Ketogenic Diet - Powerful Dietary Strategy for Certain Conditions

[naorma]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

Hey naorma, I usually find that drinking lots of water on the days that i am fasting helps with the empty feelings of hunger. I think a lot of the time our "hunger pangs" are actually the body's way of telling us that we are dehydrated. Maybe you could try this next tine your feeling hungry (unless, as you said, you like the sensation ;))

Naorma, it may be beneficial to swap that coffee and tea for broth perhaps? A friend of mine did a broth fast for 2 days and said he felt great afterwards, I've used broth a few times to get me through fasting. Broth can hold a hella'lot of salt also, so you're getting your electrolytes! :)

When you're feeling hungry, a big glass of water tends to help. :)

Thank you Lilyalic and Keyhole for the tips!
Problem with coffee is the speeding up it gives me. Especially in the morning it is a reason to get out of bed, to be honest! But as I said, I will take that round (in German we say: Ich werde die Kurve kratzen ;) ) because I strongly remember the times when I was living without coffee.
Water is a good idea, maybe I try that broth day!

Thanks again!

 

[will01]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

Recently I came across a detailed analysis about the content of bone broth. It's from a guy who wanted to figure out, what's really inside his bone broth. So he made some protocols with different cooking time and content, took samples and brought it to different labs to let them test whats inside. You can find the details here:

_http://www.alive.com/health/bone-broth-analysis-reader-research

One of our readers sent in some incredible research on bone broth and its mineral content. Find out the fascinating results here.

Reader Lawrence Dubois, manager of Salt Spring Natureworks, contacted us with some very interesting personal research on bone broth.

Bone broth is widely believed to be a mineral rich food, yet published research to back up the belief is hard to find. Because of this, Lawrence conducted his own series of experiments where he made different batches of bone broth and had the samples analyzed.

It’s incredibly interesting stuff and we’ve included his complete and unabridged findings here. If you’d like to discuss this research further, please leave a comment below or contact Lawrence directly at bonebrothinfo@gmail.com.
Lawrence Dubois

Bone Broth Analyzed

Investigation and Discussion

The Premise:

Bone broth is one of the most mineral rich foods you can make right? OK, I’ll buy that. I’ve read it in many threads online and in many written publications discussing nutrition based on traditional, ancestral, whole-food, paleo, primal and low-carb concepts. Common sense dictates that it should be true, as after all, the process of making bone broth essentially consists of dissolving bones in water (at least partially). Well, if that’s truly the case then where is the evidence?

I looked everywhere, but couldn’t find a single stich of information that wasn’t simply inference or conjecture (i.e. “Bone broth is rich in minerals, especially calcium and phosphorus”). Where are the facts, the hard numbers? Is it possible that the idea of bone broth being rich in minerals is so credible that nobody’s ever bothered to prove it? Has no one been curious to see just how many minerals there are in bone broth? I know I have.

I really wanted to scratch this itch, but even Google wasn’t helping me. Admittedly I am a bit of a data freak; I like knowing the details. That isn’t to say that I’m a “doubting Thomas”; more like “curious George”. I was already a believer in bone broth. I consumed it regularly and promoted it to others. I already assumed that there must be a cornucopia of unique health promoting compounds in bone broth, from the obvious minerals and gelatin to possibly more mysterious and elusive compounds like trace minerals, nucleotides, sulfates, long-chain fatty acids, fat soluble vitamins, co-factors, growth factors, glycosaminoglycans and a range of other potential molecules coming from such precious stores as marrow, connective tissue, bone and even spinal cord (if using back- bone segments).

While I didn’t need convincing, I still wanted numbers and values. If not to prove the concept, then at least to compare bone broth to other foods and otherwise satisfy my curiosity. I was left with no other choice than to do my own tests. And so it began.

What really surprised me was not the fact that bone broth seems to be rather low in minerals (compared to other food), but the very high protein content. After 8 hours of cooking, he got almost 50g of protein per liter and after 24 hours cooking, even almost 120g protein per liter. That's a whole lot for a ketogenic diet I think.

