of the condition in the form of dizziness, headache, weakness and drowsiness. Although, it is difficult to find a diet that does not have the above symptoms.
The diet is difficult enough for the body. Fasting is easier for many people than limiting carbohydrate intake. High-protein foods overload the liver and kidneys with metabolic products. Lack of carbohydrates leads to the formation of ketones and, as a result, adversely affects the kidneys, brain, liver. During a carbohydrate-free diet, the body does not receive enough vitamins, minerals, fiber, which are present in large quantities in carbohydrate foods.
Diseases of the kidneys, intestines, stomach, liver, heart, blood vessels exclude the use of a carbohydrate-free diet. Pregnant and lactating women should also avoid this diet. A doctor's consultation will be an important preparatory step before starting the weight loss process, this will help eliminate possible complications and exacerbations. If there are no contraindications, try a carbohydrate-free diet for yourself and form your opinion about it.
Reviews and results of a carbohydrate-free diet
Alexander. A carbohydrate-free diet begins to work in a week, in the first days, water is removed from the body, not fat. In fact, 500-600 g of fat are lost per week. And you also need to drink plenty of water.
Olga. For nine days I sat on a carbohydrate-free diet and a guard - plus 2 kg. There are only 20-30 grams of carbohydrates a day, maybe I eat a lot of fried foods?
Julia. To begin with, I studied in detail all the information about this diet, in two weeks I lost 10 kg, the most important thing is to forget about potatoes, cereals, sweet fruits, alcohol and fatty foods. The result appeared after three days (apparently, the body was rebuilding). After the diet, I eat everything, but I do not abuse it.
Eugene. I sat on a carbohydrate-free diet for 2.5 months. For the first month it took 7 kg and that's it, the weight stopped. I don't want any diets anymore, I will lose weight with the help of a rational healthy diet and sports.
The author of the article: Kuzmina Vera Valerievna | Endocrinologist, nutritionist
Education: Diploma of the Russian State Medical University named after NI Pirogov with a degree in General Medicine (2004). Residency at Moscow State University of Medicine and Dentistry, diploma in Endocrinology (2006).
