6 ms·

What is the logic behind putting butter in your coffee? If your goal is to lose weight, wouldn't not eating that butter still be better than eating it?

by jules 10y ago

snuxoll 10y ago
Fat takes a long time to digest in your stomach, as such you feel satiated for a much longer period of time. Butter can be used somewhat to sweeten coffee, and unlike using sugar won't invoke an insulin response and a subsequent crash.
- AstralStorm 10y ago
  Might as well use heavy cream. 20% or more, just an unsweetened version. Pity the diet trashed my liver long term. Not sure why (the actual dietetician had no idea either), but lab numbers do not lie. (Aspartate, alanine, cholesterol, no inflammation in CRP) It was the only thing effective so far. Long term was around 2 years thereof. Moral is, diet responsibly and pay for the metabolic panels when dieting.
  - dualogy 10y ago
    What exactly did it do to your liver (what's the diagnosis so to speak), did you have alcohol, what carbs did you have, and how do you treat the issue now?
  - splintercell 10y ago
    Could you please elaborate what kind of damages you go by following this diet to your liver?
PKop 10y ago
You're stuck in the mindset that fat makes you "fat". This is the whole point of ketosis, and a rethinking of wrong dietary guidelines that have persisted for decades. The butter in the coffee supplies fat for fuel / energy, suppresses appetite, and does not contribute to weight gain or more specifically an increase in adipose fat tissue. Simply cutting all calories is futile. Your body needs energy to sustain itself. The point of keto diet is replacing carbs with a significant increase in fat (~70% give or take) as a percentage of calories consumed. But it is crucial to actually consume a lot of fat, not just try to cut overall calories.
- collyw 10y ago
  But adding calories in whatever form still means more calories in than not eating them. Edit: I get the point that it stops hunger, but my point still stands, and the parent posters still doesn't make a great deal of sense.
  - johnward 10y ago
    Who says it's an addition of calories? For many people breakfast is just coffee with coconut oil and butter. It's not adding calories it's just consuming them at a different time. You're still going to be at a deficit at the end of the day.
    - skrause 10y ago
      For me it would be compared to just black coffee and no breakfast, so of course it would be additional calories if I force myself to drink coffee with butter in it.
      - GavinMcG 10y ago
        I have said exactly that in the past. I was wrong! It turns out morning me doesn't have the willpower to truly stick to just coffee.
      - johnward 10y ago
        In that case it probably doesn't make sense. Unless you find that adding it to your coffee allows you to not eat additional calories for a longer period of time.
  - cschmidt 10y ago
    People often have bullet-proof coffee (as it is called) as a meal replacement. Those calories make them full for a long time, as fat is very filling.
  - rotwoof 10y ago
    The point of putting butter in your coffee is to extend your natural faste. The faste that you enter every night during sleep. It is done in tandem with also skipping breakfast on keto. The reason you put butter in your coffee instead of a spoonful of say, sugar, is that fat takes a long time to digest and even a fairly small amount of it (a table spoon of butter in your coffee) takes a while to digest. During that time period your hunger sensation is suppressed. Coffee also promotes weight loss because it speeds up your metabolism. The idea behind buttered coffee is fairly simple. Put enough fat in your coffee so that you don't get hungry and eat a meal and you help extend your natural faste - and your morning coffee helps speed up your metabolism. http://paleonick.com/articles/Bullet-Proof-Coffee http://paleonick.com/articles/Bullet-Proof-Coffee There are good reasons for drinking buttered coffee even if you're deliberately trying to avoid weight loss i.e you are following a net neutral or net positive caloric intake diet. When you're fasting your body isn't spending energy digesting food which means less of your body's immediately available resources aren't spent digesting food. Even if you're getting calories from your coffee it doesn't impact your weight loss because you're still eating less calories than your body needs to maintain the weight.
johnward 10y ago
Just to get in calories by fat, which generally hold you over longer. I have coffee with coconut oil every morning. I've tried doing on coffee with coconut oil and butter but it's not for me. I'd rather have eggs and bacon.
l1ambda 10y ago
"Low carb, adequate protein, high fat" is a more accurate description of this diet. The other Keto adage is "calories count, but don't count calories". Meaning, if you eat a high fat diet, you naturally will feel full.
tripzilch 10y ago
When I tried keto a few years back (an interesting experience, to say the least), and I eliminated almost all carbs from my diet, estimated the calories that are left, I found I needed to eat a LOT more fat to reach a sensible daily amount of calories. Like heaping a few big tablespoons of mayo on a bowl of broccoli lots (being Dutch, cue the Pulp Fiction references :) ). Maybe it's just that I've never been a very big eater, but yeah I found it a bit of a struggle to keep up. So adding some butter and coconut fat to the coffee helps. Plus fat lasts longer, it doesn't quite spike like sugars do, so getting a whole lot of it in the morning is a great way to start the day. I kinda want to try and start again, it definitely had some benefits, as long as I managed to get enough calories and vegetables/nutrients (sorry I'm one of those persons that needs to take care they eat enough). The big problem, however, is that in the mean time I've greatly reduced the amount of animal products from my diet--for environmental and ethical reasons, not health. And I'm not really sure how to do both. I would need to spend a lot of money on almonds and other foods that may not seem that expensive until you need to consume them in bulk to replace the cheap, cheap carbs :) Being nearly-vegetarian is very cheap. And even though I could probably hack the costs (or figure out something clever to do so), I'm not at all sure if it's even possible to live on a healthy keto diet while keeping my environmental impact footprint to a reasonable size that I can consider myself a responsible inhabitant of this planet. I don't think I can bring myself to eat very large amounts of meat again, even if they're organic certifiably happy cows. Tempeh has slightly more proteins anyway :p (also tastier than tofu, which is not a very high bar, I know)
- CarlosD 10y ago
  I'm on a similar boat. Vegan for +10 years, I fast one day a week and aim to keep carbs under 20 grams the day after, I feel my great during those 2 days. I would like to make the switch into full vegan keto, but I've yet to find a plan that I feel would cover my nutritional bases and that I could maintain on a low-budget. Let me know if you make any headway! /r/veganketo helps. p.s. I recently found that dumpster diving asian supermarkets I can get infinite supply of still-fresh packaged tofu, that has sure been helping!
- a_brawling_boo 10y ago
  If you are not opposed to eating sea food, there are many fish that are good on keto. Mackerels, Sardines, Anchovies, and Salmon come to mind, plus they have a high ratio of omega 3 vs omega 6 and 9. I eat lots of Avacado and use a lot of olive oil you can cook vegetables in. You honestly want to go light on the nuts, because even many of the fatty ones still have quite a few carbs, and the omega fat ratio is not great. Also flax is a big deal. I get what you are saying though; I think it would be difficult to be vegetarian on this diet, though ironically I probably eat less meat than I did before keto.

