Looking for some motivation? One professional chef lost over 100 pounds the traditional way — without Ozempic — all while launching her own potato chip business.
Since 2021, Keya Wingfield has gone from 245 pounds to 138 pounds by simply adjusting her diet and committing to two key exercises.
During that time, she also started Keya’s Snacks, a brand specializing in masala-spiced potato chips — and she definitely enjoyed her creations.
“I’ve eaten more potato chips in the past four years than in my entire life,” she told The Post.
Since 2021, Keya Wingfield has gone from 245 pounds to 138 pounds by simply changing her diet and committing to two core exercises.
Weight struggles have been part of Wingfield’s life from the very beginning.
“I was born overweight,” she said with a laugh. “I always joke that I was a nine-pound baby — a pound overweight already. Honestly, it’s been a lifelong struggle.”
Like many who have wrestled with the scale, she tried just about every diet imaginable over her thirty-something years.
“There isn’t a diet under the sun that I haven’t tried,” she said, from Weight Watchers to the cabbage soup diet. “Some stuck for a little while and gave some results, but the weight always bounced back to where it started.”
It’s a story that resonates with many. Life — from work stress to hormones — can get in the way, not to mention the impact of childbirth. Wingfield has navigated that journey twice, first welcoming her daughter, now six years old.
“I saw my daughter’s face, and [thought], ‘She deserves a happy mom, a healthy mom’ — and that just kind of flipped the switch.”
Keya Wingfield
“I gained about 65 pounds with each of my pregnancies. That was the heaviest I had ever been,” she said.
At just 5’1″, she reached 245 pounds. But the real turning point came after her second delivery, when tragedy struck: Wingfield’s newborn son passed away at just one month old.
“It was an incredibly rough time, and I spiraled into habits that really damaged my health,” she recalled.
She began monitoring her blood sugar and identifying which foods caused spikes. She also discovered that a simple walk after meals helped lower her insulin levels.
“One day I woke up, saw my daughter’s face, and thought, ‘I can’t keep going down this road.’ She deserves a happy, healthy mom — and that just flipped the switch for me,” she said.
“Had I not gone through that devastating experience, I don’t know if I would have found the strength to lose this weight. My whole life, I struggled to succeed at it. But something changed after that. It broke me in ways I can’t even explain.”
Wingfield wasn’t just overweight — she was also diabetic. In 2021, GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic were still new, so her doctor didn’t offer them.
“Had I known about it, I would have taken it in a heartbeat,” she said. “We all need some kind of help. This isn’t just a mental game, and it’s not just about willpower.”
She focused on consuming 1,500 to 1,800 calories a day, prioritizing healthier foods.
Although she’s always been a vegetarian, Wingfield’s diet used to be carb-heavy and low in protein, with lots of rice, potatoes, and pasta.
“People think that if you’re vegetarian, you eat a ton of veggies — but that’s not always the case,” she said.
She began monitoring her blood sugar to see which foods caused spikes and discovered that a simple walk after eating helped keep her insulin levels in check.
With a renewed focus, she started eating 1,500 to 1,800 calories a day of healthier foods. Mornings began with coffee and toast within an hour of waking, followed a couple of hours later by eggs with cheese and vegetables.
She incorporated snacks throughout the day, choosing nuts, yogurt, fruit, and popcorn. Dinner was a balanced, home-cooked meal, usually about two ounces of pasta paired with vegetables and cheese.
Although she wasn’t inactive before, Wingfield added weightlifting and boxing to her routine — the former helping “solve” her insulin spikes by building muscle, and the latter boosting her mental health.
“Beating a bag by yourself in a loud environment is pretty therapeutic,” she quipped.
Through this hard work, she lost an incredible 107 pounds, reaching a low of 138 pounds.
Even more impressive, she achieved this transformation while building her brand, Keya’s Snacks — which came about almost by accident. She had started making her masala-spiced Bombay chips to help her white American husband, who wasn’t initially a fan of Indian food, get accustomed to Indian spices.
She also launched Keya’s Snacks, a brand specializing in masala-spiced potato chips — and she certainly sampled her fair share.
“It literally opened his world to all these flavors. That was a massive ‘aha moment’ for me,” she said. “I realized this is a way to build a bridge — to make what feels unfamiliar and out of reach suddenly within reach.”
A chef who owns a custom dessert studio primarily focused on events, Wingfield watched her business collapse during the pandemic. She pivoted to selling modern Indian-American to-go meals, packaging them with her homemade chips, and demand soared.
Today, her snacks are sold in about 1,400 stores, and she’s added a second flavor, black salt. And of course, sampling her products was part of the process.
“I found little hacks,” she admitted. “For example, I dip chips in a cup of yogurt — it’s the perfect combination.” The added protein makes them slightly healthier and helps curb insulin spikes. But she also refuses to feel guilty about treating herself.
“People ask me, ‘What are the call-outs? Protein? Fiber? Something else?’” she said. “They have nothing. They have joy. Thirty-six grams of pure joy in a small bag.
“I think the stigma around snacking — around eating something you enjoy — really needs to go away. Not everything has to be functional or serve a purpose. Besides making you happy, it’s perfectly okay to enjoy it.”