Unfortunately, the site seems to have some kind of bug because the last time I checked it, there were nice and tidy charts in it where the numbers easily could be compared. Well, the data is still there, but a bit scattered and hard to read.

Thanks for the link, interesting results. The protein content was a surprise and good to know. My broth is slow cooked for around 48 hours, so one could assume it has a high protein content. I have about 200 - 250ml a day, so that is likely 30 or more grams of protein. Having overdone the recommended amount of protein per day on a few occasions and felt the "brain fog" effect it brings, I've noted no such effects from the broth. One possible reason is having the broth with my bacon meal, which is very fatty and may be lower in protein than it's weight/volume suggests.

Like the author of the article, I too was disappointed with the mineral content of bone broth. However it will always remain a part of my diet whenever possible. Having had pain in my left knee since my teens, the introduction of bone broth has stopped it completely. If for some reason I can't have broth for 4 - 5 days, the pain returns. So it appears the broth does a great job with joint repair and maintenance.

 

[theos]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

Like the author of the article, I too was disappointed with the mineral content of bone broth. However it will always remain a part of my diet whenever possible. Having had pain in my left knee since my teens, the introduction of bone broth has stopped it completely. If for some reason I can't have broth for 4 - 5 days, the pain returns. So it appears the broth does a great job with joint repair and maintenance.

This was a disappointment to me too but I'll keep having it. It's very yummy and satiating and it makes me feel good. The extra collagen is a plus as well. It's helped with cramping for me which makes me wonder if, despite the low mineral content, the minerals are highly assimilated. Maybe one doesn't need as much mineral content if it is in the form of broth vs supplementation?

I'd like to see further studies on the mineral content of bone broth as well.

 

[davey72]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

Did the author state where the bones came from? I would imagine a big discrepency between store bought, and grass/naturally fed animals.

 

[A Jay]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

Did the author state where the bones came from? I would imagine a big discrepency between store bought, and grass/naturally fed animals.

From the protocol section:

If I was going to make bone broth and have it tested by a lab, I wanted it to be the best bone broth possible. Surely there would be a sliding scale of mineral concentration that would depend on such factors as bone type, size, quality, PH and cooking time. I wanted my broth to be in the upper limits of this scale. I also wanted the broth to be reproducible and therefore representative of what at least some people are already doing out there.

I decided to use venison bones. I live on a small island in the Pacific Northwest and we have an abundance of mule deer. Over the winter I had hunted a nice young buck and kept all his bones for future broths. Since the mule deer are quite small here, the bone yield is about as much as you’d get from a big lamb. As the bones weren’t very big I decided to make a mix, using every part of the body possible; long bones including joints, from the limbs (to get that nice soft marrow), hip bones, shoulder blades and backbone segments which included some nice spinal cord (no CWD to worry about in these parts). The bones were all scraped clean of meat and either cut or broken up to increase surface area. Deer bones are also quite thin so after cooking they easily fall apart.

From the 'new protocol' section:

Since I considered my first experiment to be less than successful, I decided to take it up a notch. I needed to increase the cooking time for sure, but I also decided to add vinegar to the broth to reduce PH and sent the samples to a bigger, more professional lab in the hopes of getting the most accurate results.

I used store-bought bones from grass-fed bison and cooked them for a total of 24hrs. I also used this opportunity to take a sample of broth midway through the boil (at 12hrs) to see the progression. I wondered if there was perhaps a “critical point” when the bones really started to shed their minerals; i.e. was the progression fairly linear or was it perhaps exponential beyond a certain point?

Then his last round:

The minerals are being bound out of solution through chemical reactions in the broth. I.e. perhaps the minerals are reacting with certain proteins or other structures and precipitating out of the broth. This would explain why the calcium values were actually lower in the broths than in the plain water. It also explains why it seemed to affect some minerals more than others; perhaps there is a chemical affinity for some minerals in this particular environment due to their unique chemical properties.
The minerals are not actually being “released” from their glyco-protein matrixes in the bones and other tissues. The macro structure of the bone is breaking down, but only into smaller micro structures that simply sink to the bottom of the pot; not small enough to be dissolved or kept in suspension.

