Want to see my 10 favorite keto meals to help you lose weight during the Coronavirus quarantine? Losing weight and keto have been a focus area of mine lately and I was worried I was going to slip up and fail, but luckily these meals I have been making are delicious. Not to mention I have been watching the number on the scale decrease which is motivation to keep going.
In this article I will detail my top 10 keto meals to help you lose, and tell you how much weight I actually lost.
What Is the Ketogenic Diet?
If you have never eaten keto, I urge you to do your research first. When I first started, I did as much digging as I could to make sure it was healthy. There are pros and cons with every diet, and no it is not for everyone, but for me it worked.
I started looking at keto as a lifestyle change more than a diet. It started forcing me to eat more natural foods and good fats instead of the pizza rolls and subs I was inhaling every few days.
The keto meals I would eat was helping me lose weight. And fast!
While in quarantine during the Coronavirus Pandemic I lost 6 pounds in two weeks!
Although a couple of those pounds were water weight, it didn’t matter because eventually I started losing inches. I feel 100% healthier than I ever have before! I never want to lose the energy I have, but eventually I will transition to more of a low carb diet instead of keto. But that is still a few months away.
For now I’ll stick to the ketogenic diet until I hit my goal weight of 120 pounds!
For more Keto Resources, Click on the Articles Below:
What is the Ketogenic Diet and Should I be on it?
What Keto Did To My Body In 30 Days.
The Keto Spinach Salad You Can’t Live Without.
What Cheating on my Keto Diet Did to me Mentally and Physically.
The above articles give a detailed description on what the ketogenic diet is, and all that is involved. Including the most delicious keto spinach salad I can’t live without.
Quarantine Life
If you’re reading this article during the Coronavirus Pandemic, then keep reading. If not, skip ahead to the actual meals.
Anyways, I’ve seen so many memes lately about everyone stuck in their houses. They range from sitting on our phones all day, to eating all the food we just purchased.
I’m trying to find things to keep me sane. If I am not coming up with easy ways to workout while on lockdown, I am in the kitchen cooking!
Cooking has been such a great stress relief for me. Not only does it make me happy, I’m getting really good at it. I always though of myself as a good cook, but having so much extra time is really pulling out my creative side.
Trying to make my quarantine food last has been a challenge, but it’s forcing me to try out new combinations. Read on to see my top 10 keto meals to help you lose weight!
Keep in mind the carbs listed are mostly NET CARBS. Net carbs are the carbohydrates minus the fiber. I try to stay under 20 NET CARBS per day. Your daily goal my vary.
1. Breakfast Burritos
Homemade!
Honestly this is my favorite out of my top 10 keto meals. It’s soooo good.
Ingredients are as follows:
- Mission Spinach Tortilla (low carb): 3 carbs
- Two Scrambled eggs w/Colby Jack cheese: 1 carb
- Two Bob Evans sausage Patties cut up: 0 carbs
- J.L. Kraft Chipotle Aioli: 0 carbs
- Taco Bell hot sauce: 0 carbs
I cook the eggs and sausage in a pot, while I am putting the rest together in the low carb tortilla. After I have included all ingredients, I grill the wrap in the sausage grease. It is so delicious. I only eat this about 3 times per week to save some of my ingredients. But if I could eat it for every meal I would. It’s THAT good.
Also I normally have extra eggs and sausage (not much), so I give my left overs to my fiance. He always enjoys that!
2. Spicy Spinach Salad
Out of my top 10 keto foods to help me lose weight, this was definitely one of the main reasons. It’s light, but filling.
I eat one of these every single day. I meal prep these salads every 5 days. That way I always know how much of each ingredient I have left.
Ingredients:
- Spinach leaves: 1 carbs
- Red onion: <1 carb
- Pepperoni: 0 carbs
- Habanero cheese: 1 carb
- Avocado: 1 carb
- Sriracha ranch: 1 carb
No cooking necessary. Basically throw all of these items in a bowl and mix. Sometimes I will use jalapenos, but unfortunately I ran out. If you decide to add them, a tablespoon is approximately <1 carb.
3. Turkey and Bacon Wrap
Okay now this was something I stumbled upon on accident. I putting lunch together for my fiance, when I decided to throw some of his ingredients into my meal. It turned out AMAZING.
