Pumpkin Spice Keto Chow Mod
Saw this on Instagram. The TL;DR is: Regular Snickerdoodle Keto Chow with 30g of puree pumpkin and some spices (I’d just use the “pumpkin spice” blend but I’m lazy like that).
Why I make Keto Chow
I want to help people change their lives… and help them not go nuts in the process.
Nutritional Ketosis (aka “Keto” or “Ketogenic Diet”) can be highly effective but it’s daunting, especially for beginners. Keto is the only thing I have ever tried that has had any lasting effect on my health and my weight. I consider it like the “Konami Code“: a cheat or hack, because of how effective it has been in turning around my life (and the lives of family, friends, and former strangers =). I’m committed to helping others get into the Keto lifestyle and Keto Chow makes doing Keto easier; not only for beginners that are just starting out, but also for grizzled veterans who have been doing keto for years.
My first introduction to the ketogenic diet was when our oldest son started having seizures. After trying most of the common anticonvulsants (with no success) the neurologist sent my wife home with some information on a dietary treatment to control the seizures. He told her that if they didn’t have success with a medication soon then we would need to try a ketogenic diet. Glancing through the information he provided, my initial reaction was “holy crap, that sounds impossible!” all of the dietary restrictions and rules were more than we could handle. We would be like this family. The next medication worked and I all but forgot about the ketogenic diet. Years later it came up again when I decided I needed to lose weight.
When you first start doing Keto, there is a lot of information to be learned. There’s new vocabulary, new science, new lists of things you should or shouldn’t eat. It can actually be a bit dangerous if you don’t do sufficient research and don’t know that insufficient electrolytes will make you feel terrible (it’s called “Keto Flu” and it isn’t any fun) – that was one of the mistakes I made when I started Keto. I also started keto using a meal replacement shake that was loaded with coconut flour, chia seeds and other gritty stuff.
My goals in making Keto Chow were:
- Make figuring out Keto easy. Easy on your brain and easy to prepare the food.
- Keep people from running into electrolyte deficiency (the aforementioned “Keto Flu”).
- Make it tasty enough that you’ll not just tolerate it but honestly, actually, for realsies, enjoy consuming it (and want more).
- Make sure people are getting the vitamins, minerals and other nutrients they need to be healthy. Likely healthier than ever before.
Here’s the honest truth: I completely and entirely believe in this product and the Ketogenic diet. It’s not the end-all, be-all answer to everything in the world and I don’t eat it all day, every day for every meal (because: bacon and cheese). But I do have it for most meals.
I made Keto Chow for myself, it just happens to be the sort of thing that other people like too. It’s easy to prepare meals and I don’t have to worry about missing out on weird vitamins or minerals. I hit my macronutrient goals. I’m getting my electrolytes and it’s REALLY good tasting – like I’m always sad when my Chocolate Peanut Butter is empty. I mix up a couple days worth at a time and am able to just grab containers out of the fridge on my way out the door. Let me give you an example:
Last weekend our family went to help some friends cut wood. They use it to heat their home during the winter and you can get a permit to take dead pines (either that or they eventually fall over and block the road; the pines, not our friends =). It’s insanely cheap to get the permit ($5 a cord, 4 cords minimum – a cord is a really arbitrary measurement). We had to leave by 6 AM to get down to the place at the time we wanted. While I was packing the cooler with food for the kids I threw in several “blender bottle” containers full of Keto Chow… and that was it! I drank one on the drive and the other in between chopping up the tree. It’s easy, it’s effective and it’s tasty. I even brought along Keto Chow to Disneyland.
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So I use it myself, how about other people? PrimitiveOrigins posted that he had lost 100 lbs on Keto Chow, complete with before and after pics. I asked him for a full review, here it is:
About a year and a half ago I was having a bunch of medical issues and it seemed my diet had to change and I needed to lose some weight. So after trying diet after diet nothing worked. A lot of this had to do with the nature of the diets themselves, I’m very “black and white” as a person and the diets I was attempting were very just avoid carbs at night or try to eat vegan for breakfast and lunch. That is fine for some people, but since these diets gave me an inch I became a ruler. I needed something as strict and rigid as myself, I stumbled across keto. It seemed very easy for me to do. Want pizza? Nope, can’t have it: carbs and sugar. Want a pineapple? Full of sugar: nope. So I went forth with this idea and it was fine for a while, but I soon realized I disliked cooking and eating; only keto gave me a realization that I was only eating for fuel so I started looking for something that would fit that idea.
I found Soylent quite quickly and marveled at the idea; this was exactly what I was looking for, but soon realized it wouldn’t work for me as weight loss was my goal and Soylent doesn’t really provide efficient weight loss. So I started looking for keto version of soylent and discovered […] Keto Chow. I placed my first order of a months’ worth of rich chocolate.
I explained to my wife what I was planning on doing, she was skeptical to say the least (amplified by the fact that the order came in a ziploc bag lol.), but I pressed and she agreed if anything was going to work it would be this. I got my order and mixed everything up and the next day I would have my first meal.
