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Food shopping

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This thread is now closed. Please contact Anna DUK, Ieva DUK or everydayupsanddowns if you would like it re-opened.
Beck S

Beck S

Well-Known Member
Relationship to Diabetes
Type 2
This has probably been ranted about before, so apologies. But why don't supermarkets make it easier for diabetics to shop? If you're coeliac, or have food allergies then you've got your own section (which is great!) but a low carb section would be ideal. I know there's a reason, and it's probably quite a sensible one, but as there are more diabetics out there than other people catered for, it seems annoying. It would certainly have helped me when I was first diagnosed.

Anyway, rant over. Thank you 🙂
 
I think it's basically because a healthy diet for diabetes is a healthy one for everyone - it's just that supermarkets, on the whole, place an emphasis on unhealthy options because that's what sells. Hence, all those offers on sweets, biscuits, fizzy drinks, pizzas etc. etc. but rarely - if ever - for fresh fruit and vegetables. Coeliac is fairly specialist, but people with diabetes don't necessarily need to buy low carb, just need to be careful about their intake and eat according to their tolerances - and there is such a high variation in what people can tolerate. Also, I would imagine that most people with diabetes, unfortunately, get poor advice about carbs, so don't know that it's not just sugar they need to be careful about.

The thing that always annoys me most it the bread section - usually 90% or more of it is cheap, horrid white bread or so-called 'healthy' wholemeal that's not really wholemeal - truly good bread like the seeded loaves (and Burgen!) is almost a 'specialist' bread. Most people do not understand about diet and the impact of carbs in particular, as the accepted 'unhealthy' option for the past 30 years has been anything containing fat :(
 
Beck S said:
This has probably been ranted about before, so apologies. But why don't supermarkets make it easier for diabetics to shop? If you're coeliac, or have food allergies then you've got your own section (which is great!) but a low carb section would be ideal. I know there's a reason, and it's probably quite a sensible one, but as there are more diabetics out there than other people catered for, it seems annoying. It would certainly have helped me when I was first diagnosed.

Anyway, rant over. Thank you 🙂
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Totally agree. Huge aisles of gluten free. How many coeliacs compared to diabetics? Very small number. Partly it’s because gluten free is perceived as being healthy and on trend I think. Trying to get cheese at a restaurant is seen as being awkward to and how difficult is it to put that on a menu? Grggh!
 
Northerner said:
I think it's basically because a healthy diet for diabetes is a healthy one for everyone - it's just that supermarkets, on the whole, place an emphasis on unhealthy options because that's what sells. Hence, all those offers on sweets, biscuits, fizzy drinks, pizzas etc. etc. but rarely - if ever - for fresh fruit and vegetables. Coeliac is fairly specialist, but people with diabetes don't necessarily need to buy low carb, just need to be careful about their intake and eat according to their tolerances - and there is such a high variation in what people can tolerate. Also, I would imagine that most people with diabetes, unfortunately, get poor advice about carbs, so don't know that it's not just sugar they need to be careful about.

The thing that always annoys me most it the bread section - usually 90% or more of it is cheap, horrid white bread or so-called 'healthy' wholemeal that's not really wholemeal - truly good bread like the seeded loaves (and Burgen!) is almost a 'specialist' bread. Most people do not understand about diet and the impact of carbs in particular, as the accepted 'unhealthy' option for the past 30 years has been anything containing fat :(
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I think I came to a similar conclusion really. I guess if the official advice is improved in the future, it may change - just looking on here at the different advice given to people means that it's all over the place! Looking at healthy eating has definitely helped me, fresh veg is an obvious one, but it's the stuff outside of that. When you spend 10 minutes looking through the different sections to find things for the rest of your diet - crackers, cereal, that kind of thing, then your half hour shopping trip turns into a 2 hour one.

I did wonder if some companies tried to make new products (like Warburton made gluten free bread, maybe they could try a low carb too, or an almond flour bread, something like that) maybe the supermarkets would catch on. In my local Tesco extra, there's a small space for the Hovis Low Carb bread, but it's always nearly sold out when I get there. Shows there's a demand for it at least.