What is the logic behind putting butter in your coffee? If your goal is to lose weight, wouldn't not eating that butter still be better than eating it?

by jules 10y ago

What is the logic behind putting butter in your coffee? If your goal is to lose weight, wouldn't not eating that butter still be better than eating it?

snuxoll 10y ago

Fat takes a long time to digest in your stomach, as such you feel satiated for a much longer period of time. Butter can be used somewhat to sweeten coffee, and unlike using sugar won't invoke an insulin response and a subsequent crash.

AstralStorm 10y ago
Might as well use heavy cream. 20% or more, just an unsweetened version. Pity the diet trashed my liver long term. Not sure why (the actual dietetician had no idea either), but lab numbers do not lie. (Aspartate, alanine, cholesterol, no inflammation in CRP) It was the only thing effective so far. Long term was around 2 years thereof. Moral is, diet responsibly and pay for the metabolic panels when dieting.
- dualogy 10y ago
  What exactly did it do to your liver (what's the diagnosis so to speak), did you have alcohol, what carbs did you have, and how do you treat the issue now?
- splintercell 10y ago
  Could you please elaborate what kind of damages you go by following this diet to your liver?

PKop 10y ago

You're stuck in the mindset that fat makes you "fat". This is the whole point of ketosis, and a rethinking of wrong dietary guidelines that have persisted for decades. The butter in the coffee supplies fat for fuel / energy, suppresses appetite, and does not contribute to weight gain or more specifically an increase in adipose fat tissue. Simply cutting all calories is futile. Your body needs energy to sustain itself. The point of keto diet is replacing carbs with a significant increase in fat (~70% give or take) as a percentage of calories consumed. But it is crucial to actually consume a lot of fat, not just try to cut overall calories.