I had my first meal. Taste wise, I did not enjoy rich chocolate at all, but again I was drinking it only for fuel so I pushed through it. I drink 2 a day as it works for my schedule better, one at around 6am and the other at around 6pm, I have done this for about a year and a half now.
The toughest part was training myself out of eating socially, that took about a month to get used to. Once that was over it was smooth sailing, I started mixing my own.
I didn’t see any weight loss, but I got a scale and I was reading it on the scale, so something had to be working. It was insanely motivating and frankly addicting. When people would offer me food or soda my gut reaction was like: “Are you insane? I’m not working out and I’m losing weight at an aggressive rate, you couldn’t pay me to stop this!” My friends all thought I was nuts for the first month or two then after I dropped my first 50lbs or so they were very interested and I had at least 4 friends try it. None of which could stick with it as aggressively as I did/do. It’s a wonderful meal replacement, but real weight loss takes dedication and I was determined.
I’ve “cheated” on Keto Chow by, now and then – maybe once a month, getting plain meatballs from Noodles&Co. or having scrambled eggs and bacon and that was great while it lasted, but I was having some stomach trouble from that so I gave it up.
Overall my plans for the future are: Keto Chow until I cannot anymore. One of the reasons I’m going to be doing keto chow the rest of my life is because I had undiagnosed absence seizures. For the longest time, my wife and I just thought I’d get mixed up when speaking because of my stutter and forget what I was talking about. I’d have really bad headaches and get randomly tired throughout the day. I was going to the doctor to make sure I wasn’t losing weight too fast and that everything was going smoothly. It was, but one day I happened to “cheat” and grab some Noodles&Co. meatballs before my Dr. appointment; and I had an absence seizure right in front of him. He noticed and we started testing for epilepsy. Apparently I have a good deal of food allergies that also trigger seizures, but apparently I was an undiagnosed epileptic for some time and thanks to you I’ve been seizure free for almost 2 years. (Minus the forced ones.)
It’s so cheap, it’s so simple. I see no reason to ever change my diet at this point. My wife and my friends are all used to it; it’s a bit strange explaining it to new people, but the results speak for themselves. Overall I’ve never been happier or more healthy and it’s all thanks to Chris.
Seriously, that’s just awesome. This is why I make Keto Chow.
Found a fun review of Keto Chow
I routinely check my web site logs for info on where people are coming from, sometimes it’s normal stuff like people coming from the Keto Chow subreddit. Other times it’s a bunch of people coming from somewhere new. Yesterday “Girl Eats Keto” published a review on Keto Chow: http://girleatsketo.com/index.php/2016/08/19/keto-chow-review/ She also has a more general “here’s what I’m doing to start Keto” post up. Overall it’s shaping up to be a nice blog! Image at top is from her review.
Awesome user success post from Reddit today
Just saw this posted over on /r/keto, thought you’d all enjoy seeing it (make sure you check out the photo gallery). 350 to 225lbs.
Found an awesome Keto blog – especially relevant for “the ladies”
OK, so I was kicking around /r/keto and found this post which linked over to this recipe over on ketokarma.com
Seriously good stuff and inspiring! She has a wealth of great information, recipes, and video updates. If you’re looking into starting Keto, wanting some more info, motivation to keep going, or whatever – check it out!
Staying keto at Disneyland
Phineas and Ferb taught me to be careful about what I post online (they carved it into a meteor or something so it was really important) so I usually don’t post anything about going on vacation until after I get back. I’m back.
We finally took our kids to Disneyland. Some of the stuff was too immature for the older kids and some was too intense for the youngest. That didn’t deter us at all though. I also wasn’t deterred about staying keto while I was in Disneyland, also known as land of carbs.
I didn’t have very high hopes of finding foods I could eat there so I bought a few extra insulated flasks and brought along enough Keto Chow for myself and my wife. I was also prepared to do intermittent fasting (eat at night, drink during the day), ended up never doing it though. Following my previously established pattern from the last time I did Keto Chow in a hotel I brought:
- Two bags of Chocolate Peanut Butter
- a carton of heavy whipping cream
- 4 blender bottles for mixing and chilling
- MCT oil
- Fish oil pills
- Scale
- Measuring cup
- Bottle brush
- Soap
- Vacuum insulated flasks
Happily it all fit into an Amazon box for easy packing:
The Vacuum flasks do an excellent job of keeping Keto Chow cold all day in a backpack- provided it’s cold when you put it in there. Hence the need for the blender bottles. I would mix up enough to replace the ones used that day, stick them in the fridge overnight and in the morning pour the Keto Chow into the HydroFlasks. Wash out the now empty blender bottles (with soap and the brush) and leave them to dry. While we were there I had a GoPro strapped to my chest that took a photo every 30 seconds. I ended up with a bunch of fun photos of me eating keto chow (and other keto friendly foods):
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Should be noted that if you’re willing to pay the $37/plate at Ariel’s Grotto for breakfast they will do a surprisingly good job adapting the meal for a low-carb diet. The server was fine removing the hash browns and toast and adding more bacon, then she asked if I wanted more sausage and some avocado slices. I also ate 3 of the smoked turkey legs – Allegedly they’re soaked in a brine solution with no carbs, I can’t find reliable information though.
