Is Ground Beef Keto? What they don't tell you about beef

Beef is a superfood providing many benefits, most notably:

1. Strong antioxidant and anti-inflammatory food
2. Can help maintain good blood pressure
3. Helps boost mood and has cognitive benefits
4. Great for weight loss
5. Improves workout performance and recovery

Beef is a nutritional powerhouse and should be your top choice for meat while doing the Keto diet. When buying beef, you can pick the fattier cuts, which will provide the fats you need while doing the keto diet. A popular choice is Ribeye. For the frugal and looking to save money, 70% lean 30% fat ground beef is an excellent choice which is around 2:1 fat to protein ratio by weight.

Some people may think eating a lot of beef is very expensive. On the contrary, depending on your location, it is significantly cheaper compared to other red meats such as lamb. Continue reading to find out the often underrated nutritional value beef provides and why it is well worth the money.

A single serving of beef (80% lean 20% fat ground beef) is approximately 4 ounces or 113 grams. Beef is made up of approximately 69% water and contains 287 kcal of calories.

Beef contains zero carbohydrates and is keto approved. The only exception to this is beef liver which contains a small amount of carbs. This is because the liver is where animals store glucose in the form of glycogen.

A single serving of lean beef is approximately 19.4g protein and 22.6g fat, at around 1:1.2 protein to fat ratio. Different cuts of beef will have varying ratios.

Animal source protein is scored to have the highest digestibility, containing high quality protein which is more bioavailable to the human body allowing it to be mostly absorbed rather than being excreted. Animal sourced protein has over 90% bioavailability whereas plant sourced proteins range from 40% - 60%.

For an average adult, a 9 oz. steak contains all the amino acid needs for the body meeting 100% of the RDA requirements.

Beef that is not overcooked contain a small amount of Vitamin C and is an excellent source for highly bioavailable heme iron, zinc, selenium, potassium, phosphorus, Vitamin B3, B6 and B12.

All essential vitamins and minerals needed by the human body are found in beef in lesser quantities.

Minerals - Calcium, Copper, Magnesium, Potassium, Phosphorus, Selenium, Zinc

Fat Soluble Vitamins - Vitamin A as the human usable form retinol, Vitamin D, Vitamin E, Vitamin K (abundant in animal fat).

Water Soluble Vitamins - Vitamin C, Thiamin (B1), Riboflavin (B2), Niacin (B3), Pantothenic Acid (B5), Vitamin B6, Folate(B9), Vitamin B12.

Beef also contains many bioactive compounds that exerts beneficial physiological effects on the human body.

Taurine

Taurine is a conditionally essential sulfur amino acid. Some can be made in the human body but generally needs to be obtained from the diet as well because not enough is synthesized endogenously. Our body in order to create taurine endogenously requires methionine, cysteine amino acids and Vitamin B6.

In the human body, it acts as an antioxidant which is able to bind strong oxidants, helping prevent inflammation in the body.(r)

It is also found in bile and makes it more potent which helps improve digestion of fat.(r)

A study shows that this may be an important nutrient which helps carbohydrate metabolism by increasing the insulin sensitivity of the tissues in our immune system, such as skin and other mucosal tissue that is exposed to bacteria and pathogens. (r)

A single serving of beef contains about 49mg of taurine. (r)

L-Carnitine

Red meats including beef contains carnitine which is an amino acid that helps you body move fatty acids into the mitochondria for burning as energy. L-carnitine has been associated with various benefits including improved weight loss, improvements in brain function, heart health, exercise performance and reduction of depression symptoms. L-carnitine supplements suffer from low bioavailability of approximately 15-18%.(r) Therefore food sources of l-carnitine provide the best absorption in to the body.

Studies have shown in mice that, l-carnitine acts as an antioxidant protecting against oxidative stress.(r, r) It is also anti-inflammatory, helping lower inflammation in the body.(r) l-carnitine also chelates metal ions in the body which helps prevent cell damage from ingested and pollution sources.(r)

Another notable function on the human body and especially on the ketogenic diet is that l-carnitine helps with ketosis, to maintain the production of ketones in the body. A deficiency can cause hypoketonemia which is a state of low ketones in the body.(r)

There is approximately 157mg of l-carnitine in a 4 oz. serving of beef.(r)

L-Carnosine

L-Carnosine is a strong antioxidant(r) found in beef and is shown to increase the activity of glutathione to neutralize toxins in your blood and skin.(r) It can also work synergistically with Vitamin E to reduce oxidative stress.(r) In studies done on mice, it is also found that it may also be able to counteract consequences of oxidative stress and thus may have anti-aging properties.(r) L-Carnosine can also form complexes with unwanted metal ions in the body preventing them from damaging cells.(r, r, r)

Animal studies have also found that it may help mitigate toxicity of amyloid plaque which is implicated in people with alzheimer's disease.(r)

In mice and human studies, l-carnosine has been found to reduce blood sugar levels, hba1c and blood pressure.(r, r, r)

You can find 424mg of l-carnosine in a single 4oz serving of beef loin.(r)

Choline

Choline is a conditionally essential nutrient for the human body since your body can produce it but doesn’t produce enough for everyday use. Deficiency is found in studies to be associated with many pathological conditions and diseases such as decreased energy production, fatty liver, hepatocyte death and skeletal muscle damage.(r)

Choline acts as an antioxidant in the body and helps prevent inflammation. It may also affect the ketogenic diet as studies in mice have shown to reduce fat oxidation when fed a choline deficient diet.(r)

A single 4 oz serving of beef contains approximately 75mg of choline. Recommended daily intake is 550 mg for men and 425 mg for women. (r)

Glutathione

Glutathione is called the master antioxidant of the human body. It acts as our body’s main antioxidant defense. We produce this antioxidant endogenously and can acquire it from food intake. Eating a high protein diet also increases its production in the body.

