GI News—February 2012

• Prof Jennie Brand-Miller dispels 8 myths about sugars and starches;
  
• Smart carbs for smarter kids? Dr Alan Barclay reports;
  
• Brown foods are better than white. Nicole Senior investigates;
• What does 'eat mostly wholegrain cereals' mean?
  
• Slowly digested carbs reduce inflammation associated with chronic disease;
• Brief, high-intensity workouts reduce BGLs;
• The scoop on barley with Emma Stirling;
  
• Three low GI recipes to try.
  

Busting Food Myths has been one of our most popular features. We like this column too, and like to explore the myths, check the evidence, sort fact from fiction and set the record straight so people become a bit more relaxed about food and eating. Sadly, we never run out of myths. Because we are always coming across stories telling people they just need to eat brown foods not white to lower the GI of their diet, we asked dietitian Nicole Senior to pull out her plucky pen and investigate the myth that white foods have no nutritional value. She also reminds us there’s a more serious side to food myths in Food for Thought, while Prof Jennie Brand-Miller dispels eight popular myths about sugars and starches in GI Update.

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Food for Thought

Getting savvy about nutrition in the news.
Dietitian Nicole Senior has just published Food Myths, a collection of food myths she has ‘busted’ in GI News … and more (many more). In the introduction (reproduced with permission) she asks us to think about a more serious side to these myths, puts forward some thoughts on why there are so many about diets and weight loss and provides pointers on how we can get savvy about nutrition in the news.

Food myths are prevalent in societies where food is abundant and choices are practically endless. In stark and distressing contrast, people in poor countries struggle to get enough food to survive. Are we fussy with our diets and vulnerable to food myths because we’re too well fed? By following fad diets, are we desperately clutching at ideas to narrow down our food options because they are now overwhelming? Are we looking to fix our broader unease with our hectic modern lifestyles? Has our food supply become so far removed from its source that we are reacting against it? These are deep questions that probably deserve book all on their own but I’d ask you to consider them when understanding why food myths persist. A bit of perspective is always good.

When I was putting my food myths book together, I couldn’t actually cover all the myths about diet and weight loss. I’ve often wondered why bad ‘diets’ seem to do so well. How can a diet that doesn’t work (in the long term) be so popular? How can a product that is unsubstantiated become a bestseller? It’s a tribute to good marketing but it also indicates the number of people struggling with excess weight, and the lengths they will go to in order to lose it. Unfortunately for many, the moderation message is boring and unappealing: instead, it seems as if we need to be shaken out of our old ways and shocked into submission. Perhaps moderation is far too sensible and we have a craving for risk? Perhaps we are just too impatient? Perhaps we latch on to the first person or company who seems to understand our difficulties? Who knows? The situation isn’t helped by the diet industry, which knows the moderation message doesn’t sell. It comes up with all manner of trumped-up benefits and half-baked theories about why their diets will actually work when all they are doing is selling creative ways to eat fewer kilojoules/calories.

To lose weight we must reconcile the – boring – fact that we must eat less and exercise more WITH ensuring we eat quality foods to meet our nutritional needs ... and eat foods we like ... and be able to afford them ... and please all the family ... and prepare food quickly. You can appreciate the challenges. Blacklisting particular nutrients such as carbs or fats, as many fad diets do, is not helpful. It’s a pity there are so many myths about weight loss and dieting to choose from. It’s also a great shame that so many people have wasted so much money and experienced so much heartache and disappointment at the hands of myth-spinners. I say: don’t get mad or get even—get savvy instead. Here are some organisations with scientific experts who review the evidence behind nutrition in the news.

• American Heart Association
• National Heart Foundation
• Glycemic Index Foundation
• Harvard University School of Public Health
• NHS Choices ‘Behind the Headlines’

Available from bookshops and online. You can download a sample chapter HERE.

News Briefs

What does ‘eat mostly wholegrain cereals’ mean?
Consume more wholegrains is enshrined in dietary guidelines around the globe and is something of a mantra with doctors, dietitians and nutritionists. Australia’s new draft dietary guidelines released in December 2011 urge us to eat mostly wholegrain’ cereals. So, how much is ‘mostly’ and how strong is the evidence? A Nutrition Reviews study that evaluated 135 articles on refined grain foods (published between 2000-2010) reports that the great majority found no association between the intake of refined grain foods and cardiovascular disease, diabetes, weight gain, or overall mortality whatsoever. A few found that very high intakes might be associated with some types of cancers. The evidence overall shows that consuming of up to 50% of all grain foods as refined grain foods (without high levels of added fat, sugar, or sodium) is not associated with increased risk of disease.


Vegetarian fried brown rice from The Low GI Vegetarian Cookbook available from bookshops and online. Photo: Ian Hofstetter.

GI News asked Prof Jennie Brand-Miller to comment. ‘This paper raises questions about the newest dietary guidelines. When health authorities recommend that we eat most grains as wholegrains, they'd like to think we will be eating more fibre (that’s probably true), more micronutrients (not likely), and lower GI carbohydrates (and that’s definitely not true!). The reality is that for most cereal products today, both the “white” version and the “brown” version have a high GI.

I’d like to suggest that we re-define wholegrains as “foods that not only contain the germ, the endosperm and the bran, but also the GI characteristics of the original grain”. At least then, we might see some real benefits of eating them. Wholegrain products might have started with the germ, the endosperm and the bran of the grain, but in many cases, the finished product has been cooked, flaked, toasted, puffed and popped beyond recognition. It’s a long, long way from the grain that came in nature’s packaging.

There are very few clinical trials that have directly compared a “brown” diet with a “white” diet that was otherwise identical. In the largest clinical trial of its sort to date, UK researchers, found that when they provided 316 overweight men and women with a range of wholegrain foods and asked them to substitute them “like for like” for refined grain foods in their typical diet over a 16 week period, there was not even a hint of difference in heart risk (cholesterol, triglycerides, insulin sensitivity and a range of common inflammatory markers) between those who substituted wholegrain foods into their diet, and those who didn’t (the control group).’

Slowly digested carbs reduce inflammation associated with chronic disease.


Associate Professor Marian Neuhouser

A diet rich in slowly digested carbohydrates reduces a marker of inflammation called C-reactive protein (associated with an increased risk for many cancers as well as cardiovascular disease) by about 22% in people who are overweight and obese, according to a study by Seattle’s Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in The Journal of Nutrition.

‘Lowering inflammatory factors is important for reducing a broad range of health risks. Showing that a low-glycemic load diet can improve health is important for the millions of Americans who are overweight or obese’ say lead author Marian Neuhouser PhD, RD and colleagues who also found that among overweight and obese study participants, a low glycemic load diet modestly increased – by about 5% – blood levels of a protein hormone called adiponectin, which plays a key role in protecting against several cancers, including breast cancer, as well as metabolic disorders such as type-2 diabetes, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease and hardening of the arteries.

