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I am a relatively recent convert to the keto diet (as of writing, it's March 2025 and I've been almost entirely carb-free for about two and a half months. And feeling really great, in spite of the fact that doing keto in Germany is not super easy - carbs are literally sold on every corner, fused into every meal, and items like pickles, mayo, and salads are inexplicably loaded with sugar here.

If you're new to keto and/or Germany, this article will save you a lot of time puzzling over nutrition labels and wondering about where your next meal will come from. Read my honest takeaways and make your "keto in Germany" journey a real success!

1) The current landscape for keto-specific food in Germany

If you've tried to look for real-life establishments specifically catering to keto in Germany, you quickly realize that whatever popularity the diet may have had at some point, all that remains are a smattering of ghostly echoes on Google maps of places that once existed, and (if you do a bit more digging) restaurants operating under assumed keto-branded names in delivery-service apps only, while their physical counterpart is more traditional, and more about rice than mashed cauliflower.

What remains are online services that will send you keto-friendly ingredients and even fully-cooked meals for you to heat up at home/work. You'll also be searching for quite a while if you're looking for the word "keto" on any products in normal supermarkets, and you can almost forget about that in discounters like Netto, Aldi, and Lidl. However, in some bio and specialty shops you'll find keto crackers (for example, at Denn's biomarkt), extremely low-carb bread (for example, at Vitalia), and well-stocked supermarkets will typically have konjac noodles and drug stores like Budni and (sometimes) Rossmann will have almond or seed-flour to bake your own keto bread in Germany.  

All of the products I've linked to so far I've really enjoyed, actually and can recommend them (especially the Keto Crackers, the keto Brötchen that you bake yourself, and the extremely tasty ready-made meals from factor (try to get them at a discount, which should not be too hard once you're in their email funnel). But the point of this article isn't really to steer you to obvious keto stuff (which is also a bit expensive) because you'll experience a much more chill keto lifestyle in Germany if you relax your focus a bit and develop a routine with low-carb items that are not specifically keto-labelled. Here's what I mean:

2) How to go out to eat and socialize stress-free in Germany while on the keto diet

When I started this diet in January, I thought my social life was going to be effectively over (which is basically like pulling the plug on a coma patient, but still), with meals with friends or having a drink seeming completely impossible. The last thing I wanted to be was "that guy" who has to tell everyone about his diet and tire out the poor server with questions about ingredients.

Fun fact: The reason I thought now was the best time to try the keto diet was actually BECAUSE I was already not going out to eat very much due to having a crazy toddler and because restaurant prices had increased absurdly in recent years. It was basically like a self-imposed covid-style lockdown in terms of seeing people and eating together.

But that's not what happened! Once you figure out which cuisines don't make carbs their centerpiece (sorry, Italian food) and which places almost always serve their carb separately (hello Indian and Chinese food!) it's really easy to go out to eat and just not eat the rice (pro tip: ask the waiter for a salad instead, or a bit more of whatever else comes with it). Ubiquitous Döner places in Germany will be happy to leave out the fries/rice and just add more salad. So will Middle Eastern places. Greek food works well, too. And since many steakhouses are in the business of not including sides with their steaks, just order to broccoli and mushrooms instead of the fries.

My personal advice is also this: Even if it means that you're not in ketosis 100% of the time, you get a lot of quality-of-life points if you go easy on yourself and don't second-guess every food item on the menu. Avoid obvious carbs (rice, potatoes, bread, pasta) and anything that is known to have a sweet sauce (you know, like sweet-and-sour pork) and then just eat. The most important thing to avoid in any case are sugars in liquids, which add up super quickly. The last bit of advice on all of this is that if you made a misstep, just call it a cheat meal (but don't make a whole cheat day of it!) and move on.

I've also found that colleagues and friends aren't as intolerant or puzzled at the keto concept as you might fear - even in Germany. You might find that everyone has their own little version of this that they're doing and are happy to talk about their own experience and (maybe) learn from yours.

As for drinking: Wine is ok, as long as it's dry. Just keep in mind that, in the hierarchy of things your body metabolizes, alcohol comes first, so the more you drink, the more time your body will spend deconstructing the alcohol and your fat will stay right where it is. 

3) What's good and what isn't if you want to try keto in Germany

I've found that when we do an elimination diet of any kind (as opposed to a moderation diet) is that we seek substitutes for what we're giving up. Hence the abundance of all types of very explicit vegan meats and cheeses, and gluten-free breads and pastas. As an enthusiastic omnivore who's tried a lot of that stuff, let me just say, they almost always fall short in comparison to what they're intending to emulate. But they're sometimes pretty good in of themselves (except for gluten-free bread - even birds won't eat that crap). 

