Keto made easy

Beginner Keto Questions Answered: Keto Is Low Carb, Not High Fat

2017-07-31

This is the longest early video on the channel, 57 minutes, live. I introduced myself as a random guy in about my third week of keto, reading a lot about it for health reasons, and wanting to answer forum questions simply because beginners were drowning in information.

In this video

The line that holds up: "the goal is not high fat, it's low carb"

If I had to keep one sentence from the first year of the channel, it's this one. Beginners were being told to hit a fat percentage, and some were forcing down fat they didn't want. My point was that the 70% fat figure is where you end up after carbs are cut and protein is in, not a target to chase.

I was already saying I ate 70% fat of what I ate, about 700 calories, not the 1,400 my targets suggested, because I wasn't hungry (video cTGYIFOTPl8). A month later that became a whole video telling people to stop pushing fat in the weight-loss phase (video NUJNFG6lLWw).

The claim worth unpacking: the protein ceiling

I said an adult male liver can safely process something like 220 g of protein before urea builds up, and used that to explain why keto can't be low carb, high protein. That number came from my reading at the time, and none of the evidence pages confirms a 220 g limit.

What the pages do say is reassuring for normal intakes. EFSA describes intakes up to about twice its reference (0.83 g/kg/day) as regularly eaten and considered safe (EFSA 2012). Across 28 studies, higher protein (≥1.5 g/kg/day or ≥100 g/day) did not change kidney filtration differently in adults without kidney disease (Devries 2018). The ISSN even discusses more than 3.0 g/kg/day for resistance-trained people (ISSN 2017).

So the ceiling exists in the sense that you can't live on protein alone, but it sits far above anything a beginner eats. By 2018 I was saying the community had a huge, inappropriate fear of protein (video UygKGoP_BtA). If you have kidney disease, the Devries finding doesn't apply to you; protein is a doctor conversation.

The claim I can't back up: the calorie-counting study

I described studies where telling low-carb groups to count calories made no difference, but it did for low-fat groups. I didn't name the study in the video, and none of the evidence pages holds a trial designed that way. So treat it as unverified.

The closest thing on the pages is DIETFITS: 609 adults on healthy low-fat or healthy low-carb diets for a year lost 5.3 kg and 6.0 kg, not significantly different (Gardner 2018). My own experience in the video was that around day 18 I started running 500 to 1,000 calorie deficits without trying. That's one person, and I said so.

Then vs now

Carbs. Here I'd been under 20 g nearly every day since June 13. By 2018 my beginner number was 50 g total (video UygKGoP_BtA).

Fat. Here I said the "fat as a lever" idea didn't make sense to me. By 2018 fat was the variable I told people to move by phase (video UygKGoP_BtA).

Lipids. I said I'd read that about one in four people on low-carb, high-fat develop a blood-lipid problem. That figure isn't on the evidence pages. The National Lipid Association describes lower triglycerides, higher HDL and a variable effect on LDL (NLA 2019). The advice I gave, get a lipid panel, still holds.

Why I started: blood sugar

I didn't start for weight. My home readings were scoring pre-diabetic in the mornings, though my after-meal numbers were normal, and I linked it to a lifetime of high-carb eating, including a lot of soda as a kid (video cTGYIFOTPl8). By about day 27 my fasting numbers were trending down toward normal.

The ADA says cutting total carbohydrate has the most evidence for improving blood sugar (ADA 2019). If you're already on diabetes medication, that same effect is why you need your doctor involved before you start: doses that were right on a high-carb diet can be too much on keto.

Key points