‘The bottom line is that when it comes to reducing markers of chronic-disease risk, not all carbohydrates are created equal. Quality matters,’ she says. ‘There are easy dietary changes people can make. Whenever possible, choose carbohydrates that are less likely to cause rapid spikes in blood glucose.’ These include legumes such as kidney beans, soy beans, pinto beans and lentils; milk; and fruits such as apples, oranges, grapefruit and pears.

Brief, high-intensity workouts reduce BGLs.


Professor Martin Gibala

Researchers at McMaster University report in Journal of Applied Physiology that brief, high intensity workouts, just six sessions over two weeks, can rapidly lower blood glucose levels in people with type 2 diabetes. They found that just 30 minutes of high-intensity intermittent exercise a week, lowered 24-hour blood glucose concentrations, reduced blood glucose spikes after meals, and increased an important marker of metabolic health called skeletal muscle mitochondrial capacity.

What did the workouts involve? Participants rode a stationary bike for 10 bouts of 60 seconds with 1 minute between each burst of exercise. The routine also included a warm up and cool down so each session lasted 25 minutes in total. Participants showed improved blood glucose levels even though they did not lose weight during the two-week study. ‘The improved glycemic control may be linked to changes in the participants’ muscles, such as an improved ability to clear glucose from the blood after meals,’ says Professor Martin Gibala. ‘We need to conduct further research to identify the mechanisms behind these results.’ Martin Gibala explains the research HERE.

Get the Scoop with Emma Stirling

The scoop on barley.


Emma Stirling APD

As new age, but ‘ancient’ grains like spelt and quinoa take over, it’s easy to forget traditional, tried-and-true players like barley – one of the oldest cultivated cereals. But if you need to watch your BGLs or want to lower the GI of your diet, you should definitely be backing barley. Rich in protein, high in cholesterol-lowering soluble fibre (beta-glucan) and packed with essential nutrients like B vitamins, pearled barley also has a very low GI (25).

Barley shopping basket The barley we buy in the supermarket is usually in the form of pearled barley and is not technically a wholegrain. ‘Pearling’ is an abrasive process which causes some loss of the outer bran layer, but still leaves a highly nutritious grain. Wholegrain barley does exist, it can be found in products labeled as ‘whole’, ‘wholegrain’ or ‘scotch’ barley in which the grain undergoes a different process to ensure all three layers – the bran, germ and endosperm – are maintained.

You’ll also find (but not low GI):
Barley flour – made by grinding the barley ‘pearls’. In the Middle East and Africa, barley flour is blended with wheat flour to produce breads or is ground and cooked as porridge.
Barley grits – are chopped grains with a shorter cooking time used in casseroles, hamburgers, soups, stews and as an ingredient in breakfast cereals.
Barley flakes – are barley grains that have been soaked to soften before being added to baked products. They may also be used to make porridge, milk puddings and breakfast cereals.
Malted barley – is used in the production of alcoholic beverages such as beer and whisky and as a flavouring agent for cereal breakfast foods and for malted milk.

How to embrace barley? So you like the idea of backing barley, but you’re not sure where to start? Try waking up to a warming breakfast porridge with barley or in Australia look for a cereal with BarleyMax – the CSIRO’s naturally modified barley grain. Or add barley to soups, stews and pilafs or grain-based salads (switch it for freekeh in my Hot smoked salmon nicoise). But the easiest way to raise the profile of barley on your plate is to use it instead of rice as a side dish or rice-based dish like Johanna’s Barley risotto with mushrooms and thyme.



Cook it, store it Steaming pearl barley takes a little longer than steaming white rice, but the method is similar (and super easy if you have a rice cooker). For the stovetop method, place 1 cup (200g/7oz) well rinsed barley in a saucepan with 3 cups (750ml) water and bring to the boil. Cover and reduce heat. Simmer gently for around 35–40 minutes or until the grains are tender but still a little chewy (al dente like pasta). Remove from the heat and leave to stand for a few minutes before fluffing the grains with a fork and serving. If you cook a large batch, freeze leftovers in small batches for up to 6 months. How easy is that?

Emma Stirling is an Accredited Practising Dietitian and health writer with over ten years experience writing for major publications. She is editor of The Scoop on Nutrition – a blog by expert dietitians. Check it out for hot news bites and a healthy serve of what’s in flavour.

In the GI News Kitchen

American dietitian and author of Good Carbs, Bad Carbs, Johanna Burani, shares favourite recipes with a low or moderate GI from her Italian kitchen. For more information, check out Johanna's website. The photographs are by Sergio Burani. His food, travel and wine photography website is photosbysergio.com.

Broccoli with orzo soup.
Leave it to the Italians. All they do is boil fresh broccoli with some other fresh household staples and they get this wonderful tasting soup. It’s usually served in the evening with bread, cheese and wine. Servings: 4 (approx. 1 3/4 cups each)

1 tbsp olive oil
2 large scallions (spring onions), finely chopped
1 medium carrot, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
5 sprigs parsley, finely chopped
450g/1 lb fresh broccoli (including stems), chopped
6 cups low sodium chicken or vegetable broth (stock)
1 cup orzo pasta
4 tsp parmigiano reggiano grated cheese



Cook the orzo in 2 litres (quarts) of boiling water (with 1 teaspoon salt if you wish) according to packet instructions until al dente. Drain and set aside. In the meantime ...
Heat the oil in a Dutch oven or casserole over medium heat. Add the scallions, carrot, garlic and parsley and gently saute for about 5 minutes. Add the broccoli, broth and season with salt and pepper to taste. Bring to a boil, then lower the heat and cover. Simmer for approximately 20 minutes. Allow to cool for a few minutes.
Puree vegetables to the desired creamy consistency. Add the pasta and heat through. Serve hot with grated cheese.

Per serve
Energy: 1120kJ/267cals; Protein 13g; Fat 5g (includes 1g saturated fat and 1mg cholesterol); Available carbohydrate 43g; Fibre 6g

Cut back on the food bills and enjoy fresh-tasting, easily prepared, seasonal, satisfying and delicious low or moderate GI meals that don’t compromise on quality and flavour one little bit with this Money Saving Meals recipe making the most of barley. For more recipes check out the Money Saving Meals website.

Brown rice & barley salad with spiced chickpeas, sweet potato and currants.
Combining the brown rice and barley like this lowers the overall GI of the meal while adding spices and roasting the chickpeas is a great way of adding lots of flavour to this salad that’s a satisying meal in itself. Serves 6

2/3 cup brown rice
2/3 cup pearl barley
3 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp paprika
½ tsp tumeric
1 tbsp olive oil
1 small (250g/9oz) sweet potato, peeled, cut into 2cm pieces
1 red onion, cut into thin wedges
400g/14oz can chickpeas, rinsed and drained
¼ cup currants
¼ cup lightly toasted slivered almonds
2 tbsp freshly chopped coriander
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Yoghurt tahini dressing
½ cup low fat natural yoghurt
1 tsp tahini
2 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp pure floral honey

Preheat oven to 180ºC/350ºF.
Cook the brown rice and pearl barley in separate pans of boiling water, with one teaspoon of cumin added to each pan. Cook stirring occasionally for 25 minutes or until al dente (pearl barley will take a little longer). Drain well. Meanwhile …
Place the sweet potato onion, and chick peas in a large bowl. Mix the remaining cumin, coriander, paprika, turmeric and the olive oil together then add to the bowl with the sweet potato and toss to evenly coat. Place the sweet potato mixture in a single layer on the prepared tray and bake for 20 minutes or until sweet potato is just tender.
Toss the rice, barley, sweet potato, chickpeas, currants, almonds and coriander together in a large bowl. Season with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper.
To make the dressing, mix all ingredients together until well combined. Serve the salad drizzled with a little of the dressing.

