Ever since I had to take steroids this past Spring for my allergies, my system has completely rebelled. My hormones are out of whack, and my body has become completely resistant to losing weight. No matter how strict I am with keto – even counting calories and cutting out dairy, alcohol, etc. I have not been able to drop pounds.
Even worse, every time I go off plan for the weekend or some event, additional stubborn pounds creep on. I know that a lot of you are struggling with this same problem, so I thought I’d do some research on ways to break through a weight loss plateau.
One tried and true method to bust a plateau and get your weight loss going again is a fat fast. 3 days, 1200 calories per day – almost all fat. Most people just eat an entire block of cream cheese per day, a few ounces at a time. Ew. So much NO. Maybe someday I’ll try it for experiment’s sake, but for now it’s just not for me.
Recently I started hearing about the Egg Fast and was intrigued. I’m planning to try it and track my results. I thought you guys might be interested in trying it too, so I’m posting some basics about it here for those of you who have never heard of it.
What is an egg fast? It’s a (short term) diet that consists of primarily eggs, cheese, and butter. For each egg you eat, you should eat a corresponding Tbsp of pure fat in the form of butter, olive oil, or coconut oil. You can also eat a corresponding Tbsp of full fat cheese per egg. Doing this will result in an extremely low carb, high fat, moderate protein intake that will kickstart your body into fat burning mode.
In my research on the egg fast diet I couldn’t find any scientific reasons as to why it works, but there are a lot of anecdotal cases of people who have had success with it. One of the most popular is from Jimmy Moore of Livin La Vida Low Carb who did it for a month back in 2010 and lost 27 lbs. You can read his story and the guidelines of the plan he followed here.
Low carb maven Dana Carpender also reports having some success with the egg fast to shed some stubborn pounds – you can read her post here. Most recently I read a post from The Ketogenic Woman chronicling her success with the egg fast to break through a plateau, and that’s what finally convinced me to give it a try.
There is a closed group on Facebook called Egg Fast – Stall = Breaker (diet) that I joined (and you can too if you’re interested) to get more information, and after reading through the threads it seems that the biggest issue people have is gaining the weight back when you go back to regular LCHF or keto. Across the board it seems that at least 90% of the people doing it will gain at least a portion of the weight lost back – though there are some who have kept almost all of it off with a careful reintroduction to their normal keto diet.
The key to success seems to be cycling on and off for 4-5 days a week. While on your off days, you should stick to LCHF (keto) and even then, don’t go nuts. It seems possible to lose 8-10 lbs (or more) a month this way and keep it off. To be clear, while I’d love to do that, I’m not (at this time) planning to do the egg fast long term. I’m hoping that this one week egg fast will kickstart my metabolism, and get my body back in weight loss mode so that I can go back to my normal keto routine and start losing consistently again like I have in the past. We’ll have to see how that goes.
I had no trouble losing almost 60lb on keto the first year I started – and kept most of it off until I started having severe seasonal allergies in 2012 that wreaked havoc on my entire system. Stalls can be the result of medications, hormones, age, and other factors. If you’re having issues losing on low carb now, even though you’ve had success in the past, you might need a reset like I do. Hopefully this egg fast will be the thing that works to get my body back on track, (and maybe yours too!)
I’ve customized the egg fast to my own preferences, and here are the basic guidelines of the egg fast that I plan to follow for the next 5 days:
- Bullet Proof Coffee within 30 minutes of waking (coffee with 1 Tbsp MCT oil, 1 Tbsp Kerrygold unsalted butter)
- Eat 3-5 meals of at least 2 eggs each, starting no later than 10am
- Have 1 Tbsp of butter or sugar free mayo per egg consumed
- 6 ounces of full fat cheese (cream cheese, cheddar, brie, etc.) allowed per day (eaten with eggs or separately as a snack)
- No eggs after 7pm (1 string cheese allowed after 7pm if starving, counts as part of the 6oz daily limit)
- Don’t go more than 4 hours between meals or snacks between 10am and 7pm.
- Drink 100 oz of water per day (minimum)
- Supplement with magnesium and potassium (lite salt) daily.
