I love when things are broken down and simplified for me. Read a few informative articles on Ketosis and the Ketogenic Diet over the summer and here’s the skinny from my perspective. (ref: Tyler Graham, Adam Bible, Alissa Rumsey & @ProfTimNoakes; Men’s Fitness)

LCHF: Low Carbs, High Fat. Keep your total carbs under 50g/day and stay away from sugar (the best you can). Your body stores ~40,000 calories of fat compared to just 2000 calories of stored carbs. If you stop giving your body carbs it will seek out energy from your fat storage. Boom! Read that again. Not that different from the Atkins, Paleo, Zone or South Beach diets.

Ketones are molecules formed by the breakdown of stored fat. Premium high octane fuel for you to use freely. You want these flourishing in your body.

That sugar craving you’re feeling is real, it’s your body searching for the regularly scheduled carb load you give it every couple of hours. Waffles and Frosted Flakes for breakfast. Put more sugar in your tank at lunch. That’s the cheap low octane gas. Gives you clogged injectors and all kinds of health problems like diabetes, cancers and more. Carbs and sugar feed that black stuff and make it grow. We’re all glorified “sugar burners”, ask any nutritionist.

Your “Eat This, Not That” list is pretty straightforward in Keto. Eat the wild, grass-fed, free-range meats, poultry and fish. Eat eggs. Eat fats from fish and animals, butter, olive oil and coconut oil are good; corn, HFCS, refined and trans fats are no good. Eat vegetables, dark leafy ones and the cruciferous ones, zucchini not pasta, and not the starchy potatoes. Full fat cheese is good, cottage cheese also a very good source of protein, stay away from milk. Nuts in moderation because they are calorie dense, berries, avocados, tomatoes, lots of water, teas, light beers, tequila, black coffee, caffeine helps the process too so don’t forget your caffeine gummies which don’t hit your diet if you’re active.

10% body fat looks really good on men doesn’t it? 17% on women. The healthy middle. Most of us are hovering at a bigger percentages than those, and it’s because the carbs and the sugars keep us there. Carbs are not your friends, and they are not food.

Try the ketosis shortcut, fast for 12 to 16 hours. Do it overnight to make it easier to try. Drink a lot of water, green tea too. Your body will tap into your fat stores because that’s what it was meant to do all along and you will feel a mental sharpness and euphoric high from the process. It’s a real experience. Stop eating at 7pm and don’t eat again until 11am.

Now that you’ve just done that, see how many days you can hold your body in that state. Eat clean, from the list, search Keto diets online. By day 2-3 you will start to feel sluggish and maybe even get headaches or flu-like symptoms as your body realizes the carbs aren’t available and your glucose-based metabolism is being tampered with. Water weight will start to drop off. And then the fog will clear if you can continue to push forward for a couple of weeks

3-4 weeks out you should be in ketosis if you held down the fort at

Check out these really satisfying replacements:

A) Pasta? Get a spiralizer and use zucchini, make some meatballs, lots of Parmesan cheese.

B) Mashed Potatoes? Magic Bullet some cauliflower up, chives, s+p, butter

C) Rice? Crumble up that cauliflower, fry it with some soy sauce and egg and chicken

D) Pizza? Almond Flour crust, cheese, fresh tomatoes on top Jersey style; or try broccoli and ricotta on mozzarella

E) Burgers, Sandwiches? Carne Asada Tacos Frescos; turkey & mustard (lettuce wraps)

F) Caffeine? Punch’d Gummies or Black Coffee, Teas no sugar or milk

G) Desert? Avocado Brownies with nuts, coconut oil

Your cravings for fast foods and sodas will go away. The McDonald’s cone craving may never go away, but if you can fit those 27g carbs and 20g of sugar into one day every other week, I say do it. Just don’t look at the ingredients.

Bonking is when you run out of carbs to burn. Runners also call it “the wall”, that point you need to push through to get to the fat burning part of the race, usually mid to late in the race. Remember what I learned earlier: The body stores ~40,000 calories of fat compared to just 2000 calories of carbs. Stop giving your body carbs and it goes to the fat stores for energy. Push through the bonk.

Update: STAY AWAY FROM ERYTHRITOL! And any of the "Sugar Free" substitutes.