There are 'NO CARBS' in Chicken!!!

your body converts some of the protein to 'sugar'

My understanding is that here is a limit to how much protein your body can process/utilise after any one meal and any not needed for basic maintenance/repair by the body is converted into glucose by a process called gluconeogenesis. I've read that the ideal amount of protein at each meal is 30g. Excess protein can also cause issues for people trying to stay in ketosis, so a moderate protein limit is recommended.

I believe Type 1s on a LCHF may need to cover excess protein with insulin for that reason. Dr Bernstein has a video about it:

My understanding has been that meat ( or any other major protein source) unless eaten in (very?) large quantities, only gets turned into energy/glucose as a sort of last resource after all carbs and fats have been exhausted? (Which I think is more or less what @Indy51 has said.) So I would imagine that you don't have to worry unless you are eating that and not much else in any one meal.

As a type 2, all meat, fish, chicken, etc, has been the major food source on my " OK to eat without worrying about any possible carbohydrate content". But, I don't know if the answer is different for insulin users/type 1s.

Robbity

Protein will increase BG levels, but fat won't. For this reason I avoid chicken breast and lean cuts of meat.
Apparently the Inuits (Eskimos - who only eat meat and fish, no carbs) would give all the lean cuts of meat to the dogs.

The "Maximum 30g of protein" statement has been disproved in relatively recent studies (do an internet search). There used to be a mantra amongst the bodybuilding community of little protein and often, however it has been determined that the body manages the digestion of protein to get the maximum amino acids out, so the 30g max in one session has been demonstrated to be incorrect.

The reason that large volumes of protein can cause issues in a ketogenic diet is the Gluconeogenesis effect already mentioned (and as I eat a lot of protein due to exercise, I see it as a regular issue in terms of blood glucose elevation). I know that I have to bolus for my protein, but I tend to sugar surf with defined limits otherwise I hypo too frequently.

Ian DP said:

Protein will increase BG levels, but fat won't. For this reason I avoid chicken breast and lean cuts of meat.
Apparently the Inuits (Eskimos - who only eat meat and fish, no carbs) would give all the lean cuts of meat to the dogs.

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Help, My collies have just headed north at high speed looking for Inuit encampments

tim2000s said:

The "Maximum 30g of protein" statement has been disproved in relatively recent studies (do an internet search). There used to be a mantra amongst the bodybuilding community of little protein and often, however it has been determined that the body manages the digestion of protein to get the maximum amino acids out, so the 30g max in one session has been demonstrated to be incorrect.

The reason that large volumes of protein can cause issues in a ketogenic diet is the Gluconeogenesis effect already mentioned (and as I eat a lot of protein due to exercise, I see it as a regular issue in terms of blood glucose elevation). I know that I have to bolus for my protein, but I tend to sugar surf with defined limits otherwise I hypo too frequently.

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Is this the article you were talking about: http://www.ketotic.org/2012/08/if-you-eat-excess-protein-does-it-turn.html ?

Interesting reading and it will take me a while to see if I grasp it all. However, they make the caveat in a few places that we really don't know how much the general rule of gluconeogenesis being tightly controlled holds true for diabetics, which only makes it harder to sort the truth from fiction - it's very frustrating trying to make sense of all this stuff in real world terms

Also makes it difficult when it seems like all the mouse studies using the diabetic mouse model may be tainted:
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/releases/288296.php

I am not a low carber, but I cannot eat 'protein' foods without taking Insulin. I am ok with some lettuce and cucumber though
I tried it once with scrambled eggs and 2 rashers if bacon, unbelieveable reading afterwards never again, so it is always Insulin.

Best wishes RRB

Ian DP said:

Protein will increase BG levels, but fat won't. For this reason I avoid chicken breast and lean cuts of meat.
Apparently the Inuits (Eskimos - who only eat meat and fish, no carbs) would give all the lean cuts of meat to the dogs.

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I wonder if that is really true. They actually seem have eaten high quantities of protein . (seems to slightly more than half the calories from protein) http://freetheanimal.com/2014/10/damned-inuit-diet.html . ( I don't normally like the style of this blogger but in this case there are links that allow you to follow up these mostly old but fascinating papers about the Inuit lifestyle )
As I mentioned in another post yesterday .The Inuits also carry a particular genetic variation and they are not effcient at breaking down stored fat or fat from food. Their ability to develop ketosis is limited. It is the normal gene variant amongst the Inuit and some other Alaskan populations Now,with non traditional lifestyles, it is screened for and anti hypo precautions put in place. This shows simply what the variant does to the metabolism http://www.newbornscreening.info/Parents/fattyaciddisorders/CPT1AV.html
I assume that none of us have have this genetic variation so what they ate is interesting but wouldn't be a good model for us.

From experimenting on myself, I have very clear protein causing blood glucose increases, and different protein sources have different effects. Whey protein shake has an effect that is not dissimilar in profile to a carb source like brown rice! It is probably remarkably individual...

I was told that in the absence of carbs protein converts to glucose by around 50% and fat 10%, it's difficult to get the bolus right for very low-carb meals and the only way to do so is trial & error, some of use the split-dosing technique whereby you take a small amount of insulin before the meal and another 2-3 hours after to allow for the slow digestion of the meal and it's effect on bg levels.

