Carnivore Diet – Healthy or Not? Here is All You Need to Know!

Looking to initiate a diet that helps you with mood issues, regulation of blood sugar levels, and weight loss as well? Have you heard about the all meat diet? Meat can surely be included in a healthy meal plan; however, according to the experts, a Carnivore Diet is something more than that.

Diets rich in protein are quite in trend for people looking for weight loss or healthy diet plans. But the carnivore diet stands out among the rest. As the name indicates, the carnivore diet completely focuses on eating meat and other animal products. But is it healthy?
Let’s find the answer to this question and other essential details about this protein-rich diet through this blog.

What is a Carnivore Diet: An Introduction

Before starting with the blog, let’s first understand what a Carnivore diet plan is. Call it a zero-carb diet or just a meat diet, the Carnivore diet includes the intake of only meat food. Having this meal eliminates the intake of carbohydrates. The diet forces the body to burn fat to gain energy, and gradually the individual loses weight. The diet plan also helps reduce blood sugar levels for diabetics, fights inflammation, and advances mental health. The carnivore diet eliminates the intake of vegetables and fruits, including grains, seeds, nuts, and even legumes.

So, is the carnivore diet healthy? As we already said, the carnivore diet restricts eating. Again, it doesn’t support the Dietary Guidelines designed for Americans, which mention having vegetables, fruits, whole grains, etc. along with animal sources in meals. And when one cuts on every food group except animal sources, he surely lacks the required nutrients to remain fit and healthy.

Carnivore Diet: How Does It Work?

The human body needs carbohydrates regularly, as they are the primary energy source. When you have carbs, the body converts the carbs into glucose or sugar to utilize it for energy. But the additional glucose gets stored in the liver and muscles in the form of fat.

When you don’t have carbs in your diet, the body uses the extra fat stored in the liver and muscles by converting it into ketones. The ketones are then used as an energy source. The carnivore diet food list excludes the intake of carbs. Hence, the body starts burning fat rapidly, which results in quick weight loss along with other health benefits.

How to Initiate with the Carnivore Diet?

When talking about the Carnivore diet for beginners, there aren’t many preparations needed. However, removing any kind of carb ingredient from the kitchen would be a good initiative. Then you need to note down seafood, poultry, and meat ingredients in your shopping list, as this is all you can have in the Carnivore diet.

Here is what the 30-day Carnivore diet meal plan includes:

1. Foods that are allowed in a Carnivore Diet

The Carnivore diet is a beef-only diet. Hence, the food allowed in this diet includes only animal products. The carnivore diet approves food items like chuck roast, burgers, ground beef, brisket, and steak in red meat. Apart from that, pork, lamb, bacon, and chicken are also allowed. The list also includes fish like trout, mackerel, and salmon and other seafood items like clams, shrimps, lobster, scallops, mussels, and oysters. Eggs in a minor quantity and organ meats like oxtail and liver can also be eaten. For cooking the food, using ghee, fat tallow, or butter is advised, while paprika, garlic, cumin, chili paste, pepper, and salt can be used for seasoning.

2. Foods that should be avoided in an all meat Diet

As mentioned above, the carnivore diet excludes vegetables, legumes, fruits, grains, seeds, and nuts.

3. Dairy products in Carnivore Diet

The all meat diet allows dairy products like cheese, yogurt, heavy cream, and milk. However, it is also advised to limit the intake of dairy products as they have an impact on inflammation.

What are the advantages and disadvantages of the Carnivore Diet?

People generally select any diet either by searching on the internet or following some friends. However, it should be noted that every diet isn’t suitable for everyone. People need to select a diet according to their body type, taste, and lifestyle. Hence, every diet has certain advantages and disadvantages.

Let’s go through the pros and cons of this diet to understand what is carnivore diet good for and who should avoid it.

Benefits of the Carnivore Diet

Weight loss is what people are mostly looking for. The all meat diet helps in weight loss. However, there are other benefits to initiating this diet. The diet is said to help improve heart health, control blood sugar levels, improve moods, and work on autoimmune issues as well.