Sally W said:
Totally agree. Huge aisles of gluten free. How many coeliacs compared to diabetics? Very small number. Partly it’s because gluten free is perceived as being healthy and on trend I think. Trying to get cheese at a restaurant is seen as being awkward to and how difficult is it to put that on a menu? Grggh!
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My friend is coeliac and she says has definitely benefited from the gluten free diet fad of the past few years. It seems that companies were more willing to work with it when people were fad dieting, as opposed to when it was just people with health reasons. It's daft really, but it's worked for her.
 
Beck S said:
I did wonder if some companies tried to make new products (like Warburton made gluten free bread, maybe they could try a low carb too, or an almond flour bread, something like that) maybe the supermarkets would catch on. In my local Tesco extra, there's a small space for the Hovis Low Carb bread, but it's always nearly sold out when I get there. Shows there's a demand for it at least.
Click to expand...
My local bakery did advertise some 'Low G.I. bread'...🙂

Low G.I. bread

Down at the bakers, I’ve heard it’s been said,
There’s a good special offer on Low GI bread.
So I put on my coat and set off down the road
For something to lower my glycaemic load.

And there in the window in prominent view
Was a sign confirming what I’d been told was true:
‘Live your life healthy, for you’re a long time dead –
Come in and sample our Low GI bread!’

The devil inside me said ‘I wonder if they know?
They say ‘Low GI’, but what makes it so?’
So I questioned the counter girl, would she comply?
She looked rather puzzled, then gave this reply…

‘Well, the ‘Low’ means there’s less, and the ‘I’ means ‘Inside’,
But as for the ‘G’ I can’t really decide…
Could it be Garlic or Ginger or Goat?
Or (scraping the barrel!) a Gloucestershire stoat?’

‘Or Gherkins or Grapefruit, or maybe Goosefat?’
I suggested ‘Glycaemic?’ – ‘No, I don’t think it’s that –
Gammon? Or Gumbo? Or Guava? Or Gin?’
(She was beginning to wish that I hadn’t come in!)

Then a lady beside me said ‘Why would I pay more
For bread that has less of what went in before?’
That caused the girl’s listing of ‘G’ things to stop,
So we both turned round briskly and vacated the shop! 😱 :D
 
For me, the key thing is good labelling. So, while the front of packet traffic light system is good for comparing calorie, fats, salt and sugar contents per portion, I need more detail, so turn over for total carbohydtrate intake. However, I can easily remember that things like eggs, meat, fish, leafy veg etc are no or very low carb. For things like sausages, more careful reading of labels is needed.
Thinking back to a holiday in 1970s, with a family with a teenage son who had coeliac disease, I remember how careful mother had to be, reading all ingredients AND checking against Coeliac Society booklet. For example, only one brand of gravy mix was gluten free.
So, I think it's great that people with coeliac disease today benefit from far more choice and much better labelling. I've never seen more than half an aisle of "free from" products in any large supermarket, and that covers gluten, eggs, dairy etc. Not just gluten.
 
Copepod said:
For me, the key thing is good labelling. So, while the front of packet traffic light system is good for comparing calorie, fats, salt and sugar contents per portion, I need more detail, so turn over for total carbohydtrate intake.
Click to expand...
The thing that annoys me in that respect is that the extra nutritional information given on the backs of packs is often in a very tiny font, and impossible for me to read if I don't have my reading glasses with me, which I often don't 🙄 I've even seen things like tubs of pasta meals where the nutritional information is on the underside of the lid and can only be seen once it is opened! 😱
 
I have had a devil of a job here identifying Carb levels in food especially the imported stuff believe it or not. They paste a label over the printed container label thereby obscuring the nutrient content.
I have to learn the Chinese characters for Carbohydrates 碳水化合物 (tan shui hua he wu), now i identify the carbs content easily not because of the characters thenselves but because it the longest description on any label of 5 characters. Everything else is 2 or 3. This allows me also to buy Chinese branded foods. Took a while but I got there eventually.
 
