LCHF — but not Keto

[RaggedClown]

I'd never heard of LCHF as a diet until I joined this group but, when it was time for me to start losing weight, it seemed obvious to me that I should be cutting down on carbs. It was easy to eliminate potatoes, rice & pasta. I've never been interested in sweets or cakes and I was only eating bread out of habit.

The lessons I learned in this group gave me permission to eat all the eggs, cheese, olive oil and cream that I like and before I knew it, I was eating low(ish) carbs and high(ish) fat. But I've never been interested in getting into ketosis.

So, here's my question: Is there a meaningful difference between LCHF and Keto?

Is everyone here doing Keto, but calling it LCHF?

Anyone else just trying to eat less carbs without trying to get into ketosis?

[Subtle_badger]

Well, keto is a LCHF diet, but not the only one.

I for one may be in ketosis or not, I'm not measuring it, and it's not what I am striving for.

Some of us are peeing on stix, so some are on a keto diet.

There is also some people still eating (lower carb) bread, so they will be way of ketosis.

I think it is a broad church.

[Gizmocat]

I had never heard of LCHF either until I joined this forum. I was diagnosed prediabetic and high BP in summer 2018. I started by calorie counting and did lose weight but reading around here posts by TheAwfulToad and other knowledgeable people made me realise that I was still eating too many carbs to reduce my blood sugars I needed to cut out the carbs.

I am not and never have been keto. Like you I cut out pasta,rice, bread and potatoes. I also cut out junk food and all sugary stuff. My blood sugars are now normal and I no longer need BP meds.

As I understand from the above mentioned posts keto is very low carb, less than 20g per day. Most people only do that as induction for about 2 weeks as it is very restrictive but it can help a lot of weight very quickly. Most people who are on LCHF do same as us after induction but may still refer to it as keto.

Have you seen the dietdoctor website. There is lots of information about keto and low/medium carb on there.

[19sunflower]

Hi Ragged Clown, that would be me I think. Literally just knocked refined carbs on the head and mainly cut out all the superfluous snacks. I'm easing myself in gently with the notion of LCHF but I've certainly been allowing myself some cheese, a whirl of cream in home made soups and Greek Yoghurt.No more low fat products in my house! I'm like so many people who can't quite believe their luck to have found this site with all this info🎉🎉

[Aussie64]

I try to keep carbs about 50 or below, so basically cut out all junk food, packet and most tinned except tuna, and refined carbs... Lots of above ground veg, meat, chook, fish, eggs, and best of all glorious cheese.... It's basically what my grandparents would have eaten I suppose, I can't bring myself to eat fat on meat though and still trim it, it makes me feel nauseous, and I too threw out all the low fat (high sugar) products, I eat Berries with seeds and Yoghurt few times a week too.... I didn't do a proper induction but am going to try to do the odd week here and there as low as I can go, try for 20gms, because I'm a shift worker every 2nd week I can't do IF but trying to do 16:8 when I can, hoping to get down to 18:6, I am not making hard and fast rules, kind of learning from here and winging it a bit.... Pre planning and logging really helps me.

[RaggedClown in reply to Aussie64]

S'funny. I can't every remember the last time I opened a packet or tin!

[Hidden]

I oscillate between 30-100g of carbs a day ish. Some days I am keto (I found it quite a laugh weeing on the testing sticks to get pink colours at first), & ketones showed up in a recent blood test, and some days I eat half a massive roasted butternut squash so no ketosis. And I ate a piece of spelt toast yesterday because I was too ill to do more food prep (just a bad cold). But I am visibly losing from my body & I no longer have any cravings to eat rubbish, so that’s success. When spring comes I’ll try a long cycle ride to see if reduced carbs have helped my arthritic knees. If not, I’ll then have to make a decision whether I want to do long distance cycling enough to cut back on carbs further.

[ChubbieChops]

Good questions, I'm wondering too