As I blogged about last week, I’ve been on the Ketogenic or “Keto” diet for 5 months now. When I first began the diet, I had no idea what to eat every day and I remember constantly asking my friend who had told me about the diet what she ate everyday. I probably drove her nuts – but I really did feel a lot of confusion in the beginning about what to eat! Now that I’ve been doing the diet awhile my feeling is that while Keto is strict, it’s not restrictive. By that I mean, this is not a deprivation diet like so many diets are. The focus is not restricting calories and you should eat to satisfaction, so not only will you will feel full after and between meals, but there are so many delicious foods on the table it sometimes feels crazy to call this a diet! I wanted to track a week of everything I ate to give you an idea what this diet looks like. Each week varies because I do like to experiment with making new dinners and mixing things up, but I do have some favorite go-to’s for breakfast, lunch, and snacks. Here’s what last week looked like:
Sunday:
Breakfast – Coffee with heavy cream, sausage patty with egg & cheese
Lunch – None
Dinner – Greek Salad with salmon
Monday:
Breakfast – Coffee with heavy cream, 2 scrambled eggs cooked in 1 tbsp butter
Lunch – Cheese, salami, and olives
Dinner – Noodle-less lasagna (this can be served over noodles for the kids!)
Tuesday:
Breakfast – Coffee with heavy cream, 2 fried eggs cooked in 1 tbsp butter
Lunch – Leftover lasagna
Dinner – Taco salad (lettuce, ground beef, cheese, tomato, onion, olives, avocado) – you can add beans and/or tortillas for kids!
Wednesday:
Breakfast – Coffee with heavy cream
Lunch – Leftover lasagna
Snack – Cashews
Dinner – Keto Chili (which is a simple bean-less chili and you can add beans for kids!) – top with cheese, onion, and sour cream
Thursday:
Breakfast – Coffee with heavy cream, 2 eggs fried in 1 tbsp butter
Lunch – Leftover taco salad
Dinner – Leftover Keto Chili
Friday:
Breakfast – Coffee with heavy cream, 2 eggs scrambled in 1 tbsp butter
Lunch – Tuna salad over lettuce, iced coffee with heavy cream
Dinner – Bun-less double cheeseburger (no ketchup, add mayo)
Saturday:
Breakfast – Coffee with heavy cream
Lunch – Cheese & pepperoni toppings from 3 small slices of pizza (we were at a party so I had to make do with what I could!)
Snack – Shared to-go taco salad with hubby after party, iced coffee with heavy cream
Dinner – Tuna salad over lettuce
As you can see, I occasionally skip meals. Since starting this diet, I really don’t believe in eating when I’m not hungry & don’t force myself to eat at regular times. Rather, I listen to my body and typically only eat when I’m actually hungry. Sometimes if I skip a meal, I find I’m hungrier later in the day and will have a snack. I also love leftovers! There is a lot of cooking on this diet, so anytime I can make a large portion of something that still tastes great on the 2nd day I will! Chili, lasagna, spaghetti sauce (you can have this over zucchini noodles) are great options and it’s so helpful having leftovers for busy weekend nights. I also use my instant pot whenever possible and there are so many amazing recipes on Pinterest! Also, it’s very easy to adapt so many non-keto meals to make them keto friendly. You can eat any sandwich lettuce wrapped without the bun, sub “zoodles” for noodles, sub mashed cauliflower for potatoes, or riced cauliflower for rice. It’s also very simple to make small adjustments to add carbs back in for the little ones! If you are considering the Keto diet, I hope you find this information helpful!
