Low Carb Diet Food

You’re probably already aware of the many health benefits of eating the low carb diet food flax seed. In this post we are going to examine 4 different ways to incorporate it into our eating regime: as a low carb substitute for flour in baking, as a nutritional enhancer of other foods, as a low carb porridge (when mixed with water), and as an edible oil.

If you have whole flax seeds, you will of course need to put them through a coffee or spice grinder before attempting to use them as illustrated in the first 3 examples in this article.

A Low Carb Substitute For Wheat Flour In Baking

Because flax seeds are a low carb diet food, you can make lower carb versions of many of your favorite baked goods by replacing up to 25% of the flour in your recipe with flax seed meal. Depending on the recipe, you may be able to use a proportion of flax seed meal higher than 25% (see this flax seed muffin recipe), but this tends to make the finished product dry and dense, and you’ll need to add additional water to your recipe to compensate for the higher fiber content of the flax seed. Be aware too that baked goods containing flax seed meal tend to brown more quickly than regular baking, so you may have to reduce the temperature in your oven slightly.

Flax seed meal is also a component of many low carb flour mixes, which comprise a variety of low carb flours (flax seed, soy, almond etc.). These mixes can replace regular flour cup for cup so produce even lower carb baking than the more basic mixture of flax seed meal and regular flour.

A Nutritional Enhancer Of Other Foods

Adding flax seed meal to other low carb diet food is a great way to increase the overall fiber content of your diet. If you eat a lot of processed foods and few fruits and vegetables you are probably not consuming enough fiber. Fiber is essential for a healthily functioning gastrointestinal tract, and is particularly useful for dieters because it expands in the body and helps provide a bulky, full feeling which helps to reduce food cravings.

Among flax seed’s other health benefits is its high concentration of alpha-linoleic acid, an omega 3 fatty acid which is a precursor to the healthy fatty acid in fish oil.

It is best to add freshly ground flax seed to other low carb diet food, rather than store-bought flax seed meal, to gain the maximum benefits. This is because flax seed is very volatile and unless stored properly the meal quickly goes rancid and loses much of its nutritional value.

Popular ways of enhancing food with flax seed meal include sprinkling it on yogurt or cottage cheese, and adding it to protein smoothies. Sprinkling roasted, coarsely ground seeds onto salads also makes a nice touch.

A Low Carb Porridge

You can make a sort of low carb porridge by stirring boiling water into a bowl of flax seed meal and letting it thicken for a couple of minutes as the seeds absorb the water. You can then mix in your choice of other low carb diet food such as peanut butter, coconut, berries, artificial sweetener, and so on. In the morning this porridge can make a nice change from eggs or fruit for breakfast.

An Edible Oil

Because of its volatility flax seed oil should not used in place of cooking/frying oil, but it can be substituted for oils in preparations like vinaigrette. This is a good way of increasing your omega-3 fatty acid intake, as flax seed oil has higher concentrations than flax seed meal (though it doesn’t contain the fiber). 

As you can see, there are at least 4 different ways you can use this low carb diet food in your meals. Can you think of anymore? Please share in the comments box below!