- Small amounts of fresh herbs, hot sauce, no carb sweeteners, and spices will be allowed – as long as they are less than 1g net carbs per serving, not to exceed 5g net carbs per day.
This may sound unduly restrictive, but you’d be surprised how many delicious recipes/combos that you can come up with using eggs, cheese, and butter (cream cheese pancakes anyone?) For those of you that are interested in trying it and want some structure, I’m working on a one week egg fast meal plan that I will post next week. I will strictly adhere to that same meal plan and will update you with my results at the end of my first week.
Update: I lost 7.4 lbs in five days on the egg fast, then gained back .5 lbs over the next two days for a net loss of 6.9 lbs. in one week. Here is a list of some of the egg fast friendly recipes I came up with and posted here on IBIH during the fast:
Buffalo Omelette
Salted Caramel Custard
Easy Deviled Eggs
Snickerdoodle Crepes
Fettuccini Alfredo
Update: Click here for my 5 Day Egg Fast Menu Plan!
A word of caution: If you are not already fat adapted and are eating hundreds of grams of carbs per day in your diet, you may not want to embark on an egg fast until you’ve been in ketosis for awhile. Jumping right in can make you feel really lousy, and may even be dangerous if you have other health conditions. Consider trying my 3 Day Keto Kickstart first and see how you do before trying something as low carb and high fat as this egg fast.
Stuck in a plateau? Is an egg fast something you’re interested in trying? Have you already tried it? I’d love to hear your results/thoughts in the comments!
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Hi!!! I‘M from Peru and i looooove your page! I have one doubt, if i have a bpc in the morning and i Want another in the afternoon… can i take it? If i have for example 8 eggs and only 5 TBSP of butter…
sorry for my english!!! ?
Yes!
Is sugar free gum (1-2 carbs per piece) okay on the egg fast? Asking because I know it’s a “no” on the beef and butter fast. Thanks!
Just finished a 5 day egg fast.I always find the egg fast easier that after the fast. I am very strict with eating, always below 20 carbs a day. But here is the question..how do i transition back.
When I do an egg fast i am keeping it simple.I hate to cook so its just eggs butter cheese sometime.My eating routine is simple raw spinach some chicken breast ,Renees chunky blue cheese dressing 0 carbs 7 fat ,actually 1 tablespoon, depending how much fat i had so far. Can i eat like that the first day after 5 day fast.Oh I always eat eggs for breakfast.Just thought i was not starting right.
Thanks so much
Starting egg fast today. I’m shhoting for 4 days to start then grilled chicken and greens over the weekend. I’m 52 and can’t lose since menopause. I’m also giving up beer for the 4 days…. just woke up and ate an egg in 5 min of waking up.
Hi there.I didn’t even know beer was allowed when eating keto?
I’m on day one and so far I’m over my calories fat and protein by quite a bit. Is this normal? I followed your day one to a T. I usually do IF and about one meal a day maybe two. I’m worried being over my macros so much will make me gain not lose. OR is that how this works?
I am curious about this as well! Anybody have an answer?
How did you figure your macros out?
I am wanting to try the egg fast, but the problem is, I am up at 5:30am daily to start getting my daughter ready for school which she leaves at 7:45a.m. I rarely have time to even fix a cup of coffee during this time and I am never hungry until after 8a.m. Do I need to eat an egg that early in the morning since it states to eat 1/2 hour from waking? I don’t go to bed until 10:45p.m. every night either, but the nothing after 7p.m. is easy. One other question – I have not found any info on how to go back on plan after the fast. Or did I just miss that somehow? Thank you so much. What a great blog..
Shelly it’s fine to eat when it’s easiest for you! The egg fast plan has a two day transition built into the end of it and then go to regular keto afterwards!
Please, where do I find the transition after a 5
been keto for more than a year… 70 pounds gone… now I am stalled…I am seriously considering an egg fast – more so as a morale booster to kick start my next leg of the journey. I was wondering if counting calories is done on an egg fast? I did a prelim run with it for a couple days and was plugging it into myfitnesspal and Im over the daily allotment for fat and calories… and I am just wondering if this is a concern or if the purpose is to stoke the fires with more fat and calories? any thoughts are appreciated… since no one seems to have a body of juried research on the mechanism of how this works – I thought I would solicit responses from people who has been successful with it. THANKS!