Some products have the nutritional info under the package seals as well, making it near impossible to read without risking opening the packet.😡
 
I agree with @Northerner, it would be much easier if the newly diagnosed were given better advice regarding food and nutrition from the outset. Maybe even some sort of meal plans and ideas, for those starting out.

We don't need specialist food, which tends to come with a raised price for those needing such products. Whilst the information given is often small, awkward to find and sometimes not written in the easiest to work out format, I have to say that over the years the information has got much better, in that all products (I think) now have some carb information, unlike years ago when all that was on any packet or tin was ingredients. Many things can now also be looked up on an app or googled. I realise this is time consuming, reading all the labels and comparing, but with practice it starts to become almost second nature.

Personally, I'm not keen on the low this, high that foods as often whatever has been taken out is replaced by something not so good. Huge lists of ingredients I've never heard of.

I do understand that this is all new and a bit daunting, but it will get easier. I think like many things it comes back to the care given and education. Good luck with the shopping...it's not the most pleasant job without the added complications and time! :(
 
I actually pointed this out to a local deli / coffee shop owner recently, regarding some fruitcake on their shelves labelled "gluten free and suitable for diabetics", all it was missing was added sugar, still packed with dried fruit! My issue was probably more with the local "artisan" producer. Shop owner had no idea, was apologetic and put a big big black line through the diabetic bit to blank it out.🙂
 
Northerner said:
I think it's basically because a healthy diet for diabetes is a healthy one for everyone - it's just that supermarkets, on the whole, place an emphasis on unhealthy options because that's what sells. Hence, all those offers on sweets, biscuits, fizzy drinks, pizzas etc. etc. but rarely - if ever - for fresh fruit and vegetables.
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They have tried to sell food specially labelled for diabetics' but the official and unofficial advice is not to buy them.
When a full fat cola is one with added sugars in the normal slang and everyone search skimmed milk products because they're with less fat, not counting that mos of yoghurt are sold with fruit and added sugars and even some white yoghurt has added sugar.
Now there are a lot of bio and vegan industrially prepared food because vegans, but actual fruits and vegetables are 100% vegan too, and I think that the healthfulness of a so called vegan steak is questionable.

Yes, Staying on a 45% carb intake and eating healthy fats and protein sources is good for everyone, but good food is in absolute value more expensive than cheap one and normally more costly to do.

Why generic advertising of food is so rare when branded on is common?
Here a rare campaign for a generic kind of cheese, in Italian but you can see the images and what the chef is saying is that this cheese is good and it's easy to use to cook a wide variety of recipes.


This one is for beer(!)

 
I get Stevia & Xylotol sweeteners, and it still states on the back of the packet 'suitable for diabetics'. Generally, I suppose it is but not everyone as some diabetics have experienced blood sugar spikes with these sweeteners.
 
Hi Beck S Why not down load your favourite supermarket, you can check all the products from the comfort of your home, put what you want in "FAVOURITES", and then they deliver your shopping to your door, two hours saved, all ingredients easily visible plus easy carbs and cal reading, trust the old timers to have this problem cracked. Cheers clive55555
 
I would love to see clearly labelled full fat, yes FULL FAT yogurts or similar desserts with no added sugar. Supermarkets in the UK seem to be obsessed with everything low fat, which usually means sugar or artificial sweeteners, uck!
 
clive555555 said:
Hi Beck S Why not down load your favourite supermarket, you can check all the products from the comfort of your home, put what you want in "FAVOURITES", and then they deliver your shopping to your door, two hours saved, all ingredients easily visible plus easy carbs and cal reading, trust the old timers to have this problem cracked. Cheers clive55555
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This is certainly my plan! It's just getting my backside into gear and actually doing it. I do use the Tesco grocery site to plan ahead though, it's very useful having all the nutritional info on there.
 
Hi Beck S , If Home Delivery isn't your thing, try "click and Collect", and if you get your backside in gear, remember Marks & Spencers deliver Food, ( that was the Devil in Me ) . Any keep counting those Calories and Carbs, Cheers all the best clive55555
 
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