So I started off, in the beginning, trying to supplement the obvious SALMON-AND-AVOCADO thing with "keto pasta" and "keto bread" and while the bread was pretty good (specifically this one) and the pasta I tried was only passable but good enough if you have a strong sauce (specifically this pasta), or very interesting in terms of flavor but definitely not a pasta (I'm talking about these konjac noodles which are worth a try), after two or three weeks I just plain stopped *needing* the fake carb. A meal did not seem incomplete without it anymore. My plates started looking pretty balanced with the protein and two types of vegetables. Instead of sandwiches (which have too many processed items anyway) I have gotten used to eating a little cheese on its own. Or spreadable with baby carrots (which contain a bit of sugar but they're my exception). To each their own, but if you're anything like me, you won't need to worry about the one-to-one replacements soon enough.  (Just as an aside, keto bread, which is gluten-free, is MUCH tastier than the popular gluten-free-but-non-keto products).

Without further ado, let me tell you what I regard as my daily essentials, and you can do with this information what you will:

a) Daily magnesium and potassium supplements. Specifically, 400mg of magnesium, and (separately) about 1500mg of potassium. Every morning, available on amazon or (in lower dosages) in pharmacies and drug stores. Research this part for yourself or ask your doctor/pharmacist what they think is best for you. Once I started taking them, my keto flu symptoms went away and I felt a lot less sore.

b) My meals during work hours consist of (really delicious) Alesto salted almonds (this is by far my favorite brand, which tastes like a delicious snack, available at Lidl), sometimes hard-boiled eggs, a bag of baby carrots and something to dip them in (usually hummus or a spreadable cheese), sometimes a salami snack. All these items are readily available in some form or another in all supermarkets in Germany. You can buy hard-boiled eggs there, too (they are the colorful ones).

If I have a bulletproof coffee (which is REALLY delicious), using MCT oil I bought on amazon I don't need to eat anything else until noon. Otherwise, I stay calory-free with a black coffee until around 10am.

c) What's an important cornerstone of my version of this diet is that while I try very strictly to stay under 30-50g of carbs per day, I often look at the nutrition facts of a product and if the product is 200-250g and the carb content per 100g is lower than 7g, I'll consider it as part of the daily intake. The aforementioned spreadable cheese and hummus falls into that category. In order to satisfy my occasional craving for a sweet taste (because the keto diet does, unfortunately, keep you far removed from experiencing that particular flavor and sometimes you just feel like everything's too harsh and savory), I reach for the "high-protein" puddings and yogurts which have three times fewer carbs than their traditional counterparts but satisfy the craving excellently. They are around 12g per serving and can definitely be a good part of your daily routine. (These low-carb tortillas can also save a taco evening with friends. There are also veggie tortillas but they taste like cardboard, IMHO). Bottom line: If you keep the total weight of the product you're consuming in mind, you can allow yourself some low-carb instead of no-carb, too.

d) Erythritol sweetener: It's a great sugar substitute and it's actually carb-free as far as keto is concerned (NOT as far as its nutrition label is concerned) and you can order it on amazon or elsewhere easily in Germany. Together with almond flour, you can bake great cakes (I baked a really nice keto-friendly one that had my family asking for seconds just using those two, eggs, butter, Leinsamen (flaxseed meal, not necessary), Flohsamenschalen (psyllium husk powder, not necessary), baking powder, and lemon juice - and had chatgpt conjure up the recipe and instructions). If you want the recipe, hit me up in the comments.

4) Is it worth it? What is my take on keto in general?

I put this last because I assumed that if you're reading this article, you're probably already familiar with keto and its benefits and did some research about it. You can probably also figure that I'm a fan if I devote a perfectly good afternoon to writing this. But you should trust the source, so here I go:

If you had met me prior to 2025, you would have probably known me to be a guy who likes to drink a lot of coca cola (specifically) and (on occasion) more than a few  beers. I absolutely love pizza and good French bread, and I was known to finish my plate and ask for seconds if there was pasta served. 

It goes without saying that my weight bothered me in a practical sense (having to suck in my stomach when people were passing in narrow hallways, which happened a lot), and I often felt bloated and very tired. I didn't make the connection that my tiredness had a lot to do with sugar crashes, wondering why I would feel lethargic after having had a whole bottle of coke...

Soon after starting keto, I felt better. A lot better. My energy levels quickly became constant and sufficient (no more highs and lows, just a nice steady just-the-right-amount of energy), and my tiredness was uncoupled from my hunger. There's no better way to explain it, and I do hope that everyone gets to experience this at least once in their lives just to see how the human body is capable of a totally different energy paradigm than what we've grown accustomed to. In terms of weight loss, I have lost around 10 kilos in this time, and my total goal is to lose around 25 (in total) around June. I will update this article when the time comes, or if I have any more revelations. If you want to see a BEFORE video of me, here's me teaching German before I started keto. If you have any questions or comments, please leave them below, I'd love to chat about this! Much success!