What about intermittent fasting…. think I could do the egg fast with only eating twice a day?
Hi Melissa, I am doing the keto diet, but weight loss is really slow. I am thinking, if I just want to do a 3 or 5 day fast, can I pick any day’s recipe out of the 7 to follow? Like I like some foods better than others, so, say can I do days 1,2, 3, 3 and 5 for a 5 day diet? Can I substitute string cheese for other cheese as it is not easily available where I live? Tks very much?
I know this post is older but I’m hoping you still see my comment. Do I HAVE to eat cheese? Like if I’m full with the 1:1 ratio of eggs to fats, can I skip the cheese? I’m not a big fan of cheese, but I want to do this right. Thanks!
No you can skip the cheese!
Thanks!
10 eggs and 10 TBS butter and 6 oz of cheddar cheese comes out to 2400 calories! In the beginning of the post, you say that a fat fast is 1200 calories. Please explain the difference and why 2400 calories would ever be ok. Thanks.
Read the comments from all the people who lost weight on this plan. There is more to it than calories in calories out.
I don’t know if this is “kosher,” but I have some roasted garlic aeoli and chipotle mayo (1 carb each) and I mixed those to make the egg salad. Tasty and kind of spicy. Fighting off the egg overload by making something a little bit different.
So I’ve been doing this for the last 4 days (following the menu) and I’ve consistently lost weight every day, but I’ve only lost 400g. Over 4 days. It’s nice to see the scale moving after ages, but really disheartening seeing other people losing 5lbs overnight while I’ve only lost 0.8lbs over 4 days.
It’s probably only water weight and muscle – at the end of the day you really want to be losing fat, which takes a longer time and therefore you won’t get dramatic numbers on the scale. Fast weight loss, while exciting for the scale doesn’t really mean it’s actually fat loss. Keep at it and you will see results, try intermittent fasting and experimenting with your deficit.
I ended up losing 1kg from it – it wasn’t water weight, since I’d been really ill the night before I started this and had dropped my stored water already. I’ve never even seen the number on the scale that I am now and I’ve stayed that number since finishing the fast. I still need some time to see if it’s kicked my body back into fat burning mode (since I’d stalled for about 4 months) but so far I’m pretty happy, even if I didn’t lose a dramatic amount of weight like others did.
Hi there, is the weight loss with this actual fat loss (or mainly water weight and/or muscle loss)? Also, is it effective for people who have less than 15 pounds to lose? Many thanks :)
I guess if you have to eat something this is probably a good thing to do. But if you can get away with it I highly recommend intermittent fasting. Don’t eat anything from when you get out of bed until dinner, you would end up fasting for about 16 hours depending on how much you sleep, and when you eat dinner. Dinner should be strict keto, and if you have a snack it should be strict keto; but if you’re doing good on maintaining weight and are well below your calorie count, you don’t have to be tooo strict.
If you read what she says… you eat from 10AM – 7PM — that’s a 15 hour fast. What you are talking about is a 23 hour fast. It might be a little hard eating 6 eggs and all that cheese in one sitting. I’ll be doing it with 2 meals, spaced out by about 4 hours apart, so basically 20 hour fast, 4 hour eating window.
Hi! I have followed this plan to a T. From an LCHF diet I started the egg fast and ate the recommended egg/fat/cheese ratio (sometimes leaving out the cheese). I lost about 5 lbs and then gained back 2 lbs. I’m not sure what else I can do, and I’ve just stayed on it for more than a week now because I’m scared of going off and gaining. I have about 25 lbs to lose, and I’m stuck (and feeling desperate!!) … have you or any of your readers had this kind of result?? That is, very little weight loss and another plateau?
Can you post a shopping list for the 5 days?
Did you find that your loss kickstarted again after the fast? I’ve been up and down ten pounds for THREE MONTHS after losing 70 pounds. I’m desperate! It’s so hard not to get discouraged and just give it all up.
I would like to introduce myself to you I’m Lori. I am not new to low carb buti am new to egg fasting. I have not eaten a single egg in over 30 years but i am giving this egg fast 7 days . I just finished my second full day and feel great. Ty kindly for all of your stories of encouragement.
