Diabetes Diet - A Low GI Diet Is Essential

With your diabetes diet a low GI diet is essential if you want to achieve optimum health and manage your diabetes effectively. The key to your success is the diet you implement, and a low GI diet is highly recommended. It may sound difficult and you might even think that the foods that are low in GI are terrible, well let me tell you how surprised you will be, the majority of the foods are what you are already eating or they are foods that you will like.

So what exactly is the GI? The glycemic index (GI) is a measure of carbohydrate quality. It is this measure that best describes how much carbohydrates (the sugars and starches) in the individual foods affect our blood glucose levels.

Following is a list of what the GI is:

The GI is a tool that allows you choose the right type of carbohydratesThe GI is on a scale from 0 to 100 that reflects how fast the carbohydrates in our foods hit our bloodstreamAn important point to remember is that the GI actually compares foods not per 100 grams of food, but does so per gram of carbohydrateA low GI food contains carbohydrates that has the least affect on your blood glucose levels, this means the GI is 55 or lessA high GI food contains carbohydrates that has the largest affect on your blood glucose levels, this means the GI is 70 or more

A low GI diet plus regular exercise is the most powerful and rewarding way that you can achieve optimal health and insulin sensitivity and the decreasing of insulin levels throughout the course of your day.

Many people that are overweight have the challenge of ignoring the hunger pangs throughout the day, this is where a diabetes diet of low GI foods will help and be very beneficial. It has been scientifically proven that low GI foods are more filling than the foods that are high in GI. These foods not only give you the feeling of being full straight away, but they actually delay the hunger pangs for longer and will reduce your food intake.

Following are 10 steps for a low GI diabetes diet:

Ensure that you eat regularlyChoose the low GI forms of bread and cerealsEat at least seven servings of fruit and vegetables each dayReduce your salt intakeLimit your alcohol intakeAdd more legumes like beans, chickpeas and lentils to your dietAlways choose lean meatsEat fish or an alternative source of omega-3 at least twice a weekChoose low fat dairy products, andEat nuts on a regular basis