LCHF for beginners

LCHF

First of all, what is lchf? 

Low carb and high fat. And that is exactly what it is. You eat low carb food and you eat a lot of fat. 

Here above we have some of the marvelous things that a LCHF diet includes of: 

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• Meat: Any type, including beef, pork, game meat, chicken etc. Do not cut and throw away the fat on the meat and eat the skin on the chicken.

• Fish and shellfish: Especially fatty  fish like salmon, mackerel and herring. 

• Eggs: boiled, fried, poached, omelettes

• Butter, coconut oil, olive oil

• Vegetables that grow above the ground: all kinds of cabbage, asparagus, zucchini, eggplant, olives, spinach, mushrooms, lettuce, cucumber,avocado, peppers, tomatoes etc.

• Dairy products: always HIGH FAT option like butter (margarine is NOT allowed), cream, sour cream, Greek/turkish yogurt, cheese. Avoid lowfat and flavored products.

• Nuts: mostly pecans, Brazil nuts and macadamias (have a carb % under 5)

• Berries (a good option is to eat them with whipped cream or coconut cream)

This is more or less how a plate should like: 




and this is how the lchf food pyramid looks like :






Have you noticed  that its basically the upside version of the "standard food pyramid" ????


Being a vegetarian(like me) does not make eating LCHF impossible.
I eat a lot of :

• coconut derivatives: coconut milk, coconut cream, coconut oil, coconut flakes, fresh coconut, shredded coconut, coconut oil
• dairy : quark, cottage cheese, Greek/Turkish yogurt, cream, whipped cream,Philadelphia cheese (full fat of everything)
• cheese: mostly goat cheese (as goats have a similar gastrointestinal physiology to ours)
• eggs : boiled, fried, poached
• avocado 
• nuts : mostly Brazil nuts, macadamia nuts and pecans as they are higher in fat. But I also eat a lot of peanuts, hazelnuts, walnuts, almonds and cashews
• All vegetables: spinach, lettuce,argula, zucchini, cauliflower,eggplant, broccoli, peppers, cabbage, pumpkin, 
• olives and olive oil 
• mushrooms
• red pesto, pesto, kale pesto, argula pesto
• berries
• nut butters
• quorn and other vegetarian alternatives to meat like seitan. 
• Alcohol: white wine
• seeds: mostly sesame, flax seeds, pine nuts, pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds. 
• sea weed noodles and konjak noodles

Here is what a "lchf" buffe dinner looked like for me and my mum:

I believe that LCHF is a flexible diet and you yourself can make a meal High in fat and low in carbohydrates depending on what you serve with it ! 

You can make a meal high in fat by , for example,adding extra healthy oils to it. 

This is why I also eat: 

• some fruit 
• sugar free chocolate and cacao 
• protein powder (casein and whey) 
• root veggies (like carrots)

I make my own low carb chocolate by mixing chocolate protein powder with coconut oil :) 

Do I miss pasta, pizza, rice, muesli and bread ????

The answer is no because I have found alternatives to it: 

RICE = cauliflower rice

PASTA = spiralized zucchini, konjak noodles, seaweed noodles, fitness noodles

PIZZA = coconut flour pizza, almond crust pizza, hazelnut flour pizza, no crust pizza (you use a layer of cheese instead of the crust) 

BREAD = I make seed crackers that I eat instead of crisp bread, I use a slice of cheese instead of crispbread that I top with coconut butter or peanut butter, and Lidl has a amazing lchf bread made of flax seed flour.

MUESLI= I make my own muesli and granola that basically consists of different nuts, seeds and coconut chips

CAKES = the list of lchf cakes is endless and trust me, they taste much better than the healthy low fat sugar free versions. 

I´d like to remind you all that I decided to go low card  NOT with the aim to loose weight but to get control back of my life. I was so tired of feeling tired, moody, anxious and hungry all the time. I was tired of not being to  sleep at night because my anxiety was so high. 

This does not mean that I will eat lchf every day from now for the rest of my life. I am not finally able to enjoy my life again and not to panic to much when it comes to planing the future. When I am in company I will eat what I am served and not be the "complicated guest" (that does not eat this and that does not eat that) but when I am home or with my family,  I will eat lchf.