Hi Lori, so glad the egg fast is working for you!
It was really nice to read the first line of this! I’ve been so frustrated and unable to lose weight now matter how I eat or work out. I too was on steroids, I had a tumor inside my spinal cord and was on very very high doses. By the end I looked like I weighed a million lbs now ten months later I’m still fighting weight. I’m glad it’s not in my head and they actually cause weight to be stubborn.
So only eat 1200 calories a day of the eggs and cheese, correct?
No. The 1200 mentioned in this post was for a fat fast. The egg fast has no calorie restrictions.
Hi! I absolutely love your site. Your post about the egg fast was intriguing enough to make me want to try it. My problem with LCHF is that I’m good for 3 weeks then I fall off the wagon for about 2-3 weeks. I’ve been yo-yoing like this since the end of April. So, in the middle of one of my self-sabotaging moments, I decided to do the egg fast. It was amazing! I did not get sick of eggs at all and still enjoy them on day 2 of transition back to regular LCHF. I lost a total of 10 lbs in 5 days and have managed to keep losing the last 2 days. I fell in love with the Buffalo Omelet and have added it to my Thanksgiving weekend menu to serve to my family for breakfast one day. I also tried the fettuccine alfredo and really enjoyed that too. Thank you for this blog post. I intend to visit here frequently while planning my upcoming holiday menus.
I am on Day 1. Don’t mind eggs and I have recipes to change it up, but I’m hungry! I’ve lost 80# in 2+ years and now can’t lose at all in months. Over the weekend, I had a roll, some tortilla chips (maybe a handful) and a couple bites of brie that had a brown sugar sauce on it. Not my typical weekend. I’m usually quite strict on keto. I gained 2 lbs! Giving this a shot
I LOVE your website. One of the reasons I started my own EF journey.
I’m not very creative with my recipes – so love that you’ve come up with these (along with the beautiful pictures!). Definitely going to try them out.
I started my own blog documenting my journey as I was inspired by yours! :)
Question for you: I plan on having 3 meals of 2 scrambled eggs with a tbsp. of butter per egg (I use Kerrygold Salted butter specifically). I intend to have BPC in the morning too. I’m sitting at 1245 calories with that food plan without even getting any cheese in? I’m a little lost how to make it work best for myself. I don’t need egg noodles and custard (all look delish by the way) I am perfectly fine with just eggs.
After being on strict keto for six months and reading on your website about the egg fast, I tried it last month. Lost four pounds in five days (even though I consumed more calories per day on the egg fast than I’ve been eating normally) and – even though I was sick to death of eggs! – was thrilled it worked so well. I kept it all off, not regaining a single ounce, and have since lost eight more pounds. I suspect the secret to maintaining the loss is not to go crazy at the end of the fast, but to go right back to normal keto.
Trying it again next week to see what happens.
Hey Lisa, I am contemplating to start an egg fast next week. How did you go on yours now?
I started Banting on 15 July, the weight loss has been slow and steady. About 2 to 2.5kg, a bit up and down but not more so I thought to up the ante by going on the egg fast
Starting egg fast today. My weight ballooned from 145 to 174 in just a few months of being stressed and using bad foods as medicine. I started back on Atkins induction and in just a week went down to 167. I’m doing 4 days of solid egg fast and on day 5 I am going to incorporate a salad to reintroduce myself back to Atkins induction for the remainder of those two weeks. With people arguing you have to have fiber to be regular is absurd. The fat helps you keep regular and I can say I don’t need much fiber. The only thing I lack is iron. I have a supplement to help with that. So for my stats I am starting egg fast at 167.20, I’ll update my end weight on Friday.
I have a few questions about this! Is there a maximum egg limit? Does it have to be every 3 hours or can we do IF with the fast (like 4 eggs for bfast then 4 for dinner?) Thanks!!
No maximum and if you want to split it up and IF it that should work fine!
I have been doing an egg fast for two days now. Broke a stall and lost 6 pounds already. I’m so happy :)
Hi, quick question….this is my first day on the egg fast, can you please critique my daily food and tell me if you think i’m good or over doing the fat? pllllssssssss :( and thank you!