Ingredients:
- Mission low carb tortilla: 3 carbs
- One slice of bacon: < 1 carb
- Colby Jack Cheese: 1 carb
- Turkey lunch meat: 1 carb
- Pepperoni: 0 carbs
- J.L. Kraft Chipotle Aioli: 0 carbs
Same as the breakfast burrito, some of it is cooked and the rest is read-to-use right from your fridge.
I take the bacon and pepperoni slices and fry them on the stove, The rest is assembled while the bacon and pepperoni is cooking. Once the fried items are ready, I put it all together in the spinach wrap and fry it in the bacon grease.
None of the food is ever deep fried in the grease. It just gives the wrap a nice crunch on the edges.
Once it’s taken from the pan, all of the contents inside melt together for the best little lunch you’ll ever eat!
4. Shrimp Alfredo Pasta
There’s a trick here…..
It’s not actually pasta. I live on zucchini noodles, and with other ingredients the dish tastes almost exactly the same as pasta. This is a super easy meal. It’s always on my list of easiest keto meals to help you and me lose weight!
I eat this meal for dinner only probably about 2 times a week.
Ingredients:
- Zucchini noodles: 1 carb
- Grilled shrimp: 2 carbs
- Rao’s Alfredo Sauce: 2 carbs
Start with defrosting the zucchini noodles. Usually I boil them in a pot of water. As they are cooking, I cook the shrimp in a separate pan. Sometimes I use butter, sometimes I don’t. That will be your call, but butter won’t add any carbohydrates. Just more flavor.
Once both are ready, I drain the excess water and mix them together. Pour the Alfredo sauce on top and you’ve got yourself a delicious keto dinner.
Sometimes I will sprinkle jalapeno powder on top to spice it up. Or once in a while I will throw cayenne pepper on to make it more of a Cajun shrimp Alfredo pasta!
5. Pizza Quesadilla
If someone told me you can’t recreate pizza on keto I would have never started. I am so obsessed with pizza it’s not funny. So thank goodness I can live on pizza quesadillas every so often to get my pizza fix in.
Ingredients:
- Vegetable oil: 0 carbs
- Two Mission low carb tortillas: 8 carbs combined
- Mozzarella cheese: 2 carbs
- Pepperoni: 0 carbs
- Pizza Sauce: 3 carbs
So clearly this meal is the highest in carbohydrates. I wouldn’t suggest eating this multiple times in a week, but for me once in a while works.
Also make sure you are looking for low carb pizza sauce. I use the Rao’s brand. I can eat this as a meal along with the rest of my days meals and not get kicked out of ketosis.
To start I pour about a tablespoon of veg. oil in a heated pan. I put on tortilla on it to soak some of the oil up, and then place that tortilla aside. Then I place the other tortilla on remaining oil and start building my quesadilla.
For me it’s only pepperoni and cheese. So I build it, and put the other oil soaked tortilla on top (oil side on top so when you flip it, it cooks). After about 3-5 minutes of each side cooking, cut however you’d like and dip in your pizza sauce!
To cut carbs, you can skip the sauce, or only use 1 tortilla, and make a half quesadilla.
I always add red crushed peppers to my inside contents to increase the hotness.
Overall, PIZZA can be on the list of keto meals I eat to help me lose weight! SCORE!
6. Actual Homemade Pizza!
Again my pizza cravings. This meal has less carbs though, because only one tortilla is being used.
But it looks and tastes just like an actual pizza pie.
Ingredients:
- One Mission low carb tortilla: 3 carbs
- Pepperoni: 0 carbs
- Mozzerella cheese: 2 carbs
- Pizza sauce: 3 carbs
- Vegetable oil: 0 carbs
This is the first meal where you will actually have to deep fry something. Put some vegetable oil in a pan, and heat it. Once it’s ready, place one tortilla in the pan. Flip a couple times and take out when it gets a nice golden brown.
While the tortilla is frying, set your stove to 400 degrees F.
After you have taken the tortilla out of the oil, put your pizza sauce, cheese, and pepperoni on top. Place it in the oven for about 7-10 minutes until the cheese is a nice golden crisp.
Enjoy!
