This blog post is rather different from the usual AI/ML blogs I am writing about. This is more about Ketogenic Diet for weight loss.
[Inspired by Fat to Fit Amir Khan for Dangal]
Keto what ???
I got to know about Keto-Diet from a friend who used to weigh more than a 100 Kgs in college but now when I met him after ~10 years he looks like ~70Kgs. So I asked him what is the catch and he told me about the keto diet. I had never heard about the keto diet before so I thought he must be eating a lot of fruits, salads and other boring stuff which I know I can never follow for long period. But I was like :O when he told me that its about eating low carbs and high fat. So one can eat all the good spicy stuff like Non-Veg, Paneer and keep loosing weight.
I could not believe him, at first, but then I thought whats the harm in trying. On the contrary, I would love to eat such food all the time if I need not worry about my body-weight. So, I started exploring food items which are low in carbs and high in fat and proteins.
But then I realized that that most food-items which we consume in daily-diet in India are full on carbs. Going on Keto-Diet, religiously, means to cut all potato, rice, chapati from the daily diet which we eat almost daily in India. As a necessary requirement of Keto, one has to restrict carbs intake to 15~20 grams/ day. But one chapati alone contains about 25 grams of carbs. So one has to be very careful about what to eat and what not to. And in India it becomes even more difficult to find such food items.
The picture above summarizes almost everything I eat when on Keto diet except some items like Ham, Pork which are not commonly available in India.
What I eat
My daily routine is: Eggs (Omelette or scrambled) in breakfast (8 am) with tea or coffee (without any sugar), have a glass of lassie around 11 am with cheese slice, then Paneer or Chicken curry for lunch and vice versa for dinner.
How I cook
I usually eat home cooked food so I had better control over which oil to use and I add cooking-cream to increase the fat intake. Sometimes I do add flakes of Tuna fish which can be bought in canned form at supermarkets.
Among vegetables, Onion-Tomato fried with spices and cooking cream is used to make curry and then cubes of Paneer or Chicken pieces can be added later. I do also add some other vegetables like Cauliflower or Cabbage or Capsicum, Carrot, Peas to the curry. Sometimes, I have Paneer with Pumpkin (Kaddu) or Brinjal (Baingan Bharta). Cheese is good to be added as topping.
I have also tried the butter-coffee with coconut oil or ghee with salt-less butter. I can not say for sure but its good to have and seems to be working for reducing the belly fat.
The key thing is to keep rotating among different recipes otherwise it becomes difficult to have the same meals in daily routine.
Results
After the first two weeks, I observed a loss of 2 Kgs which was very motivating for me. It takes a great deal of time, money and efforts to prepare all the food myself and it was good to see such positive results. I was 80. something Kgs when I started Keto diet and in about 100 days I was 70. something. The workout for me is just a casual evening or morning walk. I go for a 30 min. swim 2-3 days in a week which I do not think is a very hard workout.
Initially, I did feel some side-effects of Keto like constipation and weakness but nothing very odd. The effects disappeared after few weeks.
Why it works
For many of over-weight people, the body stores up all the fat while consuming only the carbohydrates. When one is on Keto diet, the body do not get any carbohydrates and so turns to burning fat for energy. Hence body weight reduces when fat is consumed by body.
Cholesterol Levels
It is common belief that eating high fat and fried food will cause increase in cholesterol levels. After some 6 months of Keto diet, I took a blood test and found all cholesterol levels as normal.
TNT 