Morning – black coffee
2 eggs scrambled in 1tbs of Kerrigold butter
lunch 4 boiled eggs mixed with 3tbs of mayo, 1 tbs of kerrigold butter, salt, and tapatio hot sauce. 2 oz of monterrey cheese
dinner – 2 egg omellete, 1 tbs of kerrigold butter, 1 oz of cheese
a lot of WATERR!!!!
what do you think? i’m nervous about the fat intake….also if i do incorporate the bullett proof coffeee tomorrow, will I still be fine you think? or too much?
Sorry, I don’t have time to work with people on an individual basis, I’m sure you’ll have good results if you’re following the guidelines though. For personal support and to talk with others on the plan you can try the ibih egg fast forums or one of the many egg fast specific Facebook groups!
I am curious to hear how everyone has been doing with their egg fasts. I am considering the egg fast 3 to 4 days a week over the next month. I have supplements to help with energy and base nutrients so I am not concerned about not being in Ketosis. I have been eating a lot healthier than I used to so it shouldn’t be to much of a shock to my body.
Is anyone willing to share their egg fast experiences and results?
I had been in keto for two weeks, and I already began to stall. It has happened to me before, so I was frustrated, and decided to try the egg fast. I did break the stall, I am on day 4. I only dropped 2 pounds in three days though….could it be because I am on my last 10 pounds to lose? I am 5’1 and 122 pounds today. I would love to take it to 110 to 115…
Definitely expect it to come off a lot more slowly that close to goal Grace! Still sounds like you’re doing great though, congrats!
I also wanted to comment that I used heavy cream in my coffee for the first day, and then did the bulletproof coffee the 2nd and third day….lost .8 lbs the first day, .8 the second, and .6 the third…. for me it does not seem to make a difference whether I use the heavy cream or not. I prefer the cream to butter, so I switched to cream today. Just in case anyone else wants to know.
Thanks for weighing on your results with and without cream Grace! I think it’s different for everyone depending on their sensitivity to dairy – I’ve been drinking cream in mine while we travel because it’s easier than making bulletproof! But when I’m home I still prefer the butter to the creamer!
I was skeptical at first, as I’m sure most people are. What a whacky concept. I just complete 3 days and lost 4 lbs. I’m in the middle of the 4th day and am only doing it now because I pre-made a lot of stuff to save me time and I don’t want to waste food but, like you warned, I am. so. sick. of. eggs. I’m hoping this will also help me lose interest in butter and cheese. I so desperately want to give up dairy altogether but those 2 things are big strongholds for me. Anyway, It wasn’t very difficult to stick with. Yes, I was usually hungry when I went to bed, but not so much I couldn’t sleep. And each day became increasingly more difficult to exercise. But I see the light at the end of the tunnel and this has done exactly what I wanted…broke through that stubborn plateau and got me into the 140s which I never thought I’d see again! I’m a little concerned about weight gain when I recover from this but will be as diligent as I can to avoid that. I love your blog by the way. What a happy discovery!
Great news Kathy – so glad it’s working out for you!
I’m on day 3 of another EF. The last one didn’t seem to do anything for me. And, I think I figured out why. I like my coffee sweet. Think 4 splenda-or-stevia (though stevia tends to taste ‘off’ in that quantity) per 10oz mug of coffee sweet. And 4-5 mugs of coffee per day. AND granular 0-cal sweeteners actually have some carbs I’ve (belatedly) come to find. I was consuming about 8-10 grams of carbs and I had no idea.
This time around, I’m using liquid 0-cal sweeteners which don’t have ANY carbs (as far as I can tell from my research). At the beginning of my 3rd day, I’m about 7 pounds down. Woot!! I’ll do two more days of this (today and Thursday) before switching back to a diet where I won’t crave a solitary baby carrot. I know I’ll gain a couple back at that point. But, I’ll also focus on continuing the weight-loss trend. I *really* need my cow-orkers to stop leaving candy on their desks!!!!! :(
I’m not understanding why heavy cream wouldn’t be allowed on the egg fast if you can have both butter and cheese. HWC is basically the main ingredient in cream cheese, marcarpone, etc., right?