Its Rich In Vitamins And Minerals That Support Your Health
Peanuts are naturally nutrient-rich. Some of its essential micronutrients include:
- Vitamin E: A fat-soluble vitamin that supports healthy immune function and protects cells from damage, among many other functions.
- Potassium: Research shows that potassium deficiency may increase ones blood sugar and risk of developing Type 2 Diabetes.
- Zinc: This mineral is necessary for optimal health, as it promotes wound healing, protein synthesis, and immune function.
- Phosphorus: Your body needs phosphorus to make ATP, maintain strong bones and teeth, and repair cells.
- Biotin: A 28-gram serving of roasted peanuts provides 4.91 mcg of biotin, a B vitamin that helps produce energy from carbs, protein, and fats.
- Manganese: You need manganese to form healthy bones and process the sugars and starches you consume in your diet .
- Magnesium: Getting enough magnesium has many positive health effects. For example, magnesium may lower insulin, which helps with fat loss. It may also lead to a reduced risk of cardiovascular disease.
Eating Peanut Butter Won’t Kick Me Out Of Ketosis Right
As WH previously reported, your body enters a state of ketosis when it starts burning fat instead of glucose for energy. So keeping your carb intake under 10 percent of your daily nutrients helps you maintain ketosis and, potentially, lose weight. Eating too many carbs is what can kick you out of ketosis and reset your body to burning glucose again.
So how can you avoid this? By following the serving size recommendations and choosing your PBs wisely . On a 2,000 calorie keto diet, you would aim for 50 grams of carbs per day, says Schaub. So peanut butter can easily fit within that carb budget if you stick to the serving size.
Benefits To Making Your Own Keto Peanut Butter
- You can control the consistency. Just stop processing a little sooner if you like your peanut butter on the chunky side, or keep going until its ultra-smooth and creamy. Or both: just remove half the peanut butter when its chunky and finish processing the rest.
- Add any kind of neutral-flavored keto-friendly oil, such as avocado or MCT oil, to increase the fat content as well as thin it out.
- If you dont want the added fat, you can skip the oil altogether. But if youre struggling to get your fat macros in each day, this is an easy way to get there using healthy fats.
- Control the salt content! Use unsalted peanuts or go all-in with roasted peanuts with sea salt.
- Im one of those people who enjoys a quick scoop of peanut butter on a spoon. In this case, I prefer it to be a little sweeter, so I make a batch with some powdered erythritol added. It curbs my sweet tooth and my hunger, plus it keeps me within my macros.
- Its almost always cheaper, especially if you buy your peanuts in bulk. I buy mine at Costco and see considerable cost savings.
- Make almond butter or any other nut butter using the same method.
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Keto Peanut Butter Fudge
Make this keto fudge if youre looking for a quick snack that helps reduce sugar cravings. It takes a few minutes and requires four ingredients:
Add your butter and peanut butter to a mixing bowl and pop it in the microwave for a minute, so it melts. Next, whisk this mixture using a hand or electric beater and add the erythritol and vanilla extract.
Once its well mixed, get a bread loaf tray and line it with non-stick paper. Pour your mixture into this tray, tap the tray on the table a few times and toss it in the freezer for 30 minutes. When its ready, serve and store it in the fridge.
Keto Peanut Butter Nutrition Facts
Two tablespoons of keto-friendly peanut butter contain around:
- Two grams of net carbs
- 16 grams of fat
- Three grams of fiber
If you love peanut butter and dont want to eat it in moderation, keto peanut butter is a must. With only two grams of net carbs, you can spread it on your low-carb sandwiches, top it with ice cream or make it in a smoothie.
Now lets look at some health benefits of eating keto peanut butter.
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Santa Cruz Organic Peanut Butter
Best For: Keto dieters looking for yummy low-carb peanut butter that only uses two ingredients.
This organic peanut butter contains no GMO, added sugars, hydrogenous oils, gluten, trans fat or artificial ingredients. This makes it one of the best options for keto dieters because you stay in ketosis and avoid inflammation.
Heres the macronutrient profile of one serving:
- Eight grams of protein
Youll only find two ingredients on the label organic peanuts and salt.
Feel free to choose between the dark or light roast. The dark roast is more robust, making it better for keto sandwiches, while the light option is smoother, which goes well with desserts.
Net Carbs In Peanut Butter
The issue with this though is that as per Healths contributing nutrition editor Cynthia Sass, MPH, RD A keto diet is typically restricted to 5% carbs so if you eat 1600 calories a day, that’s a maximum of 20 grams of carbs per day. A two-tablespoon portion of unsweetened peanut butter provides 6 grams of carbs with 2 grams of that as fiber, that leaves 4 net grams of carbs. So in that portion, you’ve ‘spent’ 20% of your carb allowance, not including any veggies.
In short, eating peanut butter while following a keto diet, will more than likely push you over your daily carbohydrate allowance. Additionally, it may mean you miss out on more nutritious sources of carbohydrates such as vegetables as you have already met your allowance for the day.