Per serve
Energy: 1680kJ/420cals; Protein 13g; Fat 10g (includes 1g saturated fat); Available carbohydrate 58g; Fibre 9g

My Meatless Mondays.
Aubergine, potato & pepper stew.
This rich, Mediterranean-inspired stew is full of flavours, which mature if there is any left over for the next day. It is an extract from The Meat Free Monday Cookbook, foreword by Paul, Stella and Mary McCartney, edited by Annie Rigg, published by Kyle books and available in good bookshops and online. If you are worried about the fat, use a little less feta cheese and pinenuts. Serves 4-6

3 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, chopped
1 stick celery, chopped
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 red pepper, deseeded and cut into large chunks
1 medium courgette (zucchini), cut into large chunks
1 aubergine (eggplant), cut into large chunks
2 medium potatoes, peeled and cut into large chunks
1 teaspoon dried oregano
2 x 400g cans tomatoes
400ml vegetable stock
1 tsp caster sugar
400g can butterbeans, drained and rinsed
4 tbsp kalamata olives
2 tbsp toasted pine nuts
125g crumbled feta
2 tbsp freshly chopped flatleaf parsley
salt and freshly ground black pepper



Heat half of the olive oil in a large casserole dish, add the chopped onion and celery and cook until tender but not coloured. Add the garlic and cook for a further minute. While the onion is cooking prepare the other vegetables.
Add the remaining oil, chopped peppers, courgette and aubergine to the pan and cook for3–4 minutes. Add the potatoes, oregano, canned tomatoes and vegetable stock. Bring to the boil, season with salt and freshly ground black pepper, add the sugar, cover the pan and reduce the heat to a gentle simmer. Continue to cook for about 25–30 minutes until all of the veggies are tender.
Add the butterbeans and olives and continue to cook for a further 5 minutes. Check the seasoning, adding more salt and freshly ground black pepper if needed. Scatter with
toasted pine nuts, crumbled feta and chopped parsley to serve.

Per serve (based on 6 servings)
Energy: 1240kJ/290cals; Protein 9g; Fat 20g (includes 5g saturated fat and 14mg cholesterol); Available carbohydrate 16g; Fibre 6g

Busting Food Myths with Nicole Senior

Nicole Senior

Myth: White foods have no nutritional value.
Fact: There are plenty of exceptions to this oversimplified dietary rule.
It would be nice if there was a simple colour rule for healthy eating. But there isn’t. This rule seems to have come about to discourage consumption/over-consumption of sugar, salt and white flour products, but eating well is a bit more complex than that. Brown sugar is on a par with white in the ‘little nutritional value’ stakes, and pink salt matches white for sodium, gram for gram. So forget about colour signifying health for these ingredients.



When it comes to grains, white rice and white pasta are important food staples around the world providing energy, vitamins, minerals and even a little protein, but they do have something missing – they have been refined and in the process lost some of their nutritional goodness. For example, white bread and flour have no bran or germ as a result. Choosing ‘brown’ or wholegrain versions of popular staples such as bread, rice and pasta delivers extra benefits in terms of fibre and B vitamins, however there’s no need to banish refined white bread, rice and pasta from the menu completely. You can still enjoy a soft white bread roll, yeasty Turkish bread (pide) or crispy pizza base. Although they’re not as good as their wholegrain equivalents, there’s no convincing evidence of harm in eating some refined grain foods in your diet according to a systematic review by Dr Peter Williams published in Nutrition Reviews. But don’t take this as license to live entirely on the whiter side of life: a study by Mozzafarian and colleagues in New England Journal of Medicine found refined grains were one of the foods associated with weight gain. And it’s a good idea to choose lower GI versions of your ‘white’ (refined) grain foods such as basmati rice and sourdough bread – white pasta is already low GI. The general recommendation for good health is to make sure at least half your grains are wholegrains – traditional oats, brown rice and pasta, and wholegrain (or wholemeal) bread and cereals.

What about eggs? Some people choose brown eggs and some like white, but truth be told, the colour of the egg has no effect on the contents. In general, chicken breeds with white ear lobes lay white eggs, and chickens with red ear lobes lay brown eggs (but even this isn’t a hard and fast rule). And of course, once you peel or crack the egg, they are all the same inside.

As for white foods such as milk, white veggies (cauliflower, onions, cannellini beans, new potatoes) and white fish – I don’t think the rule was intended to apply to these nutritious foods.

The bottom line: Enjoy a balanced diet that includes a wide variety of foods of all colours, including some ‘white’ ones for variety, health and enjoyment.

Nicole Senior is an Accredited Practising Dietitian and Nutritionist and author of Food Myths released on February 1 and available in bookshops and online and from www.greatideas.net.au

GI Symbol News with Dr Alan Barclay

Dr Alan Barclay

Smart carbs for smarter kids
Most parents know that for peak performance, it’s vital that children and teenagers eat a good breakfast before they head off to school. Now, there’s growing evidence that along with providing essential nutrients (protein, carbohydrate, fat and fibre plus vitamins and minerals like calcium and iron), making this healthy breakfast a low GI one brings extra benefits. In fact, this is where low GI carbs really deliver the ‘smarts’ improving mental performance during those difficult tasks like maths tests!

When UK researchers recently investigated the effects of meals of varying overall GI values and carbohydrate content on 60 students aged 11–14 years, they found that the kids who ate a low GI/higher carbohydrate breakfast completed the maths tasks faster and more accurately and improved their general reasoning skills and their overall attentiveness. In fact, the low GI, higher carbohydrate meal helped kids excel in the four hardest tests examined. Earlier studies with younger children and adolescents have reported similar results.

The brain boosting power of the low GI/higher carb meal isn’t really surprising as we know that glucose is the brain’s primary fuel source and it needs a steady supply of it throughout the day. Eating that healthy low GI breakfast provides the brain with a more constant level of blood glucose compared with the highs and lows of a high GI breakfast. So, here’s how you can kick start your children’s day every day of the week with a healthy low GI breakfast to truly nourish and sustain them.