Put simply, most of the minerals were likely in the sediments at the bottom of the pot. This is not news to anyone who’s made bone broth and experienced the soft sand-like grit waiting for you at the bottom of each bowl. Of course, it wasn’t news to me either, but I still expected the broth itself to be quite rich in minerals. The fact that it is not, and even that it’s mineral poor, was news.

I couldn’t stop there; I had to know how many minerals were in the sediments. I decided I would make yet another batch of broth, but this time separate the sediment from the broth and have both analyzed separately. I used the same protocol as above, but used 3lbs of locally pastured grass-fed cow bones and cooked them for 9hrs in my trusty pressure-cooker. When it was done cooking, I let it cool and removed all the bones from it. Once everything was settled, I carefully ladled all of the broth out until I was left with only the sediment layer. I scraped and poured all of it into a jar (only about 60ml or 2oz worth). I sent this jar along with a sample of the broth to the lab for analysis.

So from his analyses, it seems like the most minerals are in the sediment. Go figure. But the only impressive number coming from the sediment is calcium. Considering how complicated this seems to be, perhaps it really is necessary to add in things like onions and celery and the like to release the minerals?

 

[dugdeep]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

I agree that it's very interesting. However, it would've been helpful if he had included how exactly the lab tested the minerals for each sample. From what I could tell, it sounds like the lab only measured ions in solution, and not any minerals that may have been bound to proteins or other substances. So, perhaps you'll get more minerals from the broth once it reaches your stomach acid, where the broth can be broken down.

I read this piece a few months back and this is the first thing I thought. If the lab is only testing mineral ions, it makes sense that they won't be finding much (AFAIK, ionic minerals don't tend to stay in ionic form for long, and will bind to anything close by with the opposite charge). It makes more sense that the minerals would be bound to other compounds found in the broth, including amino acids or protein complexes. As zlyja said, these would be freed in the process of digestion. I don't think any firm conclusions can be derived from this guy's method unless we can be sure the lab is able to measure bound minerals.

It also would've been interesting to know the specific amino acid content of each sample to know how much of that protein is considered complete.

As was discussed earlier in the thread, bone broth is not a complete protein. It was stated earlier that, because of this fact, the protein in bone broth doesn't count towards your total protein consumption for the day (or for a meal). This makes sense if you figure that, being an incomplete protein, bone broth will be missing at least one essential amino acid. This would be a rate-limiting step, not allowing the body to use it as it would a complete protein. However, if you were to eat another incomplete protein that was complementary to the bone broth (ie. contained the missing amino acid(s) the bone broth is missing), then I believe this would make the bone broth + other incomplete protein source count towards your total protein. This might be a good argument not to put vegetables like onions, carrots and celery in with your broth, assuming you're trying to keep protein levels below a certain threshold, since they may contain complementary amino acids.

Regardless, the high protein content would likely knock people out of ketosis, as, if I recall correctly, mTOR can be activated by significant concentrations of any amino acid.

Is that the case? I was under the impression it was tied to insulin release, OSIT. Not all amino acids are insulinergic (cause insulin release), AFAIK. So this would mean it wouldn't be just any amino acids that leads to activation of the mTOR pathway, but only the ones that have an effect on insulin.

Also, keep in mind that ketosis and mTOR, while related, are not the same thing. It's possible to be in ketosis and still activate the mTOR pathway and vice versa.

 

[Nienna]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

Thank you, dugdeep, for your comments. I don't agree with what is being said about the protein in bone broth being able to knock one out of ketosis because I have a mug of bone broth twice a day (before each meal) and using a ketone monitor, it shows that I am well into ketosis. So much so that I've had to decrease my amount of fat intake. So what you are saying, dugdeep, makes a lot of sense.

