Curious about the keto egg fast? Find out what it is, and how it works.
This is an account of how I first heard about and experimented with Egg Fasting years ago. Since then I have done it many times, and have created this free 5 Day Egg Fast Meal Plan that has helped thousands of people break through plateaus and lose stubborn fat.
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.
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 the egg fast?
The Egg Fast is a (short term) diet that consists of primarily eggs, cheese, and butter. For each egg you eat, you should eat a corresponding tablespoon of pure fat in the form of butter, olive oil, or coconut oil.
You can also eat a corresponding tablespoon 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.
The biggest issue people seem to 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 with the egg fast 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.
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 tablespoon MCT oil, 1 Tbsp Kerrygold unsalted butter)
- Eat 3-5 meals of at least 2 eggs each, starting no later than 10am.
- Have 1 tablespoon 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, then gained back .5 lbs over the next two days for a net loss of 6.9 lbs. in one week.
Click here for my 5 Day Egg Fast Menu Plan!
Egg Fast Recipes
Buffalo Omelette
Salted Caramel Custard
Easy Deviled Eggs
Snickerdoodle Crepes
Fettuccini Alfredo
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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Kelly says
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.
Jeannette says
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!!
Mellissa Sevigny says
No maximum and if you want to split it up and IF it that should work fine!
Boo says
I have been doing an egg fast for two days now. Broke a stall and lost 6 pounds already. I’m so happy :)
azu says
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?
Mellissa Sevigny says
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!
Wayne McKenzie says
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?
grace says
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…
Mellissa Sevigny says
Definitely expect it to come off a lot more slowly that close to goal Grace! Still sounds like you’re doing great though, congrats!
grace says
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.
Mellissa Sevigny says
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!
Kathy says
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!
Mellissa Sevigny says
Great news Kathy – so glad it’s working out for you!
Jonathan says
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!!!!! :(
Brittany Gros says
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?
Cheryl says
Hi there, can you drink any milk during the egg fast? I put them in my black coffee. I am also not doing the BPC. The thought of putting oil in my coffee just puts me off.
Petra says
I don’t even drink milk on a normal week…… too much lactose sugars. I have thin pouring cream in my coffee.
Steph says
I’m doing really well on the diet. But I am wondering how about something like egg drop soup there are times when I’m really busy. And that would be a quick and easy option to get and all I would have to do is add that to it.