Roasted seaweed is a healthy snack that is eaten commonly in Asia and is becoming popular as a snack in the West nowadays. Not only does it taste great, it is low in calories and also a good source of vitamins and minerals. In addition, it is low in carbs and as long as you eat them moderately, roasted seaweed is keto friendly.
In general, one serving of roasted seaweed would be around 3.5g, with 1g of carbohydrate and 20 calories. The nutrition facts are often similar with other roasted seaweed brands but not the same. So, you have to make sure that you check the nutrition facts before you eat your roasted seaweed. Usually, the difference is not a lot, at most it could be an additional 1g more of carbohydrate.
Nutrition of Roasted Seaweed
The ingredients in roasted seaweed is usually seaweed, salt and a type of oil. Most of them are roasted in sesame oil, olive oil, avocado oil or grape seed oil. If you have certain preferences of oil, it would be best to take note of which brand uses which type of oil.
Roasted seaweed is a good source of iodine for you. Iodine is required to help your thyroid gland function. Your thyroid gland is involved with releasing hormones to help you grow, produce energy and fix the damaged cells in the body.
In addition of iodine, roasted seaweed also contains a decent amount of vitamins and minerals. It contains vitamin B-6 and vitamin B-12. Vitamin B-6 is also known as pyroxidine. This helps with your brain function and manufacture your neurotransmitters and hormones. Vitamin B-12 is known as cobalamin. It is something that you require everyday to help you form your red blood cells, DNA and RNA. It also helps boost your immune system. For those of you who are elderly or young, you might consider eating some roasted seaweed to help boost your vitamin B-12.
For those of you who like to DIY, making your own roasted seaweed is very easy. Roasting it yourself allows for you to make it the way you want it. All you need is seaweed sheets, cooking oil and salt. Depending on your preference, you might want to add sesame oil to your oil base or just use sesame oil. When you have all your ingredients, you can spread the oil on your seaweed sheet and then sprinkle a little bit of salt. If you want to remove a little bit of oil, I like to use a kitchen paper towel to soak up a little bit of the excess oil. Once you are done, you can heat the sheet of seaweed on a stove for around 15 seconds, until you see it green and crispy. Then you can remove it and eat it.
Keto Diet
The ketogenic diet (keto diet) is a low carb and high fat diet that offers health benefits. A lot of people try the keto diet to help lose weight and improve their health. This diet basically involves you drastically reducing your carbohydrate intake and replacing it with fat. The reduction will put your body into ketosis, a metabolic state. This means that your body will become more efficient at burning fat to use as energy.
When you follow a keto diet, most people will stick to eating only around 20 to 50g of carbohydrates a day. This will help keep your body in a ketosis state to burn more fat. In addition, you also limit the amount of protein as protein can be converted to glucose if a lot is consumed.
Eating Seaweed While Doing the Keto Diet
Because seaweed is relatively low in carbs, it is safe to consume roasted seaweed while you are doing the keto diet. On average, 5g of seaweed contains 30 calories and 1g of carbohydrate. This makes it a pretty safe snack to eat as you can consume up to 50g of carbohydrates a day.
Since it is low in carbohydrates, it means that you can leave some of your carb quota to eat during your main meals. Don’t forget that you only have a maximum of 50g of carbohydrates you can eat during a day, therefore you need to be sure of the nutritional facts of your foods. Your main meals might contain a decent amount of carbs, so it would be great to eat roasted seaweed as it does not fill up your daily carb quota.
Not only is it low in carbs, it is also coated in healthy fats (depending on the brand you buy). The seaweed is usually coated in oil before roasted to ensure that it gives you a nice crisp feeling. Some of the better keto-friendly oils are coconut oil, avocado oil and olive oil. While it is good to avoid industrial seed oils such as vegetable oil, soybean oil, canola oil and corn oil. Those oils are generally highly processed and the processing is considered to be bad for your health.
Like many things, eating too much roasted seaweed is not always good for you. You should always consume it in moderation. While it is a good source of iodine and other nutrients, overconsumption might cause side effects such as issues with your thyroid.
If you are like me, you might have a hard time eating just one serving of roasted seaweed. I have a tendency to eat another pack and then another one after my first pack. It’s just so delicious and hard to stop eating. The combination of the crispy seaweed and salt just hits the right spot and makes it so addicting. Don’t forget, one serving of roasted seaweed is usually 1g of carbohydrates. This means that you still are eating carbs, so you need to be mindful about how many servings of roasted seaweed you are eating as it can easily add up. It is important that you check both the ingredients and the macros of what you eat to ensure you are staying within your keto diet.