One of my favorite things about this meal is that unlike the quesadilla, it involves less tortilla, which means less carbs. I also love the crisp of the tortilla that’s acting as the crust. And of course you know I am putting crushed red peppers on mine.
7. Broccoli Cheddar Soup
This meal is so good for a cold rainy day. Low in carbs, but so delicious and filling. My Fiance has been loving this soup lately, so I have made two big batches in the last few weeks.
The cool thing about this soup is that it tastes just as good as leftovers.
Ingredients:
- Broccoli (I use the frozen in the bag kind): 5 carbs
- Onion (optional): 1 carb
- Heavy whipping cream: 0 carbs
- Swanson Cooking Stock: 1 carb
- Mild cheddar cheese: 2 carbs
First defrost your broccoli. I boil mine in water, and once they are soft I add a little bit of butter. I wrote onions are optional, because I make mine both ways and they honestly taste exactly the same.
If you were to add onion, let them soak in the butter along with the broccoli. Once they have sat for a few minutes, add in the stock and heavy whipping cream.
I actually add the entire soup stock and about a 3/4 cup of the heavy whipping cream and it always comes out amazing. I stopped following recipe guidelines, based on repetition.
Depending on what type of stock you use can add or subtract carbs. I use the seafood one. There is <1 carb, and it doesn’t taste any different than vegetable, beef or chicken. With all of the ingredients mixed in, no one will sit down and ask “is this seafood stock”?!
Stir in about 1 cup of mild cheddar cheese, while the heat is still on the pot so it melts right in.
Add your own seasonings for taste. I use pepper and ghost pepper salt.
Lastly, you can add a teaspoon of Xanthan Gum to thicken the broth. It does add carbs (1 tsp is 7 carbs), but if you like a thicker soup I would add some. That 7 carbs is also mixed into the entire batch. I make enough for about 8-10 servings.
8. Parm Crisps and Guacamole
I just discovered this snack the other day. Chips and fresh guacamole is one of my favorite Mexican appetizers, so imagine how bummed I am that I can’t have tortilla chips anymore.
I actually did fry some of my low carb tortillas up into chip size pieces, and they turned out amazing. But for a snack I don’t always want to be doing all that work.
So I found these Oven Baked Parm Chips in my pantry that I rarely ate, and decided to try them with some guac. Ooooh it was good. There are different flavors too, so if this sounds good to you, try out some other ones!
Ingredients:
- Sour Cream & Onion Parm Crisps: 1 carb every 3 pieces
- Avocado: 2 carbs
- Onion: < 1 carb
The only prepping you have to do is make the guacamole. I usually mash up one avocado, a little bit of red onion, tomato and jalapeno. But to save time and effort (plus I ran out of jalapeno), I have just been doing avocado and onion with some jalapeno powder.
Mix it all together, and DIP!
9. Bang Bang Sauce
Okay this isn’t a meal, but I love sauces and condiments. I started making bang bang sauce to dip my chicken in and it’s really tasty!!
Ingredients (I’ll be more specific here):
- 1/4 cup mayonnaise
- 2 teaspoons Sriracha
- 1 teaspoon swerve, confectioners
- 2 tablespoons garlic chili paste
If you total these measurements up, it comes out to 4.5 carbs total.
If you are looking for something extra to go with your pan fried shrimp or low carb crab cakes, bang bang sauce is your best bet!
I don’t always add the swerve in, and I can’t taste the difference. That ingredient is completely up to you.
10. Cauliflower Tater Tots
We’ve come so far with the 10 keto meals to help you lose weight, and now onto the last.
Cue cauliflower tater tots.
I’m sure you can make these yourself, but I wont because you can just buy this at the store. No prep time, no work. Just put in the oven and wait.
So my favorite brand to eat is the Meijer brand. But I assume not everyone has a local Meijers. Check the packages for the nutritional values of the package you want to buy. Make sure you subtract the fiber from the actual carb count to get your net carbs.
The Meijer brand has 7 net carbs, and that’s the lowest I have found so far.
Anyways, put these bad boys in the oven and once they are ready enjoy. I always let mine cook for about 5-10 minutes longer than advised, because I like them a little crispy. Once they are ready, I dip them in my bang bang sauce, and I have myself a nice little tater tot breakfast.
Sometimes I pair them with Bob Evans sausages for a little extra.