Most of us enjoy a nice, hot cup of coffee in the morning to get us going. When you are on a carnivore diet, you can have that cup of coffee you are craving. However, we recommend that at the start of the diet, you avoid coffee, otherwise you are not truly following the carnivore diet.
On a carnivore diet, you can take as much water and bone broth as you want, but it is better to stay away from tea, coffee, alcohol, and other plant-based drinks.
Coffee is good for your health. Here are some benefits of adding coffee to your diet.
Boosts Your Energy Levels
Coffee has caffeine in it. Caffeine is a CNS stimulant that helps you fight fatigue and increases your energy levels. Caffeine blocks adenosine, which increases the levels of neurotransmitters like dopamine that boost your energy.
Helps with Weight Management
Coffee helps in altering fat storage and improves gut health. This is beneficial for managing weight. Consuming coffee helps you shed those last few pounds of fat, particularly in men. People who drink one or two cups of coffee daily are more likely to meet the daily recommended physical activity levels as compared to those who don’t.
Drinking coffee reportedly helps with depression, so it improves your mental health too.
Why You Should Avoid Coffee on the Carnivore Diet
When you are new to following a carnivore diet, you should avoid consuming coffee despite its various health benefits. Here are some reasons why you should stay away from coffee while following a carnivore diet.
The Carnivore Diet Is an Elimination Diet
The carnivore diet is a hardcore elimination diet. It removes all plant-based items from your diet and allows you to consume only animal-based products. Consuming coffee on a carnivore diet would be going against the fundamental principle of the diet itself.
People can easily become addicted to coffee. When you drink coffee excessively, you develop a tolerance to it over time. Therefore, you will need more and more amount of coffee to get the same effects.
When you try to quit coffee, you will experience withdrawal symptoms.
If you are planning to follow the carnivore diet, and are a regular coffee drinker, then you should not quit cold turkey. Start tapering off your coffee intake. If you drink 5 cups of coffee in a day, start with 3 cups a day instead, for a week.
Then reduce it to two cups (and so on) until you can quit having coffee completely. Here are some carnivore diet drinks that are great alternatives to coffee:
Bone Broth
Bone broth is full of nutrients such as sodium, potassium, calcium, zinc, and magnesium, which will not only keep you healthy but will help you through coffee withdrawal as well. Bone broth has various health benefits like better bone health, improved sleep, and better digestion.
People drink coffee because they want to stay awake and fresh. However, what they forget is that being dehydrated is the main reason why they can’t remain fresh in the first place. Water will keep your body hydrated.
It will also manage the withdrawal symptoms and you will be able to quit coffee headache free. The human body consists of over 60% water. When you are on a zero-carb diet like a carnivore, it is important to keep yourself hydrated.
To stay hydrated, you need electrolytes. Try adding a small spoon of salt to your water for added sodium (the best carnivore diet salt is sea salt).
Key Takeaways
When you are starting a carnivore diet, you should avoid coffee since it is not an animal-based product and will interfere with your diet regimen. Drinking coffee to stay fresh and awake has become a norm for most of us.
When you are on a carnivore diet, you can replace coffee with water and bone broth and achieve the same results without running the risk of caffeine addiction.
Once your body has adapted to the diet it’s okay to drink coffee occasionally for its health benefits. You could even try carnivore bulletproof coffee with butter as an alternative — but you may find that you no longer need the stimulant effects of coffee because you now have more natural energy,
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