7 easy low GI breakfasts

• Fruit bread (e.g. Burgen Fruit and Muesli) with a smear of margarine and a little of a favourite spread (e.g. jam/honey) plus a glass of fat reduced or low fat milk
• Wholegrain, low GI breakfast cereals (e.g., Kellogg’s Sustain or Guardian) with
• reduced or low fat milk and fruit
• Natural muesli (e.g., Morning Sun) with reduced or low fat milk (e.g. Dairy Farmers Skim)
• Low GI bread (e.g. Tip Top 9 Grain; Burgen) with a smear of margarine and a favourite spread (jam/marmalade/Vegemite/peanut butter/etc.)
• Low GI bread with baked beans
• Low GI bread with a smear of margarine and a poached or scrambled egg (or a boiled egg with ‘soldiers’)
• Plain or diet yoghurt with fresh, canned or dried fruit

For more breakfast ideas, check out Anneka Manning’s 14 easy-to-prepare low GI brekkies including the irresistible Eggs in Nests in The Low GI Family Cookbook.

The GI Symbol, making healthy low GI choices easy choices



For more information about the GI Symbol Program
Dr Alan W Barclay, PhD
Chief Scientific Officer
Glycemic Index Foundation (Ltd)
Phone: +61 (0)2 9785 1037
Mob: +61 (0)416 111 046
Fax: +61 (0)2 9785 1037
Email: alan@gisymbol.com
Website: www.gisymbol.com

GI Update

Prof Jennie Brand-Miller answers your questions


Prof Jennie Brand-Miller

I am always being asked about sugars and starches. This month, I thought it would be useful to dispel some of the perennial myths about them.
# Myth: Starchy foods such as potatoes and pasta are fattening.
Fact: Starchy foods are often bulky and nutritious. They fill you up and stave off hunger pangs, which means they can actually help with, rather than hinder, weight loss. The key, as with all foods, is to be choosy about the kinds of starchy foods you’re eating.

# Myth: Sugar causes diabetes.
Fact: Today, there’s consensus among health researchers and scientists specializing in diabetes that sugar in food does not cause diabetes. Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune condition triggered by unknown environmental factors. Type 2 diabetes is largely inherited, but lifestyle factors such as a lack of exercise or being overweight increase the risk of developing it. Foods that produce high blood glucose levels may increase the risk of type 2 diabetes, but sugar has a more moderate effect than many starches.

# Myth: Sugar is the worst thing for people with diabetes.
Fact: People with diabetes used to be advised to avoid sugar at all costs. But research shows that moderate consumption of refined sugar (30–50 grams or 6–10 teaspoons per day) doesn’t compromise blood glucose management. This means people with diabetes can choose foods that contain refined sugar or even use sensible amounts of table sugar. Saturated fat is of greater concern for people with diabetes than refined sugar.



#Myth: All starches are slowly digested in the intestine.
Fact: Not so. Most starch, especially in cereal products, is digested in a flash, causing a sharper increase in blood glucose than many sugar-containing foods.

# Myth: Sugar is fattening.
Fact: Sugar has no special fattening properties. It is no more likely to be turned into fat than any other type of carbohydrate. Apples and soft drinks have the same sugar content (10 percent to 12 percent). Yes, sugar is often present in high-calorie foods (cakes, cookies, chocolate, and ice cream, for instance). But it’s the total calories in those foods, not the sugar, that’s the problem.

# Myth: Diets high in sugar are less nutritious.
Fact: Studies have shown that diets containing a moderate amount of sugar (from a range of sources, including dairy foods and fruit) often have higher levels of micronutrients, including calcium, riboflavin, and vitamin C, than low-sugar diets.

# Myth: Sugar goes hand in hand with dietary fat.
Fact: Many foods high in fat are also high in sugar—think chocolate, full-fat ice cream, cake, cookies, and pastries. But most high-sugar diets are actually low in fat, and vice versa. The reason: most sources of fat in our diet are not sweet (e.g., potato chips, French fries, steak), while most sources of sugar contain no fat (e.g., soft drinks and sweetened juice drinks). Nutritionists call this the “sugar-fat seesaw.”

# Myth: Starches are best for optimum athletic performance.
Fact: In many instances, starchy foods (like potatoes or rice) are too bulky to eat in the quantities needed for active athletes. Sugars (from a range of sources, including dairy food and fruit) can help increase carbohydrate intake.

GI testing by an accredited laboratory North America
Dr Alexandra Jenkins
Glycemic Index Laboratories
20 Victoria Street, Suite 300
Toronto, Ontario M5C 298 Canada
Phone +1 416 861 0506
Email info@gilabs.com
Web www.gilabs.com

Australia
Fiona Atkinson
Research Manager, Sydney University Glycemic Index Research Service (SUGiRS)
Human Nutrition Unit, School of Molecular and Microbial Biosciences
Sydney University
NSW 2006 Australia
Phone + 61 2 9351 6018
Fax: + 61 2 9351 6022
Email sugirs@mmb.usyd.edu.au
Web www.glycemicindex.com

See The New Glucose Revolution on YouTube

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GI News—January 2012

• Putting health first no matter what your size;
• Fuelling willpower to stick to New Year resolutions needs glucose;
• Dr Alan Barclay on Australia’s new dietary guidelines;
• Diet quality and stroke prevention;
• Three low GI recipes to try;
• The health benefits of low GI Meatless Mondays;
• Do you need to eat meat to get enough protein?

Human routines are stubborn things, which helps explain why 88% of all resolutions end in failure according to Professor Richard Wiseman. Did you know that it takes an average of 66 days to form a new habit and for some unlucky people up to 254 days says Dr Anthony Grant Director of the Coaching Psychology Unit at the University of Sydney and that people revert to their old habits between five and seven times. What to do? Frame changes as aspirations rather than resolutions so you don’t set yourself up to fail. So, here’s a tasty New Year’s aspiration – instead of ‘going on a diet’, why not opt to go meatless on Mondays with a low GI diet based on minimally processed plant foods and moderate amounts of protein foods. It’s a flexible, liveable, and family friendly aspiration and it will also help you optimise your insulin sensitivity and decrease your insulin levels over the whole day. To top it off, it’s good for the environment and the housekeeping budget. Healthy and sustainable nutrition all round we say.

Good eating, good health and good reading.

Editor: Philippa Sandall
Web management and design: Alan Barclay, PhD

Food for Thought

Meatless Mondays for healthy, sustainable nutrition.
Building your diet around low GI plant foods such as wholegrains, legumes, vegetables, fruits, nuts and seeds gives you all the nutrients you need for long-term health and wellbeing along with plenty of protective antioxidants and phyto-chemicals. Not only that, there’s a wealth of evidence to support the fact that eating a vegetarian diet can reduce the risk of heart disease, type 2 diabetes and cancer.

Back in November, Fiona Atkinson asked GI guru Prof David Jenkins about the benefits of going meatless? ‘I think the benefits are basically, on an humanitarian perspective,’ he said. ‘I used to put that as a sort of rider at the end but I think now it’s becoming the first issue as human beings. Second, I think one has to think of the environmental issues. They always say it’s a ten to one ratio for plant-based diet versus an animal -based diet in terms of land consumption, water usage, which is obviously a problem in many places, and basically environmental impact and environmental degradation. We can not afford to have the whole planet geared to feeding cattle that feed us, this seems to be an insanity that we accept because it’s palatable. I think those are really strong reasons. I think that if one is sensible and one watches B12 and one’s diet, one can live very well on a vegetarian or vegan diet.’

