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The Glycemic Index and Your Low Carbohydrate Diet: Part 2
By Chad
Tackett
For your low carbohydrate diet ("low carb diet") to be a success, it’s
absolutely critical that you understand carbohydrates ("carbs") and their
roles, how to select the right kind of carbohydrates and the carbs to avoid,
and several low carbohydrate diet techniques that can help you achieve
excellent results. In addition to this helpful article on low carbohydrate
diets, be sure to take our FREE Fitness Analysis! Once you've completed the
brief questionnaire, you'll receive specific weight loss recommendations
based on your responses, as well as information on your very own customized
low carbohydrate diet program. As a special thank you, you'll also receive
the new e-book, Big Fat Lies, absolutely FREE of charge.
Click here to get started!
There are all sorts of low carbohydrate diet plans out there that can
help you lose weight (not necessarily fat), but they are so miserable
that it's impossible to stay on them very long - even more difficult is
keeping the results you achieved before going off the low carbohydrate
diet program. We wanted to create a low carb plan that was both VERY
effective and a pleasure to implement all along the way. The GHF
Customized Diet Plan is just that!
Click here to learn more!
One a low carbohydrate diet, the glycemic index (GI) ranks foods on a
scale from 1 to 100 based on how much the blood sugar increases after
each food is consumed. In particular, the index is concerned with
carbohydrates because fats and proteins have little effect on blood
sugar levels. The higher the number, the greater the increase in blood
sugar on your low carbohydrate diet.
The GI was originally used
as a low carbohydrate diet tool to help diabetics keep their blood sugar
under control. This is important because people with diabetes who
control their blood sugar levels are considered less likely to develop
complications related to the disease.
The GI has recently
attracted a lot of attention in the bodybuilding, fitness, and low
carbohydrate diet world. Many popular low carbohydrate diets base their
entire program on the index as their primary criteria for choosing
carbohydrates. According to advocates of the GI system, foods that are
high on the scale such as rice cakes, carrots, potatoes, or grape juice
are "unfavorable" and should be avoided because they are absorbed so
rapidly and are therefore more likely to convert to fat. Instead, you
are urged to consume carbohydrates that are low on the GI such as
black-eyed peas, oatmeal, peanuts, apples, and beans.
Foods with
a high GI increase insulin output more than those with a lower GI.
Because high levels of insulin are associated with increased fat storage
and suppressed fat burning on a low carbohydrate diet, it is
hypothesized that eating high GI foods can make you fatter than eating
low GI foods. Low GI foods are thought to reduce fat storage because
they cause slower release of sugar into the bloodstream and therefore
less insulin production.
While the GI should be given consideration in your
carbohydrate choices when on a low carbohydrate diet, it's not a good
idea to make it your only criteria for choosing carbs. The mistake in
strictly adhering to the GI to dictate all your carb choices is that the
index is based on carbohydrates being eaten by themselves in a fasting
state.
An effective fat-burning, muscle-preserving/building low
carbohydrate diet is always based on combining carbs and protein
together. When carbs are eaten in mixed meals that contain protein and
small amounts of fat, the glycemic index loses its significance, because
the protein and fat slow the absorption of the carbohydrates. For
example, mashed potatoes have a GI that is near that of pure glucose,
but if you combine the potatoes with a chicken breast and vegetables,
the GI of the entire meal is much lower than the potato by itself. Rice
cakes also have a high GI. But if you spread a little peanut butter on
them, the fat slows the absorption of the carbs, thereby lowering the GI
of the combination.
A fat-burning, muscle-preserving/building low
carbohydrate diet should be also based on eating small frequent meals
that are spaced out 2.5-3 hours apart. This also lowers the significance
of the GI because on such an eating schedule, you are never eating in a
truly fasted state, except for breakfast.
Probably the most
important and relevant criteria for selecting carbs when on a low
carbohydrate diet are whether they are natural or processed. To avoid
natural foods like potatoes simply because they are high on the GI is
unwarranted. Potatoes, for example, are an outstanding source of starchy
complex carbs and contain protein as well.
Cooked exactly as it
is found in nature, an 8-oz. potato has only 170 calories and almost no
fat; it is loaded with essential nutrients and it is satisfying to eat.
Compare that to 8-oz. of processed carbs such as white pasta, which has
840 calories. Which do you think is the better choice when you're on a
low carbohydrate diet and you want to control body fat? If you said the
potato, you're right!
If a food is all natural, if it is starchy
rather than sugary, and if you are eating it as a part of a mixed meal
(with a complete protein and a little unsaturated fat) every 2-3 hours,
then you shouldn't worry if the food is high on the glycemic index.
When on a low carbohydrate diet, choose your carbs based on
whether they are natural or processed. As mentioned directly above, the
most important distinction you can make about carbohydrates is not the
GI; rather, it is the difference between natural and processed carbs.
The foundation of
draft-lcd, a VERY effective low carbohydrate diet, is based upon
choosing foods that are all natural and unrefined. The "acid-test" for
whether a carbohydrate is natural and unrefined is to ask, "Did this
food come out of the ground this way?" If the answer is yes, then it's a
natural, unrefined food. Broadly speaking, processed carbohydrates
include all white sugar and white flour products, such as bread and
pasta.
In the processing of a whole grain into white flour, the
carbohydrates are converted from a complex carb to of a more simple
carbohydrate. The milling of the grains in essence causes them to lose
their complexity while at the same time increasing their caloric
density. In fact, one cup of regular flour contains 400 calories. One
cup of high-gluten flour, which is used to make bagels, contains more
than 500 calories! White flour is a simple carbohydrate that is
processed in the body much like sugar. Most white-flour products are
also lower in nutritional value.
If you want the best results
from your low carbohydrate diet, you would be wise to avoid processed
carbs including white sugar and nearly all products made from white
flour including baked goods, bread, crackers, pretzels, pasta, bagels,
and so on. Switch mostly to natural, unprocessed carbs like vegetables,
oatmeal, yams, brown rice, potatoes, beans, lentils, etc.
You could probably consume small amounts of sugar and refined carbs
and still lose weight on your low carbohydrate diet as long as you
continued to burn more calories than you took in each day. But the high
calorie density isn't the only reason to avoid processed carbs. Refined
carbohydrates provide little or no nutritional value. You shouldn't just
be concerned with the number of calories you eat each day; you should
also be concerned with the quality and nutritional value of those
calories. Your goal, and the foundation of
The GHF Customized Diet Plan (an extremely effective personalized
low carbohydrate diet), is to get the most nutritional value out of
every calorie you consume.
Click here to learn more about the GHF Customized Diet Plan – our
low carbohydrate diet program that is chock full of very effective low
carb diet strategies designed to turn your body into a 24-hour
fat-burning machine. It's literally a low carbohydrate diet blueprint
for achieving the very best results in the shortest period of time by
eating the perfect foods combined at the right times in the right
amounts - all customized specifically for you.
And don’t forget,
click here to take our FREE Fitness Analysis for a free sample low
carbohydrate diet plan and for the book, Big Fat lies!
Low
Carbohydrate Diet Part 3 >>>
Low Carbohydrate Diet
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