collyw 10y ago
But adding calories in whatever form still means more calories in than not eating them. Edit: I get the point that it stops hunger, but my point still stands, and the parent posters still doesn't make a great deal of sense.
- johnward 10y ago
  Who says it's an addition of calories? For many people breakfast is just coffee with coconut oil and butter. It's not adding calories it's just consuming them at a different time. You're still going to be at a deficit at the end of the day.
  - skrause 10y ago
    For me it would be compared to just black coffee and no breakfast, so of course it would be additional calories if I force myself to drink coffee with butter in it.
    - GavinMcG 10y ago
      I have said exactly that in the past. I was wrong! It turns out morning me doesn't have the willpower to truly stick to just coffee.
    - johnward 10y ago
      In that case it probably doesn't make sense. Unless you find that adding it to your coffee allows you to not eat additional calories for a longer period of time.
- cschmidt 10y ago
  People often have bullet-proof coffee (as it is called) as a meal replacement. Those calories make them full for a long time, as fat is very filling.
- rotwoof 10y ago
  The point of putting butter in your coffee is to extend your natural faste. The faste that you enter every night during sleep. It is done in tandem with also skipping breakfast on keto. The reason you put butter in your coffee instead of a spoonful of say, sugar, is that fat takes a long time to digest and even a fairly small amount of it (a table spoon of butter in your coffee) takes a while to digest. During that time period your hunger sensation is suppressed. Coffee also promotes weight loss because it speeds up your metabolism. The idea behind buttered coffee is fairly simple. Put enough fat in your coffee so that you don't get hungry and eat a meal and you help extend your natural faste - and your morning coffee helps speed up your metabolism. http://paleonick.com/articles/Bullet-Proof-Coffee http://paleonick.com/articles/Bullet-Proof-Coffee There are good reasons for drinking buttered coffee even if you're deliberately trying to avoid weight loss i.e you are following a net neutral or net positive caloric intake diet. When you're fasting your body isn't spending energy digesting food which means less of your body's immediately available resources aren't spent digesting food. Even if you're getting calories from your coffee it doesn't impact your weight loss because you're still eating less calories than your body needs to maintain the weight.

johnward 10y ago

Just to get in calories by fat, which generally hold you over longer. I have coffee with coconut oil every morning. I've tried doing on coffee with coconut oil and butter but it's not for me. I'd rather have eggs and bacon.

l1ambda 10y ago

"Low carb, adequate protein, high fat" is a more accurate description of this diet. The other Keto adage is "calories count, but don't count calories". Meaning, if you eat a high fat diet, you naturally will feel full.

tripzilch 10y ago

When I tried keto a few years back (an interesting experience, to say the least), and I eliminated almost all carbs from my diet, estimated the calories that are left, I found I needed to eat a LOT more fat to reach a sensible daily amount of calories. Like heaping a few big tablespoons of mayo on a bowl of broccoli lots (being Dutch, cue the Pulp Fiction references :) ). Maybe it's just that I've never been a very big eater, but yeah I found it a bit of a struggle to keep up. So adding some butter and coconut fat to the coffee helps. Plus fat lasts longer, it doesn't quite spike like sugars do, so getting a whole lot of it in the morning is a great way to start the day. I kinda want to try and start again, it definitely had some benefits, as long as I managed to get enough calories and vegetables/nutrients (sorry I'm one of those persons that needs to take care they eat enough). The big problem, however, is that in the mean time I've greatly reduced the amount of animal products from my diet--for environmental and ethical reasons, not health. And I'm not really sure how to do both. I would need to spend a lot of money on almonds and other foods that may not seem that expensive until you need to consume them in bulk to replace the cheap, cheap carbs :) Being nearly-vegetarian is very cheap. And even though I could probably hack the costs (or figure out something clever to do so), I'm not at all sure if it's even possible to live on a healthy keto diet while keeping my environmental impact footprint to a reasonable size that I can consider myself a responsible inhabitant of this planet. I don't think I can bring myself to eat very large amounts of meat again, even if they're organic certifiably happy cows. Tempeh has slightly more proteins anyway :p (also tastier than tofu, which is not a very high bar, I know)

CarlosD 10y ago
I'm on a similar boat. Vegan for +10 years, I fast one day a week and aim to keep carbs under 20 grams the day after, I feel my great during those 2 days. I would like to make the switch into full vegan keto, but I've yet to find a plan that I feel would cover my nutritional bases and that I could maintain on a low-budget. Let me know if you make any headway! /r/veganketo helps. p.s. I recently found that dumpster diving asian supermarkets I can get infinite supply of still-fresh packaged tofu, that has sure been helping!
a_brawling_boo 10y ago
If you are not opposed to eating sea food, there are many fish that are good on keto. Mackerels, Sardines, Anchovies, and Salmon come to mind, plus they have a high ratio of omega 3 vs omega 6 and 9. I eat lots of Avacado and use a lot of olive oil you can cook vegetables in. You honestly want to go light on the nuts, because even many of the fatty ones still have quite a few carbs, and the omega fat ratio is not great. Also flax is a big deal. I get what you are saying though; I think it would be difficult to be vegetarian on this diet, though ironically I probably eat less meat than I did before keto.