 

[T.C.]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

The thing that stands out for me is the lack of data on the fat content. If there's a lot more fat than protein, will that in itself keep ketosis stable due to the ratio?

 

[Gawan]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

The thing that stands out for me is the lack of data on the fat content. If there's a lot more fat than protein, will that in itself keep ketosis stable due to the ratio?

There are many numbers how many proteins you should eat and how much fat. The main ratio is about 1 part protein to a 3-4 parts of fat, but you should not exceed more than 21 grams of protein per meal (and depends also on your body weight). I really think these ratios are of great help in the beginning to have a guess what to eat and to get a feeling, but in the end it is really an individual thing with lots of testing what keeps you in ketosis and what not. And still even many authors differs in what they recommend :).

 

[Sinapi]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

It also would've been interesting to know the specific amino acid content of each sample to know how much of that protein is considered complete.

As was discussed earlier in the thread, bone broth is not a complete protein. It was stated earlier that, because of this fact, the protein in bone broth doesn't count towards your total protein consumption for the day (or for a meal). This makes sense if you figure that, being an incomplete protein, bone broth will be missing at least one essential amino acid. This would be a rate-limiting step, not allowing the body to use it as it would a complete protein. However, if you were to eat another incomplete protein that was complementary to the bone broth (ie. contained the missing amino acid(s) the bone broth is missing), then I believe this would make the bone broth + other incomplete protein source count towards your total protein. This might be a good argument not to put vegetables like onions, carrots and celery in with your broth, assuming you're trying to keep protein levels below a certain threshold, since they may contain complementary amino acids.

Yes, I recall that from earlier in the thread. I thought it would've been interesting to do an analysis of the amino acid content anyway in case there were even miniscule amounts of essential amino acids not found in gelatin (cysteine and tryptophan). If the mineral content is questionable, why not question the amino acid profile as well? I was thinking about broth's use as a protein replacement in case you're unlucky enough not to have meat available, but, upon rereading others' negative experiences with using just bone broth as an incomplete protein, that's not a good idea. Sorry for not clarifying my thought process, there.

However, now that you've mentioned the idea of combining incomplete proteins to make complete ones, I wonder if the negative effects would be mitigated if those deficient amino acids were replaced by plant foods in a famine situation. That would take some calculating to figure out.

Regardless, the high protein content would likely knock people out of ketosis, as, if I recall correctly, mTOR can be activated by significant concentrations of any amino acid.

Is that the case? I was under the impression it was tied to insulin release, OSIT. Not all amino acids are insulinergic (cause insulin release), AFAIK. So this would mean it wouldn't be just any amino acids that leads to activation of the mTOR pathway, but only the ones that have an effect on insulin.

Also, keep in mind that ketosis and mTOR, while related, are not the same thing. It's possible to be in ketosis and still activate the mTOR pathway and vice versa.

After reviewing Gedgaudas, I see I was lumping gluconeogenesis and mTOR together. Thanks for pointing that out!

Regarding mTOR, I was probably wrong by saying that all amino acids activate it. I find the literature to be confusing and contradictory at times. While some amino acids are studied individually, it seems like most of the time researchers use a combination of all essential amino acids. Rosedale, in “Protein: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly”, mentions that restricting methionine, tryptophan, cysteine, glutamine, and I'm assuming aspartate (he says aspartame) inhibits mTOR. Gedgaudas additionally mentions the branched amino acids as being significant activators of mTOR. Another paper suggests amino acids, particularly arginine, lysine, and histidine, could reactivate mTOR after accumulating through autophagy (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3432651/). There are probably more, but that's already a lot of amino acids! However, there's some evidence to suggest that phenylalanine inhibits mTOR, or only very weakly activates it (see http://jn.nutrition.org/content/142/3/484.full#T4 and http://www.nature.com/srep/2014/141106/srep06941/full/srep06941.html).

