How much Butter?

I read in the news yesterday that Norway has run out of butter due to a new low carb diet craze. Instead of eating carbohydrates, people are supposed to eat a lot more protein and fats, including animal fats like butter. Apparently so many people are on this diet that in the run up to Christmas, when people not on a diet bake butter rich cookies and candies, many places have actually completely sold out of butter. As Norway has heavy taxes on the import of dairy foods in order to protect its own dairy industry (it’s not part of the EU), they can’t even import butter in large amounts.

If high fat diets resulted in weight loss, then I should be dropping weight like crazy over Christmas as most of my seasonal treat foods like cheese and pâté are very low in carbs and very high in fat. Once again I had a lovely dinner yesterday, composed chiefly of various cheeses and pâté, though I tried to cut down on the quantities this time. Rather than having 882 calories and 42g of fat in one meal, I only had 752 calories and 38g of fat! Of course all of these diets will tell you to eat a lot more protein as well (not just the 20% I got yesterday) because that is what fills you up and stops you from craving carbohydrates. While I know that’s true, it’s really hard to get a lot of protein without some fat, whether it’s from animal sources or plant sources (nuts and chickpeas are particularly high in fat).

Unfortunately I have not seen any evidence in my life that a super high fat diet (higher than my 30% limit) will help me lose weight or tone up faster. Which is too bad because if it were true, it really would be a guilt free Christmas!

The Score:

Calories:	Protein:	Carbs:	Fat:	Alcohol:	Fibre:
2010.62	98.85g	217.57g	70.02g	15.5g	13.12g
	20%	43%	31%	5%
Calories burned through exercise:		537

What I ate:

Time	Item	Amount
08:00	Vitamins - Centrum Advance A to Zinc, 400iu of Vitamin E, 1000iu Vitamin D3 and 500mg Glucosamine sulphate	1 each
	Cold water	200mL
	Sainsbury's Be Good to Yourself smoked bacon medallions	50g
	Mesa Sunrise cereal	60g
	Alpro Soy milk	120mL
	Sainsbury's pressed apple and cherry juice	200mL
09:00	Black Tea	500mL
10:00	Easy run - 36 minutes
10:45	Lemon Lime Nuun electrolyte tablet in water	750mL
11:00	Total Greek yoghurt	125g
	Sainsbury's frozen mixed blueberries and strawberries	90g
	Sponser vanilla Recovery Shake	20g (1 scoop)
	mixed with skim milk	150mL
13:30	Homemade chicken and butternut squash risotto	275g
	Tomato	135g
14:30	Green Tea	250mL
17:30	Sainsbury's fruit and seed mix	40g
	Brazil nuts	6g
	Orange, mango and cinnamon tea	250mL
19:45	Mrs Crimbles's Cheese crackers	30g
	Waitrose Long Clawson Creamy Blue Stilton	18g
	Sainsbury's Italian Parmigiano Reggiano	18g
	Essential Waitrose Brussels pâté	35g
	Waitrose smoked salmon pâté	60g
	Waitrose Carmelised red onion chutney	36g
	Red wine	150mL
22:00	Ellactiva Chocolate Calcium Chew	1 chew
	500mg Glucosamine sulphate	1 pill

Plus 500 to 1500mL of cold water sipped from a water bottle throughout the day.