For those of us who don’t want to go all the way, there’s the low GI Meatless Mondays option. This is simply making a commitment to going without meat one day a week for your and the planet’s health. Where did the idea come from? It actually goes back nearly 100 years … We turned to the US Meatless Monday organisation for some background and discovered that during World War I, the US Food Administration urged families to reduce consumption of key staples to aid the war effort. The message was ‘Food Will Win the War’ and Meatless Monday and Wheatless Wednesday were introduced to encourage people to do their bit. The Food Administration (spearheaded by Herbert Hoover), published and distributed recipe booklets and menus. The effect was overwhelming according to Meatless Mondays. ‘Some 10 million families, 7000 hotels and nearly 425,000 food dealers pledged to observe national meatless days. In November 1917, New York City hotels saved some 116 tons of meat over the course of just one week.’

In 2003, the Meatless Monday message was revived by health advocate Sid Lerner, backed by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health’s Center for a Livable Future and endorsed by 30 schools of public health. It’s now a global movement.

In the UK, Sir Paul, Stella and Mary McCartney launched the Meat Free Monday campaign in 2009. Going meatless on Mondays is a ‘fun challenge with an achievable goal that will bring many benefits, whilst providing you with the opportunity to broaden your culinary horizon along the way,’ they write in the introduction to The Meat Free Monday Cookbook. And you can listen to Paul singing all about it HERE.

For more information on Meatless Mondays, check out:
www.meatlessmonday.com
www.meatfreemondays.com
www.meatlessmondays-australia.com

To inspire you, we’ll be publishing a low GI Meatless Monday recipe every month. For recipes from vegetarian and vegan books we have previously reviewed in GI News, check out:

• Prof Jennie Brand-Miller’s The Low GI Vegetarian Cookbook
• New York Times best-seller Forks Over Knives
• Dr Neal Barnard’s Program for Reversing Diabetes

News Briefs

Fuelling willpower with glucose.
At a time of year when many people are resolving to go on a diet, we thought we’d remind readers that willpower seems to be affected by the brain’s glucose supplies – so don’t skip meals. Self-control requires a certain amount of glucose to operate unimpaired. Writing in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology Matthew Gailliot and researchers from Florida State University found that even relatively small acts of self control are sufficient to deplete the brain’s available supply of glucose thereby impairing the control of thought and behavior, at least until your body can retrieve more glucose from its stores or you have something to eat. Their laboratory tests with volunteers found that:

• Acts of self-control reduced blood glucose levels
• Low levels of blood glucose after an initial self-control task predicted poor performance on a subsequent self-control task
• Initial acts of self-control impaired performance on subsequent self-control tasks, but consuming a glucose drink eliminated these impairments.

‘… the body’s variable ability to mobilise glucose may be an important determinant of people’s capacity to live up to their ideals, pursue their goals and realize their virtues’ they conclude.

The Florida study involved numerous tests but a key one found that people who drank a glass of regular lemonade (i.e. sweetened with sugar) between one task requiring self control before beginning a second also requiring a fair bit of willpower performed equally well on both tasks, while people who drank a ‘diet’ lemonade in between made more errors on the second task than on the first. They used sugar in their studies because it is fast acting and convenient, but make the point that ‘complex carbohydrates may be more effective for sustained self control.’ Research in memory tests has certainly shown that low GI carbs enhance learning and memory more than high GI carbs, probably because there is no rebound fall in blood glucose.

Diet quality a good guide in stroke prevention.


Professor Graeme Hankey

‘While we have seen a reduction in incidence of stroke and mortality in the past 20 to 30 years due to better control of blood pressure and smoking we are seeing a deceleration in that decline,’ says Prof Graeme Hankey head of Royal Perth Hospital’s stroke unit. ‘We are seeing the emergence of the beginning of a trend to increases in stroke incidence because all our kids are overweight and not exercising and we are seeing strokes in young people as diabetes and metabolic syndrome take over.’

The overall quality of a person’s diet and the amount of food they eat rather than individual foods and nutrients is a better guide to whether he or she will suffer a stroke he says in his review of a raft of international studies on risk factors for stroke in Lancet Neurology. Weighing up the evidence he says:

• Poor nutrition in the first year of a mother’s life and undernutrition in utero, infancy, childhood, and adulthood predispose individuals to stroke in later life, but the mechanism of increased stroke risk is unclear.
• Reliable evidence suggests that dietary supplementation with antioxidant vitamins, B vitamins, and calcium does not reduce the risk of stroke.
• Less reliable evidence suggests that stroke can be prevented by diets that are prudent, aligned to the Mediterranean or DASH diets, low in salt and added sugars, high in potassium, and meet, but do not exceed, energy requirements.

Low GI eBooks now available.
Many of Prof Jennie Brand-Miller's low GI books are now available as eBooks from online retailers in Australia, the US and Canada and the UK including Amazon, Apple, ebooks.com, Google Books and Kobo.

Australia/New Zealand/UK editions (Hachette) now available

• Low GI Diet Handbook – ISBN 9780733628078
  
• Low GI Diet Shopper’s Guide 2012 – ISBN 9780733628559
• Low GI Diet 12-week Weight-loss Plan – ISBN 9780733627781
• Low GI Diet for Childhood Diabetes – ISBN 9780733628221
• Low GI Diet for Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome – ISBN 9780733628375

US/Canada editions (Da Capo Lifelong Press/Perseus Books) now available

• Low GI Handbook – 9780738214139
• Low GI Shopper's Guide to GI Values 2012 – 9780738215211
• Low GI Diet Revolution: The Definitive Science-Based Weight Loss Plan – 9780786727803
• New Glucose Revolution for Diabetes – 9780786751341
• New Glucose Revolution Low GI Gluten-Free Eating Made Easy – 9780786746538
• Low GI Guide to Living Well with PCOS – 9780738214498

Lentilicious.
Learn to love lentils and you’ll have a deliciously natural low GI diet and a great ingredient for ‘Meatless Mondays’. Now an enterprising pair up in the stunning hinterland of beautiful Byron Bay has made it really easy for everyone to learn to love lentils. Back in 2009, Anthea Packshaw and Sharna Glasser started their Lentilicious business and they have been enthusiastically making and marketing their range of five flavoured, pre-packed lentil meals that include herbs, spices and other flavourings ever since. The Lentilicious range of flavours includes Coconut Fusion, Lime Time, Mediterranean, Turmeric Magic and Red Chilli. All you need to do is tip the lentils into a saucepan, add cold water, bring to the boil then simmer gently for 25 minutes and the meal is ready. Each package serves 2–3 people.



The Lentilicious story Sharna and Anthea met while working at a resource centre in Mullumbimby. Passionate about vegetarian cuisine and inspired by traditional Indian dahl, they set about creating a range of delicious, modern lentil meals designed to make lentils mainstream. You can find out more about Lentilicious here.

