Rice cakes can be an easy snack but foods like this are often high in carbs. Find out whether rice cakes are keto-friendly or not.
What exact brand you choose will influence the number of carbs in rice cakes. However, by looking at an example the answer becomes very clear.
100 grams of one type of rice cake contain around 76.9 grams of net carbohydrates (total carbs minus fiber).
While you will likely not eat this many rice cakes in one sitting, this does make it clear that rice cakes are definitely not keto-friendly.
You will have to choose one of the more low-carb substitutes instead.
Carbs in rice cakes
Carbohydrates are not the only nutrition detail you want to look at but they do play a big role in whether foods like rice cakes are keto-friendly or not.
As briefly mentioned, the exact brand of rice cakes you choose can influence these numbers somewhat. The carbs below are only one example.
100 grams of rice cakes contain the following amounts of carbs (1):
- Total carbs: 81.1 grams
- Of which fiber: 4.2 grams
- Net carbs: 76.9 grams
76.9 grams of net carbohydrates is so high that most people will get kicked out of ketosis even if they only eat 100 grams of rice cakes a day.
On top of that, you definitely want to eat real foods too.
One rice cake is about 3 grams and contains the following amounts of carbs:
- Total carbs: 2.43 grams
- Of which fiber: 0.13 grams
- Net carbs: 2.3 grams
It is worth mentioning that you can likely eat one rice cake without getting kicked out of ketosis.
If you really just like the taste of rice cakes you could consider one every once in a while.
That being said, this amount of carbs is still relatively high for such a small amount of food. There are low-carb cheeses with fewer carbs than this per 100 grams.
Other nutrition information rice cakes
It can often be helpful to look at the other nutrients in rice cakes and other foods too.
These can also play a role in whether you stay in ketosis and more importantly how good rice cakes are for goals like weight loss and general health.
100 grams of rice cakes contain the following nutrients (1):
- Calories: 392
- Protein: 7.1 grams
- Carbs: 81.1 grams
- Part of the carbs that is fiber: 4.2 grams
- Fat: 4.3 grams
- Niacin: 39% of the DV (Daily Value)
- Phosphorus: 36% of the DV
- Selenium: 35% of the DV
- Magnesium: 33% of the DV
- Copper: 22% of the DV
And some other vitamins and minerals in smaller amounts.
100 grams of rice cakes do contain nice amounts of fiber, vitamins, minerals, and even some protein.
However, not to the extent where it becomes worth implementing rice cakes into your ketogenic diet (besides for taste reasons).
Why rice cakes are basically never keto
Sometimes you can fit small amounts of higher-carb foods into your diet without getting kicked out of ketosis. In practice, it will be very hard to do this with rice cakes.
This is because ketogenic diets are ways of eating where you need to lower your carb intake enough to get into ketosis. Ketosis is a state where you mainly burn fat to get your energy (2).
How low your carb and rice cake intake has to be for this depends on a variety of details. While these keto statistics are not perfect, there are still some general keto guidelines to give you an idea.
One of these is that you want to consume about 55%-60% of your calories in fat, 30%-35% in protein, and 5%-10% in carbohydrates to get and stay in ketosis.
If you apply these ratios, you will likely conclude you can eat around 20 to 50 grams of net carbs a day.
These amounts typically don’t include the fiber in rice cakes and other foods even though it is a category of carbs. Your body deals with fiber in more keto-friendly ways.
With all of this information, it should be clear that even small amounts of rice cakes take a good chunk out of your daily carb budget. This is often not recommended.
Keto rice cake substitutes
You may realize that rice cakes will not align with your keto goals with still want a crunchy snack every once in a while.
For situations like this, there are still some of the following keto rice cake substitutes:
- Cheese crisps
- Flaxseed crackers
- Cauliflower crackers
- Other low-carb crackers
Something to keep in mind is that even these keto rice cake substitutes typically still contain some amounts of carbohydrates.
Your regular diet already contains some amounts of carbs.
In that case, you may want to take a closer look and do the calculations so you will actually stay in ketosis while eating the substitutes above.
Why do you want to stay in ketosis?
If you want to stay in ketosis every minute of the day, you likely want to stay away from rice cakes. Even only a few of these really raise your carb intake.
On the other hand, if you “just” want to achieve things like good general health and weight loss, the guidelines are somewhat less strict.
Rice cakes are still not good for weight loss and health but for these purposes, eating a few of them will often not be the end of the world.
FAQ
Are rice cakes low-carb?
No, rice cakes are definitely not low-carb. 100 grams of these contain around 76.9 grams of net carbs.
Do rice cakes have carbs?
Yes, rice cakes have carbs. In fact, they have a lot of them. One example of rice cakes contains around 81.1 grams of carbs (including 4.2 grams of fiber).
