The Thing About Carbs

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The thing about carbohydrates is not all carbohydrates are created equal. (Not all proteins or fats are created equal either, but let’s save that for another blog post.) Carbs come in every variety, from very health enhancing to less so. That’s why any diet that banishes them entirely will, yes, cut out a good amount of play food. But it will also lead you to miss out on lots of important nutrients (honestly, the details of which don’t matter), and unnecessarily eliminate foods that are truly enjoyable. So let’s break them down…

What foods contain carbohydrates?

  • Fruits
  • Vegetables
  • Whole Grains
  • Legumes (aka beans and nuts)
  • Dairy (this one surprises people sometimes but lactose is a carb)
  • And every food derived from the above (e.g. juice, sugar derived from the sugar cane plant and all other caloric sweeteners, potato chips, breakfast cereals, snack foods like crackers and cookies, breads from white to whole wheat, pastas, etc.)

“Complex” carbs versus “simple” carbs

We’re often told to choose “complex” carbs (carbs that have three or more sugar units strung together) and to abstain from “simple” carbs (carbs made up of only one or two sugar units). But let me give you an example of why this blanket recommendation doesn’t work. White bread, made up of starch, is technically a “complex” carb. Apples, made up of glucose and fructose, are technically “simple” carbs. Few would argue that white bread is a healthier choice than an apple. It’s not.

White bread is made with white flour. White flour is made by removing the healthiest components of a wheat berry: the fiber, nutrient-filled bran and germ. What is left–the energy-filled endosperm–is then ground into a fine dust. Essentially, even before we take our first bite of toast, a great percentage of our bodies’ digestion has already been completed by outside processing. So the “complex” carbs in white bread are very readily absorbed and quickly converted into sugar in our blood streams, what doctor’s call blood sugar or blood glucose.

An apple is made from, well, an apple. When we eat it, besides the obvious fact that our teeth have more work to do to ready it for swallowing, our GI tracts also have to work harder to separate the “simple” carbs from the fiber, water and other nutrients packaged with them. This, among other reasons, leads to slower absorption and conversion of the “simple” carbs of the apple into blood sugar. Rest assured, our bodies will absorb all of the good stuff, it just takes more time. More time is a good thing.

Why it matters whether our blood sugar increases quickly versus overtime

Blood sugar fuels the activity of our bodies’ cells, but it can’t get into them without some help. Insulin, a hormone made by the pancreas, acts as a key to open up cell doors and let blood sugar in. Because our bodies don’t like a ton of sugar hanging out in our blood stream, a surge in blood sugar from foods like white bread leads the pancreas to release a corresponding surge in insulin. All of the sugar is quickly ushered out of our blood stream and into our cells. Before you know it, the highway that is our blood stream is free of sugar. This wouldn’t seem like a bad thing, but our bodies actually prefer there to be a little blood sugar traffic. If there is no blood sugar available to cells, what would happen if all of a sudden our bodies needed more energy? So, low blood sugar triggers additional hormonal responses in our bodies – hormones that make us hungry. This explains why most of us feel starved only a few hours after having a muffin for breakfast.

Alternatively, when we eat foods like apples that are full of nutrients like fiber that take longer to break down, our blood sugar rises slowly and steadily overtime. Correspondingly, our pancreas releases insulin slowly and overtime. There is a steady flow of light blood sugar traffic in our blood stream. When insulin moves some blood sugar into our cells, a little more blood sugar merges onto the highway from our GI tract to replace it. This translates to our blood sugar rising and falling slowly and overtime. Why is this so great? Our bodies tell us that they are satisfied for longer.

A better way to think about carbs

So, here is a clearer carb recommendation: Eat carbohydrate foods that have undergone as little processing as possible the majority of the time –

  • Fruits
  • Vegetables
  • Whole Grains
  • Legumes (aka beans and nuts)
  • Low fat milk and yogurt

– and the ones made by processing them, less often –

  • Juice, even smoothies
  • All sugars from white to agave to honey
  • Traditional snack foods like potato chips, pretzels, crackers
  • Bakes goods like cookies, cakes, doughnuts
  • Breakfast cereals
  • Breads from white to whole wheat
  • Pastas and white rice
  • Etc.

