Here's the Real Problem With the Keto Diet, According to Carla Hall

Positively everyone is weighing in on the Keto diet these days — from those who say it's "stupid" or "dumb" (or even "really dumb") to those who swear by it for life-changing weight loss.

So when The Feast got Chef Carla Hall on the phone to talk about her new book, Carla Hall Soul Food: Everyday and Celebration, we had to know: What does she make of all this Keto business?

"First of all, I think that everybody sees something that works for someone else and then they want to jump on it — and you have to look at your own body and what works for your body," she told us. Secondly, she added, "It feels like another version of Atkins." That is, to say — a fad.

"It sounds like a fad. I think that in this country it’s akin to when people say, 'What are the in vegetables? What’s new? What’s trending?' I’m like what?" she mused.

Instead, she noted that in order to determine which vegetables are right to eat now, the right question should be: "What season is it?"

She said, "You’re not going to jump on a farm and say to farmers, 'Um, can you just go and grow more cauliflower this year because it’s like the trending vegetable?' Then what happens next year when he has grown all this cauliflower and nobody’s buying it?"

Beyond that, she said that the Keto diet fad just feels a little unoriginal — by its very nature as a trend people are inclined to follow blindly. "It remind me of when... Dominique Ansel had the cronut and everybody was like [doing their own version of] 'Oh! It's a cronut!' When you’re doing trends, you’re jumping on somebody’s creativity and you are not allowing your creativity to come through — and I think you’re selling yourself short. If anything, that trend should inspire you to do something that is coming from your heart. And that’s why I don’t like Keto."