What is low carb?
A low carb meal is a meal that is lower in carbs – pretty straight forward but not really. For most low carb diets (and I don’t mean diet like crash diet but rather way of life), instead of just “lowering carbs” you also want to focus on lowering simple carbs that are high in sugar, and focus more on carbs that are complex carbs and those that have great amounts of fibre.
The standard “recommendation” for carbs is 300g a day. This lifestyle left my sluggish, tired and with high anxiety. Generally a low carb diet means eating 100g to 150g per day. I tend to stay below 100g on most days, sometimes carb cycling up to 150g on some days (maybe twice a week) to switch it up so I don’t get bored and my body doesn’t get used to it.
What is a low carb meal? How many carbs are in a low carb meal?
There is no specific definition of what a low carb meal is, but if we are aiming for 100g a day, then I believe it’s safe to say that a low carb is 20g of carbs or believe for a full serving. I’ve done a lot of research and bought a few low carb books and that seems to be the general consensus all across. With that in mind, there are so many amazing options that open up!
When choosing low carb meals, I like to ensure they have a good amount of healthy fats. The point isn’t to deprive our body of carbs, but to instead to give it another fuel source which would be our healthy fats. I promise, a healthy fats blog post is coming! Even better, a lot of these options include good fibre.
Usually on a lower carb way of eating you want to focus on fibre too. Carbs – fibre = net carbs which are the carbs you want to focus on when doing a lower carb diet since fibre is basically “all good” and doesn’t cause any insulin spikes. So for example, while some foods do have carbs (sweet potato) the fibre amount really balances it out, allowing you to still enjoy your favourite complex carbs. I never want my vegan diet to be restrictive in good for me things, so this is excellent!
Is Low Carb and Keto the same thing?
Low carb and Keto are not the same things. A low carb diet consists of daily consumption of 50 -150 grams of Carbohydrates. Keto consists of a diet that is 50 Carbohydrates or less daily. So that means that keto may be low carb but not all low carb recipes are keto. We focus on low carb recipes on this blog and sprinkle in some keto recipes here and there.
Are the recipes complicated?
We come from a background of Jessica in the Kitchen where we focus on creating recipes that are predominantly simple healthy and delicious. We aim to bring that same mindset to this site. So the short answer is no, the recipes are not complicated.
Why low carb?
There are several reasons why you might want to incorporate some low carb recipes. Maybe you’re trying to break your simple carb addiction, or it’s for your health or your doctor recommended it.
Personally, we felt that a low carb diet helped to improve our sleep, aid in significant and attainable weight loss, and to boost our metabolism and energy levels. We consulted our doctor before embarking on this lifestyle, and strongly recommend that you always consult your doctor before starting a low carb diet.