Indy51 said:

My understanding is that here is a limit to how much protein your body can process/utilise after any one meal and any not needed for basic maintenance/repair by the body is converted into glucose by a process called gluconeogenesis. I've read that the ideal amount of protein at each meal is 30g. Excess protein can also cause issues for people trying to stay in ketosis, so a moderate protein limit is recommended.

I believe Type 1s on a LCHF may need to cover excess protein with insulin for that reason. Dr Bernstein has a video about it:

Click to expand...

Thanks for the link Indy51.

So according to Dr Bernstein the typical insulin requirements to cover protein are only one half of a unit per ounce (28.35g) compared to one unit per 8g for carbohydrate. So it would seem that although excess protein can raise your BGL it is approximately only one seventh as potent as carbohydrate in this regard.

Further to this Dr Bernstein recommends that only the slow acting "crystalline" form of insulin is needed, presumably due to the limited rate at which glucose is produced via gluconeogenesis.

All of this suggests that the people here who have observed large BGL spikes after consuming protein may have something else going on here. It may be that there was some other carbohydrate inadvertently consumed with the meal, or it may be one of the other complex feedbacks (from the gut) on insulin sensitivity causing this.

In other words, I don't think it's normal for protein to cause BGL spikes, but excess protein may require some additional slow release (or basal dose) insulin. At least in the case of most people.

Ian DP said:

Protein will increase BG levels, but fat won't. For this reason I avoid chicken breast and lean cuts of meat.
Apparently the Inuits (Eskimos - who only eat meat and fish, no carbs) would give all the lean cuts of meat to the dogs.

Click to expand...

I can't stand the fat or skin of any meat, so will only eat skinless chicken breasts and the leanest of meats. I haven't noticed my BG going up afterwards as long as I haven't had any carbs with it..

uart said:

Thanks for the link Indy51.

So according to Dr Bernstein the typical insulin requirements to cover protein are only one half of a unit per ounce (28.35g) compared to one unit per 8g for carbohydrate. So it would seem that although excess protein can raise your BGL it is approximately only one seventh as potent as carbohydrate in this regard.

Further to this Dr Bernstein recommends that only the slow acting "crystalline" form of insulin is needed, presumably due to the limited rate at which glucose is produced via gluconeogenesis.

All of this suggests that the people here who have observed large BGL spikes after consuming protein may have something else going on here. It may be that there was some other carbohydrate inadvertently consumed with the meal, or it may be one of the other complex feedbacks (from the gut) on insulin sensitivity causing this.

In other words, I don't think it's normal for protein to cause BGL spikes, but excess protein may require some additional slow release (or basal dose) insulin. At least in the case of most people.

Click to expand...

I noted that when Bernstein talks about ounces of protein, he means the weight of the meat/fish/whatever rather than the grams of protein in it.

uart said:

All of this suggests that the people here who have observed large BGL spikes after consuming protein may have something else going on here. It may be that there was some other carbohydrate inadvertently consumed with the meal, or it may be one of the other complex feedbacks (from the gut) on insulin sensitivity causing this.

In other words, I don't think it's normal for protein to cause BGL spikes, but excess protein may require some additional slow release (or basal dose) insulin. At least in the case of most people.

Click to expand...

When you are eating <30g of carbs per day, pure whey protein causes a very clear increase in glucose level - I have observed this via the Libre on multiple occasions. The one I take has 1g of carbs per serving and 24g of Protein. The resulting increase in bg levels is not attributable to the one gram of carbs. Neither is it a Spike in the traditional sense of the term. It is a slower rise more like you'd see with eating low GI carbs, but it is nevertheless there. I'd agree with Bernstein and had previously floated the idea of taking Actrapid as a good way of dealing with it.

As for the requirement to bolus 1u per 28.35 grammes of protein - don't take everything the "great man" says as gospel. He's the first to admit that it's generally personal. Like I take 1u for 12g of carbs, and not 8g, so I need to take 1u for about 24g of protein.

Equally the rate of gluconeogenesis varies dependent on protein type. Eggs have a more rapid effect than Chicken which has a more rapid approach than Beef due to fat content of the various food. This is, again, personal.

In addition, I am eating 50-70 grams of protein per meal so it's not like simply eating a single chicken breast. As an overall percentage that is causing the increase, it's probably less than half the protein content doing this.

robert72 said:

I noted that when Bernstein talks about ounces of protein, he means the weight of the meat/fish/whatever rather than the grams of protein in it.

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Yes I was wondering about that myself. He did seem slightly vague on that point in the video. His exact words were (2:45)

One ounce of protein food will require (for most people...) about one half a unit of regular insulin per ounce of protein.

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This seemed a little unclear to me. At first when he said "protein food" I thought perhaps he was talking about per ounce of whole food, but then at the end of the sentence he says "per ounce of protein", suggesting that it really is per ounce of just the protein content itself.

So my question to you Robert is: Are you certain about what he meant there, or are you also guessing? Because I am somewhat unsure.