Get the Scoop with Emma Stirling

The scoop on putting health first in 2012


Emma Stirling APD

Do you have weight loss goals as part of your New Year’s resolutions? Well here's a new idea to consider. Forget about the idea of dieting altogether. That’s right. Completely put weight loss out of your mind and take a leaf out of the Health At Every Size Approach (HAES) and put healthy eating and a healthy lifestyle first.

Health at every size Championed by Linda Bacon, PhD nutrition researcher at the University of California-Davis and author of Health at Every Size: the surprising truth about your weight, the focus of HAES is on improving health outcomes, not on the “perfect” body. You see for some people, especially those who have been on the dieting roller coaster, the key is a change in mindset to avoid the repeated cycle of yo-yo dieting and lapses, relapses and collapses. Instead of weight loss as the end goal which places an emphasis on body image, you put healthy eating and a healthy lifestyle first. You may actively work on switching to more low GI choices in order to better manage your blood glucose levels, then set up a program to eat more intuitively for better digestion and next set goals to increase your physical activity to boost feelings of vitality. And guess what? Studies have shown that these seemingly small lifestyle steps, add up to huge rewards, and for some people, may in fact be finally the answer to long term weight loss success.

Health At Every Size is supported by an active community who follow these principles:

• Accepting and respecting the diversity of body shapes and sizes
• Recognizing that health and well-being are multi-dimensional and that they include physical, social, spiritual, occupational, emotional, and intellectual aspects
• Promoting all aspects of health and well-being for people of all sizes
• Promoting eating in a manner which balances individual nutritional needs, hunger, satiety, appetite, and pleasure
• Promoting individually appropriate, enjoyable, life-enhancing physical activity, rather than exercise that is focused on a goal of weight loss

The jury deliberates In scientific circles the HAES approach raises fiery debate. If we focus on health and not body weight, are we admitting that we’ve lost the battle of the bulge? Is this sending a message that overweight and obesity are not harmful to long-term health? By accepting HAES are we simply driving overweight as the norm and “fat acceptance”? Or is this approach the answer for many to break free from years of restrictive and fad diet failures, improve their health and learn to have a healthy relationship with food, once and for all? You can read more about both sides of the HAES debate in this recap of a session at the last American Dietitians Association Food Nutrition Conference and Expo written by dietitian blogger Janet Helm RD.

The scoop? As we continue to battle obesity I believe that we need to explore more individualized options as it is clear that some people respond well to structured weight loss programs, whereas for others, this can be their greatest undoing. I certainly believe that HAES will help us shift our distorted mentality that super skinny, equals super healthy. We know from research that you CAN be fit if you’re fat. You only need to visit my training group and see all the different shapes and sizes working out together. Believe me there are larger people than me who can run faster, lift far heavier weights and still keep chatting as I huff and puff. And I certainly know my fair share of women that have too long a list of personal food rules and go to extremes with eating for shape, not health, that is far from nutritious. So I ask what are you doing for your health and a healthy relationship with food this New Year? I’ve made a suggested list over here on my blog The Scoop on Nutrition.



Emma Stirling is an Accredited Practising Dietitian and health writer with over ten years experience writing for major publications. She is editor of The Scoop on Nutrition – a blog by expert dietitians. Check it out for hot news bites and a healthy serve of what’s in flavour.

In the GI News Kitchen

American dietitian and author of Good Carbs, Bad Carbs, Johanna Burani, shares favourite recipes with a low or moderate GI from her Italian kitchen. For more information, check out Johanna's website. The photographs are by Sergio Burani. His food, travel and wine photography website is photosbysergio.com.

‘Spunky’ cavatelli and broccoli
Pasta with broccoli and a strong earthy olive oil is a very popular winter dish for Italians and cavatelli seem like the ideal pasta choice. Its crevices create lots of little spaces where the broccoli sauce can nest. I’ve added a hint of mustard to my broccoli puree to give it a little ‘spunk’. Another option might be a few peperoncino (red pepper) flakes. Bring 4 litres (quarts) of water to the boil to cook the pasta while the broccoli is steaming. Serves 8.

2 large stalks of fresh broccoli (approximately 1lb/450g)
1–2 large cloves garlic, sliced lengthwise in quarters
1½ tbsp sharp mustard (Dijon type)
1/2 tsp salt
1lb/450g cavatelli pasta
¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
4 tbsp grated parmigiano reggiano cheese

Separate the broccoli florets from the stems and cut them into small pieces. Peel the tough outer skin from the stems then cut them into small pieces. Place all the broccoli in a steam basket, wash and drain.
Add 2 cups of water to a large pot. Place the basket of broccoli in the pot. Add the garlic slices on top of the broccoli. Cover and steam gently for 15 minutes or until the broccoli is tender. Once cooked, transfer the broccoli-garlic mixture to a food processor. Reserve the cooking water. Pulse the broccoli mixture for 15 seconds. Add ½ cup of the reserved water. Pulse for another 15 seconds. Repeat with another ½ cup of water and another 15 seconds of pulsing. Meanwhile, bring 4 quarts (litres) of water to the boil and cook the pasta until al dente following the directions on the packet for timing.
Whisk together the mustard and the salt in a small dish with 2 tablespoons of the cooking water. Add to the food processor. Pulse for another 15 seconds. Set aside and keep warm. (You will have about 2½ cups of this pureed sauce.)
Drain and tip the al dente pasta back into the saucepan and toss with the olive oil. Add in the broccoli mixture, toss thoroughly and serve with grated cheese.

Per serve
Energy: 880kJ/292cals; Protein 8g; Fat 9g (includes 1g saturated fat and 2mg cholesterol); Available carbohydrate 45g; Fibre 4g

Cut back on the food bills and enjoy fresh-tasting, easily prepared, seasonal, satisfying and delicious low or moderate GI meals that don’t compromise on quality and flavour one little bit with this Money Saving Meals recipe making the most of cauliflower, now in season for those readers in the midst of winter. For more recipes check out the Money Saving Meals website.

Cauliflower and Red Lentil Stew
When we spoke to Professor David Jenkins for GI News, we asked him if he would share his favourite low GI meal with us. ‘My wife has a very tasty stew,’ he said. ‘It’s like a very thick lentil soup with chunks of marinated cauliflower in it. I have to say that I could overeat on that quite easily.’ We tried it – it’s delicious, nutritious and perfect to kick start your meatless Mondays. Makes about 4–6 servings.

1 cup chopped onions
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp oregano
1 large cauliflower, chopped into florets
1 green pepper (capsicum), chopped
4 carrots, sliced or if large – diced
1 vegetable bouillon cube
½ cup water
1 cup red lentils, well rinsed
2 tbsp whole wheat flour

Gently sauté the onions in the olive oil until translucent. Add oregano, cauliflower, pepper, carrots, bouillon cube and water. Stir until well mixed, cover and simmer until cauliflower is cooked (soft rather than still crispy).
While the cauliflower is cooking, add lentils to 3 cups of water in a saucepan and boil until lentils are soft.
Sprinkle the whole wheat flour over the cauliflower mixture and stir until the stew begins to thicken, add lentils and serve.