The former are like time-release energy/fullness pills and the latter are like fast-acting energy/hunger-inducing pills. Maybe this means you choose to do an 80/20 split, or 90/10, that’s all up to you. The good news is there’s no good reason to give up carbohydrates.

Nutrient and Caloric Density: Cracking the nutrition code for good

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If I had the eyes and ears of the world and only 10 minutes to share some of the most important concepts in nutrition, I would attempt to explain nutrient and caloric density. Horrible, horrible names but important ideas. The good news is that the devil is NOT in the details. A broad understanding is all you need to answer most nutrition-related questions.

Before we get into it, I bet these concepts are things you already get intuitively. Let’s see:

Question 1: Both the five Starbursts and medium banana below are about 100 calories. Of these two, which do you think is the healthier choice? Why?

What We Eat: Starbursts v BananaAnswer 1: If you guessed the banana, you’d be right. Clearly, there is way more good stuff (vitamins, minerals, phytonutrients, etc.) per calorie in the fruit than in the fruit candy. This is what is termed “nutrient density.”

Question 2: You’re trying to maintain your weight. Would one-cup granola or one-cup oatmeal be the better breakfast choice? Why?

What We Eat: Oatmeal v Granola

Answer 2: Guess oatmeal? Ding, ding, ding! Considering the same volume of oatmeal has about a third of the calories of granola, you could fill your tummy equally with less calories. This is what is termed “caloric density.”

So, Nutrient Density = the amount of good stuff  (vitamins, minerals, phytonutrients, etc.) in a specific food per the amount of calories it provides.

  • High nutrient density = lots of good stuff per calorie (aka “superfoods”)
  • Low nutrient density = little good stuff per calorie (aka “empty calories”)

And, Caloric Density = the amount of calories in a specific volume/weight of food.

  • High caloric density = lots of calories for small amount of food
  • Low caloric density = few calories for a large amount of food

Want to see how this should play out on your plate day-to-day?

Healthy Eating Plate
Those geniuses from Harvard think of everything.

So now, tell me and be honest, do you get it? Let me know because I am practicing for when I have those 10 minutes of the whole world’s attention.

Breaking Down Breakfast: My 4 go-to’s

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What We Eat: Breakfast 6

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.
…

Oh sorry, I just fell asleep for a second. You? But in all seriousness, while I know that starting a blog post with a boring sentence like that breaks rule #1 of captivating an audience, hear me out:

I freakin’ love breakfast. Although it typically provides just 17% of our day’s total calories, it accounts for a much higher proportion of important vitamins and minerals like calcium, vitamin D and potassium. The bulk of the research shows that eating breakfast daily is important for weight maintenance too, not to mention mood and mental stamina. So what does this dietitian eat to keep herself fueled until lunchtime? Here are my personal go-to’s – quick, balanced and good.

What We Eat: Breakfast 4

  • ¾ cup cooked whole grain + ¾ cup plain Greek yogurt + fruit (unlimited) + 2 tablespoons toasted nuts or nut butter + sprinkling of cinnamon.

I prepare the grains and toast the nuts in bulk once or twice a week (Sundays or weekday nights after dinner) so I can make quick work of morning prep. To keep things interesting I switch up the grains – oatmeal, yes, but also farro, barley, quinoa, brown rice, etc. Seriously, try this ASAP.

  • 1-2 slices whole grain bread (the grainier the better) + 2 tablespoons peanut butter + ½ cup plain Greek yogurt + sliced banana and/or strawberries + sprinkling of cinnamon

This is like breakfast banana shortcake – bread toasted, everything else heaped on top, consumed with a fork and knife.

