No Carb Diets- how is that possible?

Do "No Carb" diets mean just cutting out pastas and breads and other things in the carbohydrate bottom section of the food pyramid?  Because I was looking at the nutrition facts of various foods and just about everything has some amount of carbs in it, vegetables included.  How do they cut out all carbs and manage to eat?   

no carb usually translates to no starches and no sugary things...

like on atkins, you can't have starchy vegetables like potatoes, butternut squash, pumpkin... but you can have high-water-content vegetables like peppers, celery, broccoli, which are obviously all carbs...   and you can't have fruits

"no carb" is not literal, the most hardcore no carb diets typically include at least 10-30 grams of carbs per day.

I'm doing a contest prep diet right now and i'm carb cycling...it's not technically NO carb, but 2 of the days are VERY little carbs....and I still get up to 40 grams a day. yea, you have to count the carbs that are already in various foods....I don't know if it would be possible to do NO carb whatsoever! haha at least not possible for me!

So I think they mean no carb as in starches like what homesick18 said!

Original Post by vicki8seekers:

I'm doing a contest prep diet right now and i'm carb cycling...it's not technically NO carb, but 2 of the days are VERY little carbs....and I still get up to 40 grams a day. yea, you have to count the carbs that are already in various foods....I don't know if it would be possible to do NO carb whatsoever! haha at least not possible for me!

So I think they mean no carb as in starches like what homesick18 said!

 ive heard very good things about carb cycling for pre-contest prep. what comp are you doing?

I think maybe you're thinking of the 'no white' diet, where you do cut out all breads (white) potatos (white) and pasta (white) and anything else sugary? dunno.

A legitimately 'no-carb' diet would be carnivorous.  You would be limited to meat and seafood.

This is technically possible.  The Inuit, for example, have next to no vegetation in their area, so they eat meat and seafood almost exclusively.  Some of the Native American tribes living in the plains traditionally ate a lot of meat, especially when edible vegetation was scarce.  However, this is only possible because they eat the entire animal.  The guts, the blubber/fat, the bone marrow, any partially digested material in the animal's intestines, heart, liver, glands, etc.  You get far more vitamins and essential nutrients by consuming every part of an animal.

It is not feasible in modern, everyday life.  Grocery stores only really sell muscle meat (steak, pork tenderloin, chicken breast, etc.).  It's taboo in modern society to eat the fats and organs.  Too high in cholesterol, too high in fat.  Of course, that's sound enough advice for well rounded diets.  Not so sound for carnivorous diets.  Eating muscle meat alone is recipe for accidental starvation.  Most societies and animals who subsist on meat prize the organs, marrow and fatty cuts for a reason.  Muscle meat fills you up too fast despite fewer calories due to how dense it is.  It's a recipe for accidental starvation.  Also has fewer vitamins and essential nutrients.

It would be more feasible if you were a hunter, I suppose. 

But, as the others have said, "no carb" usually just translates to "very low carb" in the modern sense.

octo-luv....'m not actually doing a contest yet. My sister competes...Ive always been the 'chubby' sister until recently, so she convinced me to do a 'fake' contest prep diet to see how it goes and to see if i'd be comfortable enough to get on stage....we shall see!

I think you mean 'low-carb'. I've never seen Atkins or those other diets promote cutting out every single carb.