Per serve (6 serves)
Energy: 780kJ/185cals; Protein 12g; Fat 4g (includes 0.6g saturated fat and 0mg cholesterol); Available carbohydrate 21g; Fibre 9g

My Meatless Mondays
Book cover pic

Chickpea tagine with harissa
This recipe is an extract from The Meat Free Monday Cookbook, foreword by Paul, Stella and Mary McCartney, edited by Annie Rigg, published by Kyle books and available in good bookshops and online. The book is conveniently organised by season with menu plans for 52 weeks – so you never need to eat the same meal twice! Serves 4

1 large onion, finely chopped
2 carrots, peeled
1 large sweet potato, peeled and cut into chunks
1 red pepper (capsicum), deseeded and diced
1 stick celery, chopped
1 courgette (zucchini), chopped
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp coriander seeds
pinch saffron stamens
2 tbsp olive oil
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tbsp grated fresh ginger
1 cinnamon stick
220g/7oz can chopped tomatoes
2¾ cups vegetable stock
400g/14oz can chickpeas, drained
1 tbsp clear honey
salt and freshly ground black pepper

To serve
wholewheat or barley couscous harissa



Tip the cumin and coriander seeds into a small dry frying pan and toast over a medium heat for 30 seconds until fragrant. Lightly grind using a pestle and mortar. Soak the saffron stamens in1 tablespoon of boiling water.
Heat the olive oil in a large sauté pan over a medium heat. Add the onion and cook for 3–4 minutes until tender but not coloured. Add the ground spices, garlic, grated ginger and cinnamon stick and continue to cook for a further minute. Add the chopped tomatoes and tip the vegetables and the drained chickpeas into the pan. Stir to coat the veggies in the spiced mixture and pour over the stock. Bring to the boil, reduce the heat to a gentle simmer and continue to cook for 20–25 minutes until the vegetables are tender. Add the honey and season with salt and freshly ground black pepper.
Serve in bowls with whole wheat couscous and a good spoonful of harissa.

Per serve
Energy: 1200kJ/290cals; Protein 9g; Fat 12g (includes 2g saturated fat and 0mg cholesterol); Available carbohydrate 33g; Fibre 9g

Busting Food Myths with Nicole Senior

Nicole Senior

Myth: You need to eat meat to get protein
Fact: There’s plenty of protein in plant foods
It’s a popular view that you need to eat meat to obtain protein, however this is far from the truth. Protein exists in many plant-based foods and in appreciable quantities.

How much do protein do we need? Well, not as much as you might think. The recommended Dietary Intake (RDI) in Australia is 46g a day for women and 64g a day for men aged 19-70 years. Check out how much protein you get from these different foods (we have rounded the figures).

Eggs contain perfect quality protein against which all other proteins are measured. Protein quality is a reflection of the number and balance of essential amino acids (protein building blocks) present.

• One 50g egg contains around 6g protein

Dairy foods are great sources of protein.

• 1 cup of reduced fat milk contains around 9g protein
• 200g/7oz of low fat yoghurt contains around 13g protein
• 40g/1½oz of cheese (hard variety such as cheddar) contains around 9g protein

Fish & seafood are excellent sources of protein. Pesco-vegetarians eat fish but not meat.

• 100g/3½oz white fish (cooked) contains a hefty 25g of protein
• 100g/3½oz prawns/shrimp (cooked) 24g protein
• 100g/3½oz squid/octopus (cooked) 21g protein

Legumes (pulses) are great low GI sources of protein.

• ½ cup baked beans in tomato sauce provides around 7g protein
• ½ cup canned, drained cannellini beans provides around 8g protein
• 2/3 cup cooked red lentils provides around 9g protein
• 1 cup cooked split peas provides around 12g protein
• 1 cup cooked soy beans provides around 23g protein
• 100g (3 1/2 oz) tofu (raw) provides around 12g protein
• 1 cup light soy milk provides around 5g protein

Breakfast cereals, breads and grains are surprisingly high in protein, and the relatively high protein content of wheat is one of the reasons it has become such a widely grown staple food crop. Here are some low and moderate GI examples:

• ¾ cup Kelloggs Special K Original provides around 6g protein
• ¾ cup Kelloggs All-Bran provides around 7g protein
• ¼ cup raw traditional rolled oats provides around 3g protein
• 1 slice soy and linseed bread provides around 6g protein
• 1 cup cooked brown rice (GI 59–86, so check the tables and choose a lower GI one) provides around 5g protein
• 1 cup cooked pasta provides around 7g protein
• 1 cup cooked soba/buckwheat noodles provides around 9g protein
• 1 cup cooked pearl barley provides around 6g protein
• 1/2 cup cooked quinoa provides around 4g protein

Nuts and seeds are super nutritious foods that also contain protein.

• A small handful (30g/1oz) of most nuts or seeds will deliver around 5g protein
  

Menu: If you enjoyed the following plant foods over the day for breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks, you’d easily meet the RDI for protein for men (the highest requirement).

• ½ cup oats 6g
• 1 cup milk 9g
• 2 slices soy and linseed bread 12g
• 20g cheese 5g
• 1 cup soba noodles 9g
• 100g tofu 12g
• 1 tub yoghurt 13g
• 30g mixed nuts 5g
• TOTAL 69g

So, you don’t need to eat meat to get enough protein because it is easily available in plant foods. However the nutrients meat does provide more efficiently than plant foods are iron, zinc and vitamin B12. Vive le Meatless Monday!



Nicole Senior is an Accredited Practising Dietitian and Nutritionist and author of Eat to Beat Cholesterol, Heart Food and Belly Busting for Blokes.

GI Symbol News with Dr Alan Barclay

Dr Alan Barclay

The ‘new’ Australian Dietary Guidelines, carbs and GI
The draft (there’s still time to comment) Australian Dietary Guidelines are a definite improvement on earlier versions. But they represent a mix of progress and lost opportunities and we must do much better if we are going to tackle the diabetes and obesity epidemics. We need to get them right because as Drs Willett and Ludwig point out (commenting on the US equivalent), they have a major impact on our foods and diets – government food policies, food and health programs and food regulations generally comply with them, even though the average consumer has never heard of them. Here, I am simply going to focus on a couple of key issues regarding carbs because they focus on the health problems associated with eating and drinking too many added sugars, but ignore or confuse the role of added refined starches.

Added sugars The Guidelines advise people to limit their intake of sugar-sweetened drinks. While there is some evidence that people who are obese should limit their intake of sugar sweetened beverages, there is evidence that Australians are drinking less of them, but we are still gaining weight and developing type 2 diabetes. So something else is happening ...

