Health Alert 21
You have seen that cutting calories is not the best way to lose weight. And that eating enough protein can “throw a switch” that will get your body to burn its fat stores.
Today, let’s look at the last piece of the fat-loss puzzle. By eating the “right” kinds of carbs you can induce your body to make and store less fat. This is a tremendous fat-blasting secret few people know about.
* Carbs and the Glycemic Index *
The Glycemic Index ranks foods on how rapidly they spike your blood sugar levels.
The index is expressed in percentage terms. A food with a glycemic index of 50% will cause half of the rapid rise in blood sugar that glucose (pure natural sugar) would.
Why don’t you want to spike your blood sugar levels? Because when you do your body starts converting the food you eat into fat.
The higher the glycemic index of the food you eat, the more fat you’ll make from it – even if it has an equal number of calories.
Most of the patients I treat – even the ones who have heard of the glycemic index – think that sweets are the trouble. That is incorrect.
The real problem is with starches. They not only produce more blood sugar but they cause a much more prolonged elevation of sugar and insulin than simple sugars do.
Here is a table with common foods and their glycemic index.
If you look at the table carefully, you will see that sweet potatoes have a lower glycemic index than potatoes. But which is sweeter?
You may also be surprised to see that:
• Whole wheat bread raises blood sugar levels more than white bread.
• Corn flakes raise blood sugar twice as much as orange juice.
• You get more blood sugar from spaghetti than you do ice cream.
What to do: Pay attention to this chart. Reduce (drastically if you can) the amount of foods that score high. Substitute lower-scoring foods.
* Your Key Points *
In summary, here is my pan to get you lean, strong and feeling great:
• Avoid excessive calorie intake, but don’t try to force weight loss by restricting calories only. For most people, there is no need to count calories
• Overconsume protein. This is the one where I get the most resistance. If you can have some faith and try it, you will see how much easier it makes fat loss.
• Lower carbs and avoid high glycemic foods. There are two rules here to simplify.
• Don’t eat anything made from grain regardless of whether it’s “whole grains”.
• Don’t eat anything made from potatoes.
Good luck on your new plan for a trimmer, healthier you. In a future message, I’ll tell you about my exercise plan – that works incredibly well with this eating program.
Al Sears, MD