Also, by insulinergic amino acids, do you mean glucogenic amino acids? If so, I don't think it's true that only the glucogenic amino acids activate mTOR, because leucine, a ketogenic amino acid, is commonly cited as being a major activator of mTOR. Unless my searching skills are failing me, in which case, could you please provide a link?

Anyway, considering that glycine and proline are the most abundant amino acids in gelatin, and that they're both glucogenic, perhaps they can produce enough glucose to kick some people out of ketosis.

Thank you, dugdeep, for your comments. I don't agree with what is being said about the protein in bone broth being able to knock one out of ketosis because I have a mug of bone broth twice a day (before each meal) and using a ketone monitor, it shows that I am well into ketosis. So much so that I've had to decrease my amount of fat intake. So what you are saying, dugdeep, makes a lot of sense.

How long do you cook your broth for? I tend to cook mine under pressure for at most three hours per batch. I don't think many people cook theirs for a full 24 hours. Assuming you stop at 12 hours, you're left with 57.5 g/L. A liter is about 4.23 cups, so you have roughly 13.6 grams of protein per cup, and thus you'd get an extra 27.2 grams of incomplete protein per day. That's unlikely to increase your protein levels out of a moderate range, especially if you already restrict protein, making any gluconeogenesis negligible, OSIT. On the other hand, if you do cook your broth for 24 hours and therefore get about twice the amount of protein calculated while the monitor says you're in ketosis, then perhaps the amino acid content doesn't matter, or there are other variables involved, such as the ratio of fat to protein. It'd be interesting to have more data to settle the question, but if it's working for you, I'd keep doing what you're doing.

 

[T.C.]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

The thing that stands out for me is the lack of data on the fat content. If there's a lot more fat than protein, will that in itself keep ketosis stable due to the ratio?

There are many numbers how many proteins you should eat and how much fat. The main ratio is about 1 part protein to a 3-4 parts of fat, but you should not exceed more than 21 grams of protein per meal (and depends also on your body weight). I really think these ratios are of great help in the beginning to have a guess what to eat and to get a feeling, but in the end it is really an individual thing with lots of testing what keeps you in ketosis and what not. And still even many authors differs in what they recommend :).

Right, okay. Thank you.

I'm still working my way through the diet threads and related books. I'd started with this thread, but I've switched to the LWB thread instead, as that one seems to be more important to start off with, as I change my physiology. I've read LWB, am reading The Art and Science... and have The Vegetarian Myth too.

Your above post helped to crystallise something for me last night. I've fortunately never had a negative program towards high sat-fat consumption. But I now see that a false understanding I had was the idea of a good, hearty meal as being a substantial meal. And while reading the threads and books, whenever the idea of ratio's of fat/carb/protein came up, the image it would conjure up would be a plate with a massive amount of fat on it, and a miniscule amount of carbs and protein. But I now realise it's the energy content that counts, not the portion size.

The other thing that seemed to go over my head was the idea of foundation veg. I believed that ideally, I shouldn't eat any veg, and only animal fat and meat. So I decided to add these into my diet and watch out for any negative effects.

This morning, for breakfast, I've had some bok choy and broccoli equating to 5g of carbs, about 80g of organic pork mince (not ready to go down to less than 21g's yet), with 50g of butter and 50g of beef tallow.

To look at the plate, it doesn't appear to be a high fat breakfast, and certainly doesn't look like an overwhelming ratio of fat to carbs/protein. But when you actually add up the energy content, I got around 340kcal from the carbs/protein and 900kcal from the butter and tallow.

I've been using keto-strips for the last two weeks - I test every morning. My body very quickly went into producing acetoacetate, and my strips show that I hover around 8mmol/L. I know it's no indicator of beta-hydroxybutyrate, but it looks like my body hasn't got used to using up all my ketones yet.

I have to say, the biggest thing that's helped my transition bowel-wise, has been doing the liver cleanse.