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Is Peanut Butter Inflammatory
One of the main criticisms Ive seen about peanut butter is that it can cause inflammation.
Heres the scoop: Peanut butter is high in Omega-6 fatty acids and low in Omega-3 fatty acids .
That alone is not necessarily a bad thing. The problem is that Americans are eating far too many Omega-6 fatty acids overall, and excessive Omega-6 consumption can indeed cause inflammation .
So its not the peanut butter itself that causes inflammation, but eating too many foods containing Omega-6 fatty acids.
The solution?
- Omega-3 fatty acids actually help to fight inflammation, so making sure to eat more of these can help balance the effect of Omega-6s on the body.
- Lower your consumption of foods containing Omega-6 fatty acids. If you cut out other culprits, then this could leave room in your diet for peanut butter.
Are Some Pbs More Keto
Yes! Peanut butter with added sugar increases the carb content but not the fiber content, says Schaub, meaning youll consume more net carbs. The most keto-friendly peanut butters have just peanuts and salt as ingredients because they have the highest fiber content, which you can subtract from the total carbs, she explains.
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Unfortunately, your childhood favorites, like Jif and Skippy, are not the best choices given that they contain added sugar. Schaub says many variations are also flavored or altered to reduce the fat content, which is another thing to avoid when making a PB purchase when you’ve got keto on the mind.
A good rule of thumb: Look for ingredient labels that include only peanuts and salt, palm oil, or coconut oil.
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Does It Matter What Kind Of Peanut Butter You Eat
“It’s always best to stick to peanut butters that are organic or really from the source,” says Blevins, which means no added sugars. You’ll also want to steer clear of products that contain fillers, like palm oil or other kinds of hydrogenated oil, which are usually added to preserve freshness, per Ernst.
Getting freshly ground peanut butter from your local grocery or health food store is the best way to go, since it’s usually made with just the nuts and maybe a little salt. “That is amazing because then it’s extra nutritious,” explains Blevins.
Justin’s Classic Peanut Butter
If you can’t find that, Justin’s Classic Peanut Butter is also a great and convenient option you can buy. It only contains six grams of carbs per serving and no added sugar. It’s also available in individual packets for an easy keto snack on the go.
Common brands like Jif and Skippy ballpark at around a similar number for carbs , but both products have added sugars. You can definitely still have some while on keto, but opting for naturally sweetened versions is still your best bet.
Helps You Get More Protein In Your Diet
3 tablespoons of peanut butter provide you with 12 grams of protein. From a macronutrient standpoint, protein is essential for repairing cells and preserving muscle mass.
Note: You need a moderate amount of protein on a standard keto diet, ranging from 0.8 to 1 gram per pound of body weight, depending on your goals and activity level.
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Benefits Of Peanut Butter
There is a good bit of nutritional benefit to eating peanut butter. It is rich in essential nutrients such as:
In fact, potassium is amazing for your heart health!
Peanut butter can aid in weight loss because it can be part of a satisfying snack that keeps you full in between meals. This means you will be more likely to stay within your daily carb limit.
It also has quite a few different types of healthy fats! Studies have shown that these types of fats do amazing things for our bodies, like lower blood pressure, decrease the risk of cardiovascular disease, and reduce “bad” LDL cholesterol.
Plus, it has a good source of vitamin E, which is fantastic for your hair, nails, and skin.
Can You Eat Fried Chicken On Keto
To make a Keto Friendly fried chicken we skipped the flour and went for pork rinds and Parmesan. Almond flour helps adhere everything together as well for a perfectly crisp chicken. We also baked this chicken to skip all of the unnecessary oil, but it still bakes into a chicken breast that you would swear was fried.
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Is Peanut Butter Keto
Yes, but there’s a catch.
On a ketogenic, the caloric breakdown usually falls in place as so: 60 to 80 percent of your daily calories come from fat, 20 to 30 percent from protein, and the rest from carbs.
Peanut butter is high-fat, low-carbunless you’re buying flavored peanut butters that load up on one threat to ketosis: sugar.
“The keto diet is all about staying in the nutrient ranges, so avoiding added sugars is key,” says Jessica Crandall Snyder, R.D.N., of Vital RD in Denver and spokesperson for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.
So fair warning: “Most peanut butters on the market add sugar into their product,” says Dara Godfrey, MS, RD, a registered dietitian in New York City.
If you’re serious about keto, make sure you’re reading labels for peanut butter with no added sugars.
Important note: Peanuts naturally contain sugars so it’s incredibly difficult, if not impossible, to find a peanut butter with no sugarit’s the added sugars that you need to watch out for.
Peanut Butter Nutrition Facts
Peanut butter is super nutritious.
Yes, its high in calories, but that doesnt mean its unhealthy. Your bod needs nutrient-dense, high fat foods for many important functions. So, dont judge a food simply on the number of calories it has. Its also a good source of magnesium, which can be lacking in very low carb diets.
