Recently, we did a blog series on how to do no-cook keto in the summer. To truly make these options work, it’s easiest if you find some keto products to help you along. These products are not all conducive to strict keto. Strict keto is more about eating whole foods without any alterations like sugar alcohols. It’s a great goal, but reality is that unless keto is your full time job, you’ll likely need a little help along the way so you don’t fall off the tracks. Here are six keto products that help us along our health journey.
Meats That Make Keto Easy
Recently, Bill found pre-cooked bacon at Costco and this has been a game changer for us! As good keto people, we always have bacon in our fridge. I usually have a strip of bacon with my keto muffin or biscuit for breakfast. There’s also bacon in a lot of our keto dinner recipes. We were cooking a package of bacon a week.
Now, that’s not terrible and really, you stick it in the air fryer and it’s done in about 15 minutes. But then there’s the clean up and the putting it away. It wasn’t the end of the world, but the pre-cooked bacon is awesome. It’s clean, it’s easy, and you just stick it in the microwave or in your frying pan with other ingredients, and it’s perfect. Also, it has 0 carbs!
Pre-cooked chicken strips are also handy. Again, it has no carbs because it’s just chicken. This makes it a better option than the deli meats (which we also tend to have on hand). I like having some of it in a low-carb wrap or there are several recipes where you can chop it smaller and toss it in. Saves you the time and energy of cooking the chicken and dealing with the possible salmonella that goes along with this particular raw meat (yuck).
Deli Meats Also Keep Us on Track
Like I mentioned, deli meats are also a staple in our house. They are great on their own or put them in a wrap with some mayo and cheese. When you want a quick lunch, these are key. They do tend to have some fillers in them, so look at the nutritional label carefully. You want ones that are just the meat. There’s usually one or two carbs in a serving of them. Unfortunately, the ones without filler are also more expensive. But, not as expensive as going to a fast food place for lunch.
Keto Products that Act as Bread
I have two go-to keto products that I use as a base. The first is Mr. Tortilla wraps. They have 15 calories and one gram of net carbs in each one. We use these for sandwich wraps, taco shells, and (my favourite) pulled pork tortillas. These things are truly delicious and hold all the food together. They are a bit small, but you can have 3 or 4 and still be way below your carb count for a meal.
These wraps also freeze really well. We get them shipped to us through Amazon, put one package in the fridge, and the other packages in the freezer. Just take them out of the freezer when you need them and put them in the fridge. They keep well and don’t lose their texture.
Also, Carbonaut breads are a staple in our house. I tend to prefer the Mr. Tortilla wraps for sandwiches, because I’ve gone so long without bread. But their hamburger and hotdog buns are essential – especially in BBQ season! They feel like wheat buns, they taste like wheat buns, but they are completely keto friendly with only 2-3 grams of net carbs per bun. I was so happy when I tried these, I almost cried. Again, they are expensive so we make sure to budget them into our grocery bills. They also freeze really well. We keep them in the freezer and take some out as we need them.
Keto Products for Dessert
The other place that we use keto products is for dessert. We’ve always been people who like something a bit sweet after dinner. I try to make desserts like fat bombs, and keto cookies, but sometimes I’m just too tired. That’s when it’s great to have some Enlightened ice cream in the freezer.
Enlightened ice cream isn’t as creamy as the real deal, but it certainly tastes good. There isn’t a lot of aftertaste from it, and you can get it in pint sized or as ice cream bars. I like the dark chocolate vanilla almond bars. Bill enjoys the chocolate covered peanut butter ones. They only have 1 gram of net carbs in each one. Now, yes, they have a list of chemicals and ingredients you can’t pronounce a mile long, but having one every once in a while truly seems okay to me.
Are Keto Products Really Okay?
Like I said, on strict keto, products like these are probably a no-go. If you are just starting keto and you are deep in your weight loss journey, these many trigger your body and it might not work as efficiently. But, if you have been keto for a while and you are more maintaining your weight, an occasional keto product is not going to hurt you.
To us, keto is a balance. We need to stay in ketosis, but we also need to make the lifestyle work for us. Sometimes, we get overwhelmed in life and we depend on these things too much. At that point, we regroup and go strict for a while. But overall, we’ve found that the occasional keto product will just help you manage and stay on track.
Wendy
