Working Out Carb Values....

[Laura22]

How do you work out carb vales of food that have no nutritional information on them at all? Yesterday I treated my daughter and myself to a hot cross bun with fresh cream and jam in from Morrisons. I weighed it- 110g but I put that data into my meter and it told me to take 10u of Novorapid. I decided against this as my levels would have plummeted within the hour. I took 3u instead and ended up with a good level 2 hours after.

But anyway, just need to know how to work it out. I don't know if taking 3u as opposed to 10u (because I weighed the whole bun rather than carbs per 100g) was a fluke or not but I don't want to risk high levels after a treat. Thanks x

 

[Copepod]

There are lots of websites and books with nutritional information. For your bun, cream and jam example, you'd need to consider bun and jam separately, and estimate CHO content of each item - estimate weight of bun, and estimate weight of jam or how many teaspoons.

I try to estimate for such items, and if in doubt, underestimate amount of insulin to dose, as treats like that are rare. If I were eating things like that every day, I'd be more accurate in weighing, looking up etc.

 

[Sally71]

Hi Laura

When you put 110g into your meter it thinks you mean 110g of carbs, but a bun is not 100% carb, that's why it suggested such a high dose. Hot cross buns from Tesco are usually something like 34-37g carb each. Then add a few more for the jam.

Do you have the Carbs and Cals book or app? That's really useful for situations like that. Or failing that, if I'm at home I go on the internet, just do a Google search for something like "hot cross bun nutritional info" and you'll find some very useful sites!