Low GI Diet Info

Many people want to try to lose weight without really knowing what to do. One of the first things that comes to mind is 'I'll go on a diet'. But what does that really mean? Adopting a healthier diet means more than just eating less food. In fact, if you adopt the right diet you can still eat heaps of healthy and delicious foods and be satisfied!

If you are interested in health and fitness at all, you might have heard of the low GI diet. GI stands for Glycaemic Index, and the GI value of a food tells you the impact of that food on your blood sugar levels. High GI foods raise your blood sugar quickly, whereas low GI foods affect your blood sugar more gradually. This can happen for several reasons - often it's because of the physical way that the body breaks down a food. Foods that are less refined, or have indigestible fibre are often very low GI.  It's helpful to keep in mind that GI is not a measure of the kilojoules or calories in a food. It’s possible to have a food high in calories, but low in GI. This food would still be better than a high GI food with the same calories, but should not be eaten to excess.
Eating high GI food has a couple of problems. The rush of blood sugar that you get gives you energy, but this does not last. Once you burn through the quick sugar rush, you will be left wanting more, so might eat more than you need. Your body will also burn this easily available energy in preference to fat, so it makes it harder to lose weight.

A good tip is that mixing some low GI foods with high GI foods can reduce the overall GI of the foods. For example, sprinkling sunflower foods over starchy vegetables like potatoes is a good way to reduce the GI value of your meal. Foods containing vinegar are also said to lower the GI, and sourdough bread is much lower GI than an equal weight of white bread for the same reason.
A low GI diet is a diet where you focus on eating lots low GI foods, and  minimizing the high GI ones. So how can you get started?
There are lots of great books and sites around with detailed charts of the GI value of all foods, so that is a good starting point. Once you have this information, check all of the foods in your diet. Start figuring out how to replace or minimize the high GI foods with a low GI alternative. If you can slowly include these changes into your diet, you will start to feel better, be less irritable with swings in your blood sugar changing your mood, and best of all – lose weight!