Glutathione also boosts immune cells improving our capacity to fight bacteria and pathogens.(r, r)

A single 4oz serving of beef contains 20mg of glutathione.(r)

Creatine

Popularly it is known as a sports performance supplement, creatine is a conditionally essential nutrient which is found in high amounts in red meat including beef which usually accumulates in muscle meat. Creatine is a very well studied compound and is shown to accelerate increase in muscle mass and the force produced. It works by increasing our energy efficiency by recycling ATP, the molecule our cells use to produce energy. Our body can produce creatine endogenously, in our liver and kidneys.

Creatine has also been shown in studies to increase cognitive performance.(r) Early trials show that it has mood boosting action in the brain. (r)

A single serving of 4oz beef contains 500mg of creatine.(r)

Conjugated linoleic acid (CLA)

CLA is a fatty acid found mainly in ruminant animal sourced foods such as beef. CLA is very well studied and known for its beneficial effect of enhancing breakdown and burning of fat in fat cells and muscles resulting in reduction of total fat mass and body weight.(r)

CLA also has the beneficial effect of being anti-inflammatory, is shown in clinical trials in humans to lower blood pressure and protects LDL from oxidation in hamsters. (r, r)

CLA can be found in beef at approximately 4.3mg per gram of fat.(r)

Coenzyme Q10

Coenzyme Q10 is a conditionally essential nutrient found in beef that your body needs for energy production and is associated with many diseases when there is a deficiency. (r) Coenzyme Q10 also works to help reduce blood pressure. (r)

It has unique properties as an antioxidant which not only helps protect membranes in the mitochondria, but it help regenerate other antioxidants such as Vitamin C and Vitamin E.(r)

A single serving of 4oz of beef contains approximately 4mg of Coenzyme Q10. This nutrient is found more abundantly in heart organ meat.(r)

Studies have shown that Impaired mood, apathy and depression is associated with inflammation in the body and therefore it is important to lower oxidative stress to boost our mood. Taurine, L-Carnitine, L-Carnosine, Glutathione, CLA, Coenzyme Q10, Choline which are all antioxidants and anti-inflammatory compounds found in beef able to prevent oxidative stress, counteract damage caused by oxidation and prevent cell damage from free metal ions in the body from food and pollution.

A population study done on 5918 men and women shows that low choline status is associated with high anxiety, but not depression.(r)

Acetyl-l-carnitine deficiency is shown in studies to be implicated in major depressive disorders (r, r) and the precursor for your body to be able to produce this compound is using l-carnitine. Therefore it is important to maintain proper dietary intake of this conditionally essential nutrient since your body will not be able to produce enough on its own.

With beef, with the combination of its protein and fat profile is very satiating and will keep you full for a long time, all while providing you with the nutrients and energy to run you body efficiently. While losing weight on a Keto diet, pick leaner cuts of beef such as chuck roast or buy lean ground beef. This will allow your body to utilize more of your stored fats rather than burning fat from your dietary intake.

Taurine found in beef increases insulin sensitivity helping you stay in ketosis and improve fat metabolism.(r)

Long term intake of CLA improves the breakdown and burning of fat.(r)

Red meats such as beef, lamb and bison are a good source of creatine. Creatine is known as a supplement that enhances muscle performance. Rather than buying a creatine supplement, 454g(1lb) of beef already contains approximately 2g of creatine. The general recommended dose of creatine is 4g so you can easily get that amount with 908g (2lb) of beef together with all the protein and other nutrients you need for the day. This is an excellent strategy for all types of sports and athletic activities. For aerobic exercises, the fatty acids provided by beef will provide a very steady flow of energy directly to your muscles while your liver will convert amino acids provided by the protein into glucose on demand for explosive movements. In order to build muscle, it is important to consume sufficient protein and eating at a caloric surplus. The best way to do this with beef is to eat slightly it past satiety. Steak and eggs is a popular way to provide all these benefits, even astronauts eat this for breakfast!

L-Carnitine helps your body maintain proper functioning ketogenesis helping your body maintain production ketones on the ketogenic diet.

The combined action of l-carnosine, glutathione and high availability of bioavailable amino acids from beef will improve your workout recovery and improve muscle protein synthesis.

Beef is highly underrated in its potential and can be considered a nutritionally complete food. Comparatively inexpensive for the value it provides, it should be used as a staple food in your diet to attain your goals.