Here are the deets for a 2-tablespoon serving of peanut butter:
- Vitamin E: 19 percent of the daily value
- Niacin: 27 percent of the DV
- Magnesium: 13 percent of the DV
- Phosphorus: 9 percent of the DV
- Manganese: 23 percent of the DV
Just keep in mind that a serving of PB contains about 7 g of total carbs and 5.6 g of net carbs . That isnt considered high carb, but it might take up a considerable portion of your daily carbs.
Youll typically keep your carb intake below 50 g per day on a keto diet. This helps you reach and maintain ketosis, a metabolic state where your bod burns fat for fuel.
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Negatives Of Peanut Butter
As healthy as peanut butter is for you, there are also some downsides to it. This is why there is so much debate about whether it is low-carb!
In addition to the healthy fats, peanut butter also has a lot of hydrogenated oils in it. These are unhealthy fats because, just like trans fats, they are proven to increase the risk of diseases.
If you eat too many hydrogenated oils and trans fats, you are at a higher risk for:
Peanut butter is also so delicious that it is easy to eat too much of it!
There are 5 grams of net carbs in 2 tablespoons, so staying within your daily carb limit can be tough if you really love peanut butter.
Finally, it is high in oxalates which are called “anti-nutrients,” because too much can actually inhibit the retaining of nutrients. So, if you eat too much peanut butter, the oxalates in it could prevent your body from digesting much-needed nutrition.
Make Your Own Peanut Butter
In order to stay clear of the store-bought peanut butter brands that contains ingredients like hydrogenated oils, trans fats, and sugar, one option to eating peanut butter is by making your own. The key is in the selection of peanuts you may prefer organic, dry roasted, salted or unsalted peanuts. It is also important to make sure you are purchasing natural peanuts with no added ingredients or additives Food Network is a credible source that offers some ways to make home-made peanut butter.
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What Peanut Butter Is Keto
Plain peanut butter can be suitable for the ketogenic diet provided that you eat it in moderation.
So, why shouldnt you eat peanut butter on a regular basis on keto?
This is essentially due to the nutritional value of peanut butter. Peanut butter contains 16 grams of fat and 7 grams of total carbs and 5 grams of net carbs in every 2 tablespoons
Although peanut butter isnt super high in carbs when compared to other foods, just a small serving size of peanut butter can be as much as 20% of your daily intake of net carbs on the majority of keto diets, so its something to bear in mind.
That being said, you wont want to be consuming peanut butter on a regular basis. In addition to this, if you buy store-bought peanut butter, you try opting for natural peanut butter.
Peanut butters such as Teddie All Natural Peanut Butter is a good option, as it only contains two ingredients: Peanuts and salt.
Alternatively, you could opt for Crazy Richards Peanut Butter which is made out of 100% peanuts.
When buying peanut butter, you will need to make sure that you check the label for added sugar and other ingredients that might not be suitable for your keto diet.
Its also important to note that you should be wary of any products that claim to be keto-approved or certified ketogenic. This comes down to the fact that there is no official certification to qualify peanut butter as being keto-friendly.
Typically speaking, youll want to opt for peanut butter with minimal ingredients.
Which Peanut Butter Is Lowest In Carbs
There are many different types of peanut butter, with some better for keto than others. The most keto-friendly peanut butter will be sugar-free or natural. However, you dont really need to avoid peanut butters with sugar in them.
So, which peanut butter brand you should go for then depends on personal preferences. But if youre a die-hard keto-er, then a sugar-free version is the way to go.
So, what brand of peanut butter is best for keto? Here are a couple of great options that are lowest in carbs.
- 365 Everyday Value, Organic Creamy Peanut Butter, Unsweetened : Paulina Nowak, RD suggests to Choose a peanut butter that contains only peanuts, maybe salt and beware of those with added sugar!. Well, this one fits the bill. Just give it a good stir the first time you use it and keep it in the fridge. Buy here.
- Spread The Love NAKED CRUNCH Organic Peanut Butter : This one is made with only one ingredient: dry-roasted organic peanuts. That means that with this product you wont have to worry about added sugar, excess salt, hydrogenated oil, and other ingredients you may be trying to avoid. Buy here or here.
- Packaged in a glass jar and made with organic peanuts and palm oil, this is a great option when youre trying to eat clean. But the added fat is also great for keto. Organic palm oil helps improve texture and spreadability. Buy here.
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Is Peanut Butter Healthy
It depends. We know that peanuts, the main ingredient of peanut butter, contain substantial amounts of health-boosting fatty acids, protein, and micronutrients like vitamin E, potassium, zinc, and phosphorus. Yet, what makes peanut butter bad are its high amounts of added sugar and trans fats from partially hydrogenated oils.
That said, not all peanut butters are created equal. Some commercial brands sneak in unhealthy ingredients, but there are also manufacturers that keep other ingredients to a minimum or stick to healthy choices like coconut oil, sea salt, and natural low-carb sweeteners like monk fruit or stevia.
Knowing what goes into any given jar of peanut butter is the biggest key to making sure that you buy one that meets your health and nutritional needs, regardless of your diet but even more so if you eat a low-carb diet.