What about alcohol?
What about alcohol?
It is kinda possible to enjoy alcohol when persuing a ketogenic lifestyle. Although alcohol is often classified as the fourth macronutrient, it is not essential to survive, even though, after a long day, it can feel that way. Drinking alcohol while you are on a keto diet will not necessarily derail you, but it certainly will slow down things a bit.
While it’s obvious that sweet cocktails and beer are full of sugar and carbs that can immediately bring you out of ketosis, straight liquor and dry wine can also cause issues for some people. Take a drink like a vodka soda: It has very few calories and even fewer grams of sugar. But it’s not the calories in this simple drink that can cause a problem; it’s how the body processes the liquor in the first place.
If you maintain a ketogenic diet, your body uses your stored fat for energy. When alcohol enters your system, your liver will default to using the byproducts of the metabolized alcohol instead of fat, which means fatty acid oxidation (the process of creating ketones) is slowed until all the alcohol has been processed.
If you drink alcohol occasionally, this will probably not cause any long-term issues. But if you find yourself drinking often during the week or every weekend, you could be slowing your fat-burning process down.
A few tips that keep you in ketosis on a night out
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Eat a Keto-Friendly Meal Before Drinking
When you eat a carb-heavy meal before drinking, you kick yourself out of ketosis and jeopardize how your body metabolizes the alcohol.
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Size matters
The proper servings for alcohol are :
- Wine 150ml
- Wodka, Tequila, Whiskey, Gin… 45ml
If you enjoy alcoholic beverages at home, you can monitor your alcohol portions.
In a bar or restaurant, it is hard to see how much they pour into your glass
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Try to take 1 or 2 drinks maximum
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Calories matter, just as carbs do
On a keto diet, counting net carbs is more critical than counting calories, but alcohol is the exception to the rule. Alcohol contains 100 percent empty calories. With just a few beverages, you can easily drink a meal’s worth of calories.
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Choose the right alcohol
Quantity isn’t the only factor in choosing alcoholic drinks on a keto diet. The type of alcohol matters just as much. Since certain types of alcoholic beverages contain more carbs than others, you’ll want to choose for the ones with the least amount of carbs.
Determination, alcohol, and keto
Maintaining a healthy ketogenic lifestyle requires focus and determination. When you drink, your inhibitions and willpower weaken. You might end up eating chips or a slice of pizza instead of a hard-boiled egg or some olives.
Now that you have a better idea of how alcoholic beverages affect you in ketosis and know which low-carb alcohol choices are better than others, you can decide whether alcohol consumption even has a place in your meal plan.
If you’re new to the keto lifestyle or haven’t reached ketosis yet, consider taking a break from alcohol to help you get there. If you decide to imbibe, take it easy. Your keto alcohol tolerance will be much lower once you’re in ketosis.
Enjoy a glass every now and then
Love,
Ketocosmo