 

[SeekinTruth]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

Yeah, it's important to keep in mind that the fat to protein ratios are talking about calories not weight. Fat has twice the calories per gram compared to protein or carbs. Also getting you liver to make more bile is very helpful to digesting all that fat. Eventually, you'll be able to digest more and more fat without getting loose stools and won't need to do liver cleanses and other liver support for fat digestion, as the high fat diet will eventually get the bile production and consistency right for much better digestion. But in the beginning, liver support herbs and supplements, such as milk thistle, can definitely be a big help.

 

[fabric]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

This morning, for breakfast, I've had some bok choy and broccoli equating to 5g of carbs, about 80g of organic pork mince (not ready to go down to less than 21g's yet), with 50g of butter and 50g of beef tallow.

Did you mean 80g as in 80g of protein (so about 8-9 ounce portion) or 80g as in weight so approx 2.8 ounces? If it is only 2.8 ounces then you are only taking in about 20g of protein which is well under Nora's recommended allowance. I myself don't feel satiated until about 4 - 4.5 ounces (which is in the 28-35 grams of protein range). I do workout however and think I just have a higher requirement as I am pretty steady in ketosis.

 

[T.C.]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

This morning, for breakfast, I've had some bok choy and broccoli equating to 5g of carbs, about 80g of organic pork mince (not ready to go down to less than 21g's yet), with 50g of butter and 50g of beef tallow.

Did you mean 80g as in 80g of protein (so about 8-9 ounce portion) or 80g as in weight so approx 2.8 ounces? If it is only 2.8 ounces then you are only taking in about 20g of protein which is well under Nora's recommended allowance. I myself don't feel satiated until about 4 - 4.5 ounces (which is in the 28-35 grams of protein range). I do workout however and think I just have a higher requirement as I am pretty steady in ketosis.

Thanks for the info, it was 80g total, so 20g protein. I'm sorry it's taking me a bit to get my head around the numbers. I'll continue to read the threads.

 

[dugdeep]

Re: Ketogenic Diet - Path To Transformation?

It also would've been interesting to know the specific amino acid content of each sample to know how much of that protein is considered complete.

As was discussed earlier in the thread, bone broth is not a complete protein. It was stated earlier that, because of this fact, the protein in bone broth doesn't count towards your total protein consumption for the day (or for a meal). This makes sense if you figure that, being an incomplete protein, bone broth will be missing at least one essential amino acid. This would be a rate-limiting step, not allowing the body to use it as it would a complete protein. However, if you were to eat another incomplete protein that was complementary to the bone broth (ie. contained the missing amino acid(s) the bone broth is missing), then I believe this would make the bone broth + other incomplete protein source count towards your total protein. This might be a good argument not to put vegetables like onions, carrots and celery in with your broth, assuming you're trying to keep protein levels below a certain threshold, since they may contain complementary amino acids.

Yes, I recall that from earlier in the thread. I thought it would've been interesting to do an analysis of the amino acid content anyway in case there were even miniscule amounts of essential amino acids not found in gelatin (cysteine and tryptophan). If the mineral content is questionable, why not question the amino acid profile as well?

I've been trying to find references to the amino acid content of bone broth for the last hour and it's not easy to figure out! According to Sally Fallon, in Nourishing Traditions, bone broth contains primarily arginine and glycine (which compose gelatin). Other sources mention proline, glycine, and glutamine, as well as cysteine in the case of chicken broth. Lysine is a component of collagen, in small amounts, so that's probably in bone broth too.

This article on SOTT lists glycine, proline (plus hydroxyproline) and lysine (plus hydroxylysine) as the amino acid profile of gelatin.

Also, you mentioned cysteine in reference to it being an essential amino acid, if I understood you correctly. Just wanted to point out that cysteine is not an essential amino acid (which include isoleucine, leucine, lysine, methionine, phenylalanine, threonine, tryptophan, valine).

I was thinking about broth's use as a protein replacement in case you're unlucky enough not to have meat available, but, upon rereading others' negative experiences with using just bone broth as an incomplete protein, that's not a good idea. Sorry for not clarifying my thought process, there.

