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.

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

Outsmarting Nutrition Labels: Part 3 (of 3…phew)

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Let’s get right to the last installment of this not-so-brief nutrition label reading “how-to.” Today I’m simply sharing a chart that indicates what you should pay attention to within particular classes of food outside of serving size and calories per serving of course. For example, saturated/trans fat and sodium are important to consider when comparing snack foods like crackers, pretzels, etc., while fiber and sugar content should be more of a focus when comparing cereals. Remember, there’s no need to look at nutrition labels for fresh fruits and vegetables, whole grains, dried legumes, eggs, and fresh seafood, poultry and meat (although leaner cuts are better). They are our best options on supermarket shelves.

Food Category Besides serving size and calories, pay attention to…
Canned vegetables, legumes and soups (-) Sodium

(-) Sugars (check the ingredients list)
Dried, frozen and canned fruit (-) Sugars (check the ingredients list)
Packaged grain products (pasta, cereal, bread, etc.) (-) Sodium

(-) Sugars (check the ingredients list)

(+) Fiber
Nuts and nut butters (-) Saturated and trans fat

(-) Sodium

(-) Sugars (check the ingredients list)
Milk, yogurt and cheese (-) Saturated and trans fat

(-) Sugars (check the ingredients list)
Frozen Entrees (-) Saturated and trans fat (aim for less that 10% DV saturated fat and zero trans fat)

(-) Sodium (aim for less than 500 mg)

(+) Fiber and protein (extra points for more than 5 g fiber, more than 20 g protein)
Snacks (chips, pretzels, popcorn, crackers) (-) Saturated and trans fat

(-) Sodium

(+) Fiber
Beverages (-) Sugars

(Always aim for ZERO calories)

To test your new found skills, here are two breakfast cereal nutrition labels. What do you notice? Which do you think might be a better choice? My thoughts are at the bottom of the page so you can’t cheat.What We Eat: Cereal Labels

So after three posts, that’s it! Not so bad right? Right? Anybody still there? Ugh, I know. It’s hard. So here is where I tell you how to cheat. One of my favorite websites for label reading is called Fooducate. The site grades each product (A-, B+, C, etc…) based on its nutrition facts and ingredient list and prioritizes minimally processed, real foods. I have yet to come upon a rating that I find suspect. Fooducate’s mobile app allows you to scan a product’s barcode while at the supermarket so that you can make good food decisions on the spot. But even better, let me come along with you the next time you go shopping. We can work through all this together so you won’t be up the creek when your cell service decides to be spotty. Learning how to do this intuitively without the help of modern technology will guarantee you a lifelong ability to protect your grocery cart from the all too rampant devils in disguise in the supermarket today.

Cereal standoff: After noting that the two cereals have the same serving size (1 cup), I notice that Raisin Bran Crunch has 30 more calories than Kashi Go Lean (190 versus 160), 10 grams more of sugar (19 g versus 9 g) and 6 grams less of fiber (4 g versus 10 g). Reading the ingredients list on Raisin Bran Crunch, not only is sugar the second ingredient to appear, it also contains brown sugar syrup (sugar), corn syrup (sugar), molasses (sugar) and honey (sugar). Going even farther than necessary, I also see that Raisin Bran Crunch has more sodium and less filling protein, two more minuses. Yes, it is more heavily fortified with vitamins, but I’d rather get those somewhere that they’re not packaged with nearly 5 teaspoons of sugar. Winner: Kashi Go Lean!

Outsmarting Nutrition Labels: Part 2 (of 3)

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So here we go…how to read a nutrition label. One of the (admittedly) more dull things to blog about, but important enough to try.

A quick note before I start: If you just want the nuts and bolts of nutrition label reading, skip over the “more info” bullets. They provide “nice to know” detail, but not necessarily “need to know” information. Also, remember tomorrow I’ll be sharing a chart showing what you should pay attention to within particular classes of food. For example, saturated/trans fat and sodium are important to consider when comparing snack foods like crackers, pretzels, etc., while fiber and sugar content should be more of a focus when comparing cereals.

Grab a cup of coffee and let’s get to it….

What We Eat: Nutrition Facts Panel1. The first place to start is “Serving Size,” which is always listed directly under the words “Nutrition Facts.” All of the numbers on the rest of the label are based on this value. If you eat two servings, you have to double the rest of the values. (Side note: Yes, this is what tripped up my husband.)

2. Check out the calories. Knowing that most people eat between 1500-2500 calories a day, you can see how this food fits into your calorie “budget.”

More info: Generally meals should contain ~400-600 calories and snacks should be less than ~250 calories. Pay extra close attention to foods that contain loads of calories but not much nutritional value otherwise like sugary drinks.  Avoid them.

3. Minimize saturated and trans fat, sodium, and sugar.

More info on saturated and trans fat: Ignore “Total Fat” and look below to the numbers next to “Saturated Fat” and “Trans Fat.” These are the only fats that adversely affect your heart health. Both saturated and trans fat raise your LDL cholesterol (aka the Lousy kind), but trans fat is the real bad boy because it also lowers your HDL cholesterol (aka the Healthy kind). Unfortunately, it gets even trickier. A food company is allowed to claim a product has zero trans fat on the label if it has less than 0.5 g per serving. To really make sure a product is trans-fat free, you must look to the ingredients list and check to see whether the word “partially hydrogenated” pops up anywhere. If it does, the product does in fact contain trans fat. If you’re eating one serving, you might be okay but if you’re eating two or more servings, that small amount of trans fat can quickly add up.

More info on sodium: Americans consume too much salt and over 75% of it comes from eating packaged and restaurant foods. The best way to gauge whether a food has too much salt is to look at the Percent Daily Value (%DV). While the %DV is generally useless because it’s based on a 2000 calorie diet and many of us need to eat more or less than that, the %DV for sodium is based on 100% of the recommended amount of sodium for the vast majority of us, which is less than 2400 mg per day. A rule of thumb is

  • 5%DV (120 mg) or less of sodium per serving is low – Go for it!
  • 20%DV (480 mg) or more of sodium per serving is high – Think twice!

More info on sugar: Another tricky one. Nutrition panels don’t distinguish between added sugar – what we want to minimize – and naturally occurring sugar. Naturally occurring sugar can be found in all dairy (lactose), fruit (fructose), grains and starchy vegetables (glucose). That’s why the grams sugar is useful when comparing products (e.g. plain yogurt versus flavored yogurt), but not necessarily useful on its own. To make sure a product is not high in added sugar, you’ll need to check the ingredients list. Ingredients are listed by weight. The farther up sugar falls on the list, the more added sugar there is. Also look for code words that are just sugar in disguise: cane/beet sugar, sucrose/fructose/lactose/maltose, molasses, maple syrup, agave nectar, etc.

4. Maximize fiber and vitamins and minerals.

More info: Nah, enough said.

Now that you’ve gotten the rundown, go back to the food labels that I asked you look at yesterday. Did you first look at serving size? Did you get side tracked with less important info like total fat or cholesterol? Still confused about what information is most important with your particular class of food? Don’t worry, I’ll be back tomorrow to help with that.