The FastDay Forum

There's a good article in this month's Healthy food mag (in Australia) about low GI foods. I remember the concept of low GI as the answer to anyone looking to be healthy and lose weight in the 90s.

I couldn't see much about it in this forum though the search is hard when your looking for a simple common term so send me to any threads if there are any.

If not, I'm interested in your thoughts on this whole Low GI thing. do you specifically attempt to go low GI on fast days or on feast days. Does it matter?

Do you regularly check the glycaemic index of foods?.

Great question @Juliana.Rivers and very timely because I was just looking at this link this morning

http://www.health.harvard.edu/newsweek/ ... _foods.htm

For me though its a bit too complicated to remember the numbers associated with the various foods and I know I can't check the GI/GL load of everything I eat; it's just not sustainable. What I do do is stay away refined carbs, white bread, rice etc and eat a more plant based diet so that in itself will lend itself to better, hopefully low GI choices.

I was surprised though when I went through the list to see the difference between say instant oatmeal/porridge and the regular kind and to see the numbers of white vs brown rice! So I've bookmarked the link and will go back to it periodically to remind myself and may be some new relevant piece of info will stick in my head

good link thanks Jeninboston

I know my calories (roughly) but never quite got the GI thing yet. Is it still in vogue?

[carorees]

GL is nowadays considered more important than GI because GI does not consider the effect of the food on total insulin release. As GL is mainly related to carb load it's probably easier to just count carbs but bear in mind that complex carbs are to be preferred over simple carbs.

Hi, I use an app called simply "GI". I use for all days and so far this has been successful.

I followed a low GL plan a few years ago.., the book is still on my shelf

It worked, insofar as. Lost weight. However, it was time consuming to check everything, and I found my digestion wasn't great I just didn't find it sustainable. The principles made sense at the time. Maybe I'd have done better if apps and so forth had existed back then.

GL is nowadays considered more important than GI because GI does not consider the effect of the food on total insulin release. As GL is mainly related to carb load it's probably easier to just count carbs but bear in mind that complex carbs are to be preferred over simple carbs.

Thanks @carorees

Is there a good GL guide online carorees. Do you follow a low GL food regime yourself?

Do you think it's worth looking at

i just realised the original guide linked http://www.health.harvard.edu/newsweek/ ... _foods.htm has the GL in last column. The GI and GL ratings dont seem to relate at all ..so a low GI one can be a high GL one.

Hi Juliana.

I low carb and use GL if I want to increase my carb intake for whatever reason, It helps me to avoid sugar spikes. I see it as a useful management tool rather than anything to do with weight loss.

Thanks for the link jeninboston

I use a chart in Antony Worrall Thompson;s Gl Book, however I want to make my own chart which would be more relevant to the things I eat.

There's some interesting information on here.
https://www.patrickholford.com/topic/low-gl

I have been a low GI girl for the past nearly 14 years, since that's when I diagnosed myself with type 2 diabetes. It has literally saved my bacon, with that and exercise, my diabetes has been under good control all that time. I guess I have also kept a rough count of my carbs for that time too, I instinctively know exactly what constitutes 10-15 g of carb! So that means I've been keeping track of my glycaemic load.

Even though one of the gurus of low GI in Australia, Jennie Brand-Miller, has recently had a bit of a fall from grace, I still think low GI is definitely the way to go, even though I am now attempting to go a bit lower carb as well. But, in a nutshell, if you avoid white bread, potatoes & rice, and instead eat small amounts of grainy bread, beans etc, you won't go far wrong.

I recommend glycemicindex.com as a great reference for GI values. GI is not always intuitive, so until you get used to it, it's better to check there.