The FastDay Forum

FatDog asked :

What are your thoughts on the low-carb vs. low glycemic index (GI) vs. low gylcemic load (GL) debate? My (very limited) understanding is that GL is the important thing when it comes to insulin spikes / resistance stuff. Thus otherwise low-carb forbidden foods ?e.g. apples, rice? are okay on low-GL eating plans...

Indeed, my diabetic* cookbook is full of pasta recipes (pasta being middle-ish GL) - it seems to balance the pasta with other much lower GL ingredients.

Atkins is both low carb and low GI and indeed low GL as it has low carbs and a preference for them to be from green veg etc which in general are low GI / GL as well.

Glycemic Index is a measure of how fast blood glucose appears from a given food, compared to a reference food like glucose or white bread. It gives you an idea how fast the response will be but the size of the response is more about the Glycemic Load or GL. GL = GI * grams of carbs I think ?

I don't like the way High, Medium and Low GI are all at the top end of the range - from memory 50 is "low" whereas to me low would be 20 or less.

The other limitation of the GI / GL concept is that it doesn't account for mixed foods, so strawberries and cream would have a different outcome to just one of the ingredients. Unless the actual meal has been tested I'm not sure we know what the GI would be.

[carorees]

Glycaemic load represents the area under the curve of the insulin response. So it indicates the extent of the insulin response. Thus, low GI foods can be high GL. The thinking is that prolonged raised insulin is not good for us just as much as a high peak of insulin.

Glycemic load of a serving of food can be calculated as its carbohydrate content measured in grams (g), multiplied by the food's GI, and divided by 100

Above from Wikipedia, says same in paper below.

http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/76/1/5.full

Are under curve of insulin response gives you the insulin index, shirley ?

A low GI food can indeed have a high GL if you eat enough of it.