  • 1-1 ½ cups cereal + 1 cup milk + 2 tablespoons toasted nuts or nut butter + fruit (unlimited) + cinnamon

I try to choose cereals with more than 5 grams of fiber and less than 4 grams of sugar per serving (equivalent to 1 tsp). I also mix high- and low-calorie options so I get the belly-filling benefits of the former and the bulk of the latter. Some of my favorites:

  1. Nature’s Path Heritage Flakes (3/4 cup serving contains 120 calories, 5 grams fiber, 4 grams sugar)
  2. Ezekiel 4:9 Sprouted Whole Grain Cereal, Original (1/2 cup serving contains 190 calories, 6 grams fiber, 0 grams sugar)
  3. Cheerios (1 cup serving contains 100 calories, 3 grams fiber, 1 gram sugar) Note: I only add this for bulk. Cheerios alone would never keep me satisfied until lunch.

What We Eat: Breakfast 5

  • 1-2 slices whole grain toast (the grainier the better) + 1-2 eggs prepared anyway + ½ sliced avocado + sliced tomatoes + drizzle of olive oil + fruit on the side

Of all the options listed, this is probably the one I have for breakfast the least, but not because I don’t LOVE it. Instead, it’s because eggs are a go-to protein source for me at lunch or dinner and I don’t want to overdo it. If you lean towards the savory, an egg breakfast is an incredibly healthy choice, and I find more filling than many of the other options. And don’t skip the yolk – it provides nearly half the protein and the majority of the rest of good vitamins and minerals found in eggs. Yes, it also houses most of the cholesterol, but research shows that dietary cholesterol is not nearly as big of a contributing factor to your body’s cholesterol as saturated fat.

What’s in your breakfast rotation? As long as it’s got belly filling fiber from fruits/vegetables and/or whole grains and a little protein from dairy/eggs/nuts/legumes/animal protein/etc. to make the fullness last, you’re nailing it!

A RD’s Meal Planning Checklist

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What We Eat: Balanced Meal

I cook a lot. I mean, A LOT. I cook four+ meals weekly for a host of clients, dinner for my husband and me nightly (always making enough for the next day’s lunch, topped with greens, whatever it is becomes a salad) and typically at least one larger, more labor-intensive dinner weekly for a crowd of friends or family. Overtime I’ve developed a mental checklist to help me plan that I thought you might find useful. These principles make sense nutritionally, but even more important, following them makes my food taste better (I think) and makes cooking it easier (I know).

  • Balance. A quarter of what I make is protein, a quarter a grain or starch, and (at least) a half non-starchy vegetables and/or fruit. Some meals – think soups, pastas, etc. – may contain all three elements mixed together, but if I separated them out, my goal is for them to still contain foods in these proportions.
  • Color. This is important to me for several reasons. We all eat with our eyes first and having a variety of colors on the plate makes the meal look more appetizing. A food’s color (if it’s natural) is also usually indicative of what vitamins and minerals it contains. More color = largest variety of vitamins and minerals at each meal.
  • Texture. When I’m planning what to cook, I make sure that the recipes I choose aren’t all one-dimensional in the texture department. More texture = more interest. For instance, topping soup with homemade croutons offers a nice contrast to soup’s smooth texture, or adding toasted nuts to a salad offers a dense crunch to a the delicate crispness of greens.
  • Simplicity. Unless I have a lot of time on my hands, I never make more than one new recipe at a time. Whatever I make to accompany a new recipe is easy enough that I can go on autopilot making it.
  • Freshness. I plan to use more perishable foods within the first few days of going to the market, and less perishable foods later in the week. This principle dictates my weekly menus. For instance, if I go to the market on Monday, my menu might look like this…
    • Monday: Fish variation
    • Tuesday: Chicken variation
    • Wednesday: Soup/pasta/vegetarian variation
    • Thursday: Egg variation (frittata, shakshuka, omelet, etc.
  • A note on richness. I love fat – oils, cheeses, butter…all of it – BUT I use fat strategically. I employ high fat foods to enhance healthy vegetables and whole grain dishes versus on dishes that are already easy to eat on their own. I.e. Yes, of course white pasta with butter and parmesan is delicious, but opting to use a little parmesan on roasted broccoli gives me more nutritional bang for my caloric buck.

What principles help guide your meal planning and prep?

“Cooking is like exercise or spending time in nature or good conversation: The more you do it, the more you like it, the better you get at it, and the more you recognize that its rewards are far greater than its efforts and that even its efforts are rewards.” – Mark Bittman