Low carb stands for forms of nutrition in which the absorption of carbohydrates (Carbs are non-essential nutrients!) is more or less severely restricted. The ketogenic diet represents in this respect the most extreme type of low carb, in which almost no carbohydrates are consumed and the body metabolism must completely change with respect to its energy generation. Certain tissues in our body, which are otherwise supplied with the carbohydrate component glucose, derive their energy replacement for "carbohydrate deficiency" from the ketone bodies increasingly formed to compensate for it. These ketone bodies, which are detectable in the urine among other places, provide the name for the "ketogenic" diet and the metabolic state of the "ketosis". Here the ketosis can be considered as a type of indicator and is just one of many metabolic changes occurring during the prolonged absence of carbohydrates. For the non-medical ketogenic diet, however, the impact on the lipid metabolism is likely to be of overriding interest. While each carbohydrate intake slows down the lipid metabolism due to an increase in blood sugar and the secretion of insulin, these are properly trained by the ketogenic diet and become more effective in the long run. As most body tissue fatty acids can be used very well as an energy source, a few tangible benefits can hence already be seen:
Alongside the various motivations for the ketogenic diet (health awareness, weight loss, medical application) there are, in spite of some common basic rules, some partial but significant differences in their practical implementation, especially as regards the resulting distribution of nutrients and food selection. The non-medical ketogenic diet proposed proposed on this website focuses upon a permanent diet. In addition, it is ideally suited for the reduction of body fat due to the activation of the lipid metabolism in conjunction with a negative energy balance.
It is implemented via the selection and combination of the right foodstuffs and supplements (nutritional supplements). You can find more about this in the chapter on Ketogenic Foods.