On a side note, on our way to California we stopped in Mesquite Nevada for a night, we caught the buffet and I was surprised at the crab legs, I kinda ate a lot of them (did 3 plates like this):
Results from soylent eater’s survey – keto and gender analysis
The results from the 2016 soylent Eaters Survey are in – I hadn’t commented on it yet since I was out on vacation last week and didn’t really dig down into the results until yesterday.
I’m not a stats guy, can’t even hope to work R but I can poke around a bit with Excel and a few other tools. One question I had was “given the gender disparity in the 2015 survey, would the ketogenic versions change the results? Would there be a higher incidence of women drinking ketogenic ones?”
I’m not going to get into the argument about gender/sex and all that, not the time. There were 26 people who gave a response on the survey that wasn’t “male” or “female”. If you like you can read all the responses to all the questions here. I’m just going to analyze the responses. OK, now that that’s out of the way…
The image at the top shows the total numbers and percentages for all the responses, regardless of what they were or were not using/eating. 18% selected Female, 81% selected Male and 0.8% typed in something different. 18% is larger than the 14% from the 2015 survey but it’s still small. I’ll quote Ted:
Such a wide skew is unlikely to be due to the demographics of reddit as our major sample source, as the Reddit audience is 47% female.
The most plausible answer we’ve heard for the gender disparity since first reporting this disparity last year is that the market for female meal replacement shakes is already well served by Slim Fast and the plethora of other diet shakes created in the past 20 years. In this interpretation, the soylent/future food trend can be categorized as “slim fast for men.”
We think there are two important differences between future food and the diet shakes of the past. One, future foods could be consumed perpetually as a single source of nutrition, even if they aren’t currently being used that way. And two, as we’ve seen in this years data, use of these products is consistent over time, not just during periods of dieting.
That’s the general breakdown by gender, let’s see what happens when we add the additional dimension of “Which soylent/future food distributions do you primarily consume?” – I took off any that had less than 15 responses to make it more relevant. I’d also like to add “Which soylent/future food distributions have you tried?” but I haven’t figured the Excel stuff to do that yet.
I find it really interesting that the two “soylent” type foods with the highest percentage of female users are both ketogenic: Keto Chow and KetoSoy. I did skew the numbers a little in my favor by sending out a quick invitation to people who had used Keto Chow in the last year. Still, I like that my product has an above average representation of female users, mostly because the people I like best are women =) Here’s another view of the gender/distribution data:
Here’s some additional analysis of the survey, and here too.
A Keto Vacation
Got back yesterday from vacation at Bear lake (because we’re the BAIR’s! get it?! …sorry, “dad” joke) My parents came along which made meals interesting – 4 adults eating (mostly) keto and 6 kids eating regular food. We only cooked 5lbs of the bacon we brought but we did power through an awful lot of rotisserie chicken, mayo and boiled eggs for chicken salad. It was a fun time. My wife said:
You should make a post with the big bacon pictures in Minnetonka Cave. Then you can geekily talk about the minerals and stuff
Well, I’m not going to geek out about minerals and stuff – our guide did that enough for everyone. =) The “Cave Bacon” was pretty cool though, here’s another picture of the surrounding area
I did set up a time lapse both times we went down to the “beach” (which consisted of tiny shells that got into your shoes and was the equivalent of walking barefoot across a floor of legos) – the kids still had fun.
About the Business Cards that come in orders
Back in March we started including business cards in the packages we ship out. It was my Wife’s idea (I think, might have been Heather’s idea originally). There’s a discount code on the back but it only works once for each person, we continue sending them with each order so you’ll have a nice and easy way to explain to people that ask what is up with Keto Chow. Here’s a comment I got on an order this morning:
Please include a bunch of cards so I can hand em’ out to my friends and coworkers whom are interested in the “shake” that has allowed me to loose 45lbs.
THAT is why we put the cards in there =)
Keto Chow 1.5… ice cream?
The overwhelming consensus of Keto Chow 1.5 is
tastes like melted ice cream
I agree and decided to see what would happen if I tried making it back into ice cream. So I mixed up 6 meals worth of Cookies&Cream and put it into (one of) my ice cream makers. One of my daughters did a science experiment on salt/ice ratios for ice cream 2 years ago so I have the technique down solid (30+ rounds of ice cream will do that).
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So, I think that Keto Chow has too much water in it to make ice cream. It would be fine for shaved ice or something but it turned out more like Ice Milk than Ice Cream. I put it into pint mason jars and into the freezer, once frozen you could easily see the clear ice. I later softened it and had my awesome wife try it out. She likes how it’s cold but has been letting it melt and drinking it – there are easier ways to make cold Keto Chow =)
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