No doubt, the Carnivore diet benefits are listed above, but there are no medical proofs or research that confirm them. Hence, it is difficult to determine how this diet is beneficial. On the other hand, people who have adopted this diet for around 9 to 20 months have reported improvements in their health like improved sleep, lower BMI, increased energy levels, improvement in focus and memory, and better endurance and strength.

People suffering from diabetes have reported reducing their dosage of diabetes medications after practicing a carnivore diet. However, as medical practitioners fail to learn what they eat and check their health and nutrition levels, they can’t confirm the health benefits of this diet.

Cons of the Carnivore Diet

Thinking when there are various health benefits, why a carnivore diet is bad? Let’s study the cons of this diet to understand the answer to this.

Firstly, this diet is very obstructive. Hence, people might find it difficult to follow unless they are super interested in meat meals. The diet eliminates the ingredients that provide important nutrients to the body and improve overall health, like vegetables and fruits. This adds to the risk of developing serious health issues like heart disease, Alzheimer’s disease, type 2 diabetes, and cancer.

Secondly, the diet includes the intake of only animal sources, which are high in cholesterol, saturated fat, and sodium. The saturated fat adds to your LDL cholesterol, leading to heart issues. Some of the processed meats, like bacon, are high in sodium levels, which can lead to kidney disease, high blood pressure, colon and rectal cancer, and other health issues.

The list of Carnivore diet side effects also includes constipation and imbalance in bowel movements. As people following this diet completely depend on animal sources, they fail to consume fiber, one of the important nutrients that promotes healthy bowel movements and gut. When you eliminate fiber from your food, it creates an imbalance in the bacterial levels in your gut. This leads to various gut issues like colon cancer, increased gut inflammation, constipation, etc. It has a very negative impact on the health of the bowels.

Again, this diet isn’t suitable for everyone. The diet is rich in protein; hence, people who should limit their intake of proteins should avoid going for this diet, like people suffering from chronic kidney issues. Also, people who are sensitive to cholesterol should avoid this diet. The diet isn’t recommendable to pregnant or breastfeeding women and children.

Carnivore Diet: Sample Meal Plan and Food List

Confused about what you can eat when following an all meat diet? Well, you can have different types of meat and lots of water when on a carnivore diet. Here is a sample menu for those looking to follow this diet.

Breakfast: (any one of the following options)

• Scrambled Eggs and bacon
• 3 fried eggs in butter, cheese, and ham
• Eggs and liver
• Scrambled eggs and Salmon
• Trout and shredded chicken

Lunch: (any one of the following options)

• Rib-eye steak (in sea salt)
• Beef ribs (in sea salt)
• NY strip steak
• Pork Chops
• Burger Patties
• Lamb chops
• Pork Shoulder

Snack: (any one of the following options)

• Beef jerky (excluding sugar and soy)
• Bone broth
• Bone Marrow
• 2 hard-boiled eggs
• Sardines
• Pork rinds
• Salmon jerky (free from sugar and soy)

Dinner: (any one of the following options)

• Lamb chops, Shrimp, and mussels
• Fried shrimp with mussels
• Peppered chicken thighs
• Trout
• Scallops (in pepper and salt)
• Baked trout (in sea salt and pepper)
• Hamburger patties

Some of the recipes that can be tried in the all meat diet include Scrambled eggs and Turkey, Salmon patties, Carnivore chicken casserole, cheese sticks, skinless chicken wings, etc.

Conclusion

Is the carnivore diet safe? Wrapping up with the answer to this, the all meat diet is an unsustainable, restrictive, and quick-fix diet. However, there is no evidence that supports the claimed benefits. It can also result in nutrient deficiency.

So, as long as you are healthy, you can give this diet a try to grab its benefits under the supervision of a health practitioner. However, it is recommended to avoid this diet for more than 10 days and avoid it immediately if any health issues arise. Again, while following this diet, make sure you take mineral, fiber, and vitamin supplements to avoid the nutritional gaps. Or you can also look for other similar diet plans that are less restrictive, like the Mediterranean diet, that help in improving the overall health.