Yeah, I think this would be tricky. Given the information I was able to glean about the amino acid content of bone broth, it looks like it's pretty deficient in essential amino acids. Although, Sally Fallon says that gelatin is a "protein sparer", which somehow allows the protein that is consumed to go further. Unfortunately, she doesn't go into detail about this, but I figure it probably has to do with the fact that bone broth contains so much glycine, which is used in abundance in the body. If you're taking in a lot of glycine from an external source, your body won't need to use up its essential amino acids making it. Therefore you'll have more essential aminos for other things. Just speculating.

Regardless, the high protein content would likely knock people out of ketosis, as, if I recall correctly, mTOR can be activated by significant concentrations of any amino acid.

Is that the case? I was under the impression it was tied to insulin release, OSIT. Not all amino acids are insulinergic (cause insulin release), AFAIK. So this would mean it wouldn't be just any amino acids that leads to activation of the mTOR pathway, but only the ones that have an effect on insulin.

Also, keep in mind that ketosis and mTOR, while related, are not the same thing. It's possible to be in ketosis and still activate the mTOR pathway and vice versa.

After reviewing Gedgaudas, I see I was lumping gluconeogenesis and mTOR together. Thanks for pointing that out!

Regarding mTOR, I was probably wrong by saying that all amino acids activate it. I find the literature to be confusing and contradictory at times. While some amino acids are studied individually, it seems like most of the time researchers use a combination of all essential amino acids. Rosedale, in “Protein: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly”, mentions that restricting methionine, tryptophan, cysteine, glutamine, and I'm assuming aspartate (he says aspartame) inhibits mTOR. Gedgaudas additionally mentions the branched amino acids as being significant activators of mTOR. Another paper suggests amino acids, particularly arginine, lysine, and histidine, could reactivate mTOR after accumulating through autophagy (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3432651/). There are probably more, but that's already a lot of amino acids! However, there's some evidence to suggest that phenylalanine inhibits mTOR, or only very weakly activates it (see http://jn.nutrition.org/content/142/3/484.full#T4 and http://www.nature.com/srep/2014/141106/srep06941/full/srep06941.html).

I think this is why, from a practical point of view, it's better to simply restrict protein as a whole, rather than look at individual amino acids.

I like to keep in mind that all the research on mTOR is just burgeoning now, and no firm conclusions are known at this point. I actually think that Gedgaudas has kind of "muddied the field" a bit in her book by talking so much about it. One can maintain a ketogenic diet fairly easily without ever worrying about mTOR (see the Atkins diet); it really only comes into play in terms of longevity. Don't get me wrong; I think it's interesting and it may be beneficial to take steps to not activate mTOR too much. But I don't think it's the primary concern in the diet. My 2 cents, anyway.

Also, by insulinergic amino acids, do you mean glucogenic amino acids? If so, I don't think it's true that only the glucogenic amino acids activate mTOR, because leucine, a ketogenic amino acid, is commonly cited as being a major activator of mTOR. Unless my searching skills are failing me, in which case, could you please provide a link?

No, insulinergic means the amino acids cause insulin release in and of themselves. Glucogenic amino acids are the ones that can be converted to glucose. Different things.

Anyway, considering that glycine and proline are the most abundant amino acids in gelatin, and that they're both glucogenic, perhaps they can produce enough glucose to kick some people out of ketosis.

It's possible, but keep in mind that, theoretically, the body will only start converting amino acids to glucose if it has an over-abundance (this is actually a rather hotly debated topic and there are some studies that show gluconeogenesis is not dependant on amino acid availability, as Gedgaudas and Rosedale claim, but based on the body's needs for glucose).

My point being - I don't think we need to fear the bone broth for any reason. While it's interesting to dig in to this stuff, I personally have never felt like I've been kicked out of ketosis from eating bone broth. I'm not a diligent ketone measurer, but I can usually tell if I'm back in sugar burning mode, and that seems to only happen with an over-indulgence in carbs, not because I had some bone broth with my meal or had an extra 2 ounces of steak.