GI or low carb diet; What's best?

[cakemaker]

A friend who's been T2 for many years and also been on insulin jabs for a number of years sent us a GI cook book by one of the 'celebrity chefs' when my husband was diagnosed as T2.

The introduction says that 'there are no bad foods, only bad diets'. The recipes include most food groups but with the emphasis on slowing down the rate of dijestion and absorption of carbs and sugars by lowering the GI (glycaemi index) of a meal.
e.g. If you eat bread then use wholemeal as the fibre in the cereals grains lower the GI. Also a sandwich with meat or fish protein lowers the GI and salad will lower it further. There are a lot of pulses in the recipes which I have always been a fan of: cheap, filling, full of protein and fibre; good healthy food. Anyway, you all probably know this already.

It all seems to make sense. In fact it's really saying just eat a well balanced diet but replacing potatoes with pulses etc. and cut down on the bread.
But..... is a GI diet any good for diabetics or is a low or no carb diet better?

 

[brett]

A friend who's been T2 for many years and also been on insulin jabs for a number of years sent us a GI cook book by one of the 'celebrity chefs' when my husband was diagnosed as T2.

The introduction says that 'there are no bad foods, only bad diets'. The recipes include most food groups but with the emphasis on slowing down the rate of dijestion and absorption of carbs and sugars by lowering the GI (glycaemi index) of a meal.
e.g. If you eat bread then use wholemeal as the fibre in the cereals grains lower the GI. Also a sandwich with meat or fish protein lowers the GI and salad will lower it further. There are a lot of pulses in the recipes which I have always been a fan of: cheap, filling, full of protein and fibre; good healthy food. Anyway, you all probably know this already.

It all seems to make sense. In fact it's really saying just eat a well balanced diet but replacing potatoes with pulses etc. and cut down on the bread.
But..... is a GI diet any good for diabetics or is a low or no carb diet better?

Not really sure on type 2 diets. hopefully someone will be along in mo. Having fat and protein slows the absorbtion of carbs, but obviously try to minimise saturated fat.

 

[Mark T]

To me, it's what ever diet works for you - and that might include concepts from lots of different plans

Personally I trimmed back the carbs and initially went mostly low carb with a few no-low treats. These days I find I can lift the GI a little and not send my numbers too stratospheric.

I found Alan S's Test, Review, Adjust advice very helpful: http://loraldiabetes.blogspot.co.uk/2006/10/test-review-adjust.html

 

[Ellie Jones]

Yes, being aware of GI index/load is very good, but also the actual amount of carbs being consumed also plays a large part in control..

You will generally find those that maintain good control, are on moderate or lower carb diets, and carbs being eaten based on GI load...

It's really a case working out your own diet, with the above principles in mind, which you need a blood glucose meter so that you can find out what works or doesn't work.. As sometimes even though a carb is good, due to portion size it's impacting on the blood glucose too much..

And no food are really out, just that some will come under the heading of occasional treat in small portions...

 

[everydayupsanddowns]

I'd agree with what's been said by others. Especially the 'eat to your meter' thoughts.

GI tables themselves are only the average BG impact measured in a relatively small sample so while GI *can* be a reasonable indication there is no guarantee that a food with a medium or low GI will bbe medium or low GI for you - only your meter will tell you that (wholemeal bread for example is almost indistinguishable to white for me - only seeded makes any real difference, but that won't be the case for everyone)

When comparing to low/moderate carb it seems to me that low carb is by it's nature going to be low GI. Carbs raise BG quickly so by reducing portions of them and replacing with more BG-neutral alternatives is bound to lower the GI of the diet as a whole.

 

[HelenM]

I think that the possible GI of bread is a minefield.
If you put in bread in the GI data base and order it from highest rank to lowest you'll find wholegrain bread with a GI of 87 and multigrain (Sainsbury UK) with a GI of 80.
I think the average GI for both white and wholegrain is about 71.
The lowest GIs in the tables are for coarse grain Barley bread,(27) Burgen Oat Bran and Honey(31) and Burgen mixed grain( 34) [are either available in UK?].
Burgen Soy and linseed comes in at 36.

In the 40s and 50s are some wholegrain rye/pumpernickel, some more heavily seeded loaves and more barley bread.... and also some of the above mentioned Burgen breads;tested on different occasions or in different countries.
Tesco Finest crusty malted was surprisingly low at 52.
http://www.glycemicindex.com/index.php

We can only judge which types of Bread are more likely to be lower GI (coarser flour, lots of seeds, dense, mixed grain) and then test... if it seems very high, its worth looking for another make as it might have very different properties.

And having said all that, I find all the manufactured breads I can buy in a UK supermarket (including Bergen) are far more likely to cause problems than the breads I use at home (which tend to be made from coarser flour, lots of seeds or nuts and definitely not soft and fluffy), even white pain de campagne made in the local bakery seems less problematic.

 

[cakemaker]

Bread is the hardest thing to give up especially here in France. I do make my own quite often; just made some sunflower seed today but a friend brought round 2 lovely fresh baguettes; too tempting to say no to, so we had home made tomato soup and I made lean ham and egg mayonnaise (not so good) sandwiches with lettuce for lunch.

Normally we buy the most seedy/cereal bread we can find or make it.

I keep a food diary on and off. I count a portion of bread as 10g.carb but was surprised to find that crackers are on average 7g. carb each. One book I follow losely says that you should have 100g. carbs per day so a few slices or portions of bread doesn't take long to fill the quota.

 

[HelenM]

Cakemaker, didn't realise that you were also in France.
Be careful about the carb count for bread. One 2cm slice of baguette is indeed about 10g carb but very high GI.
The other breads I buy regularly, a pain aux noix,one with mixed cereale and amandes, even local pain de campagne are all comparatively dense so when you weigh them (and unless I'm out I always do) you find that a fairly small slice can be quite heavy. I usually count on 50% of it being carbohydrate.