Starchy foods Here they take a ‘good cop’ ‘bad cop’ approach. They generally opt for the out-dated term ‘complex carbohydrate’ instead of ‘starch’, the term recommended by the World Health Organisation since 1997. This is confusing and misleading as most people don’t know that starches are complex carbohydrates – they are one and the same. Complex carbohydrates (specially wholegrain ones) are the good cops and there’s lots about their health benefits in the draft Guidelines. Starches are the bad cops and this is the term they choose to use when discussing dental caries or other health problems, e.g.: ‘Historically, the prevalence of dental caries has increased when dietary patterns have changed to include more added sugars and foods containing refined starches.’ And ‘fermentable carbohydrates (both sugars and starches) are a substrate for bacteria such as S. mutans and S. sobrinus, which increase the acid-producing potential of dental plaque’.

Glycemic Index Interestingly, every Australian Guideline in the draft has a statement comparable with the 2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans. One area where they have very obviously borrowed straight from the US is with the glycemic index. They say: ‘The review for the US guidelines also found strong and consistent evidence that glycaemic index and/or glycaemic load are not associated with body weight and do not lead to greater weight loss or better weight management. These factors were not included in the literature review to inform the revision of these Guidelines.’ However, in their critical review of the new American Dietary Guidelines, Drs Willett and Ludwig state ‘Furthermore, the quality of carbohydrates, as characterized by their glycemic index, is dismissed as unimportant, whereas we believe the evidence strongly suggests the opposite.’

We agree with Drs Willett and Ludwig: there is in fact level 1 evidence (the highest level) that low GI diets help people lose more weight and in particular body fat than regular healthy diets, and level 2 evidence that low GI diets help people keep the weight off for longer. And of course it is short-sighted to focus just on body weight with a diabetes epidemic on our doorstep. The GI is widely accepted around the world by diabetes associations as a useful dietary tool for people with diabetes to help them manage their blood glucose levels.

We will be commenting on these draft Guidelines and we urge you to do so as well. They offer Australia an opportunity to lead the world by:

• Discarding an outdated term like ‘complex carbohydrate’ which does not describe how carbohydrates behave in our bodies, and
• Encouraging the consumption of low GI carbohydrate foods to reduce rates of overweight, obesity and type 2 diabetes.

The GI Symbol, making healthy low GI choices easy choices



For more information about the GI Symbol Program
Dr Alan W Barclay, PhD
Chief Scientific Officer
Glycemic Index Foundation (Ltd)
Phone: +61 (0)2 9785 1037
Mob: +61 (0)416 111 046
Fax: +61 (0)2 9785 1037
Email: mailto:alan.barclay@gisymbol.com
Website: http://www.gisymbol.com/

GI Update

Prof Jennie Brand-Miller answers your questions


Prof Jennie Brand-Miller

In the past month, I have received two inspirational weightloss success stories from women which I want to share with GI News readers (with their permission). The stories raise weightloss questions I am frequently asked about – plateau-ing and feeling hungry all the time.

I have been following the Low GI diet since June of this year and have lost 40 pounds. I did not think it would be so easy but it truly is. I am so happy that I stumbled on it looking for a diet that I can manage. I do work in the food industry and have found that has helped a lot in creating meals for myself and family. The only concern I have now is that I want to lose at least another 15 pounds but I seem to have hit a plateau and I have not lost any weight for about 2 weeks. Will this pass because I do not wish to cut any more out of my daily intake because I notice that cravings do start when I do so.

Plateau-ing is common and normal. This is because your body weighs less and you are now eating exactly the calories (kilojoules) that you need. You are right, eating less isn’t the answer. One strategy now is to up your energy expenditure, i.e .exercise, aiming for 60 minutes every day (or 20 minutes of Peak 8s) levels to increase the metabolic rate. Some form of resistance training to build muscle mass is good. I like Peak 8s because they are so efficient. Another option is to just try to maintain your current weight for a couple of months … eating to appetite … and then try for more weight loss later. Good luck and do let me know how you go.

I am a professional female, 61 years old, and over the last 95 weeks have lost 61 kilos with a low fat, low GI, calorie controlled diet and considerable consistent exercise. No health issues apart from hypothyroidism. This weight issue has tormented me all my adult life so of course I am thrilled to finally have come this far (from 130 kilos to 68). I am struggling to lose 3 more kilos and am very interested in research about weight maintenance and appetite control. I have, and continue to be hungry all the time. All my doctor says is ‘you will get used to it – after 95 weeks! A tale I am sure you have heard many times.

Thank you for taking the trouble to write. It's an amazing amount of weight and I’m not surprised you are hungry all the time. You might like to increase your protein intake and fat intake, with good fats of course, and reduce carbs a little (just modest changes). I say this because of recent studies suggesting that a high protein, low GI diet is the best diet for weight maintenance after weight loss.

GI testing by an accredited laboratory North America
Dr Alexandra Jenkins
Glycemic Index Laboratories
20 Victoria Street, Suite 300
Toronto, Ontario M5C 298 Canada
Phone +1 416 861 0506
Email info@gilabs.com
Web www.gilabs.com

Australia
Fiona Atkinson
Research Manager, Sydney University Glycemic Index Research Service (SUGiRS)
Human Nutrition Unit, School of Molecular and Microbial Biosciences
Sydney University
NSW 2006 Australia
Phone + 61 2 9351 6018
Fax: + 61 2 9351 6022
Email sugirs@mmb.usyd.edu.au
Web www.glycemicindex.com

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GI News—December 2011

• Eating fish regularly linked to lower risk of diabetes and heart disease
• Low GI diet, with or without a change in weight, is good for overall health
• Holiday cooking with low GI Carisma potatoes
• Is a day or two of festive overeating harmless?
  
• How to lower the GI of your baking
• Submit a low GI left-overs recipe to OzHarvest for their cookbook

It’s laden table, festive fare time, so this issue we have 7 low GI recipes from colleagues from around the world to share. Our take-home message however, is to remember that food provides more than nourishment and pleasure, it can also ‘build bridges to friendship’. We were reminded of this reading a wonderful new cookbook, Monday Morning Cooking Club, whose authors have raised $230,000 for charity including OzHarvest (see Food for Thought). It’s not a diet book or health book. It’s a book about the real food that real people love to prepare and serve their loved ones and many of the recipes are low GI (the chicken and barley soup is perfect for a wet and wintry night). May you enjoy cooking and sharing good food (low GI of course!) and good times with your family and friends in the month ahead and years to come.

Good eating, good health and good reading.

Editor: Philippa Sandall
Web management and design: Alan Barclay, PhD

Food for Thought

Ten million meals

“My name is Ken and I am a rough sleeper. I have been living on the streets of Sydney for the past 10 years and I am 62 years old. The years have been very hard on both mind and body, but one thing has made the past five years bearable and that is OzHarvest. They don't only feed people like me with fresh and nutritious food but they supply drop-in centres right across Sydney. We, the homeless, are forever grateful for the caring people of OzHarvest. We love and thank you OzHarvest.”

OzHarvest is a non-denominational charity that collects and delivers perishable excess food from food wholesalers, retailers, function centres, caterers, supermarkets, corporate offices, restaurants, and cafes and delivers it to charities feeding people in need on the same day. They don't store or warehouse food. Currently they deliver 333,000 meals a month Australia wide with a fleet of 16 vans. By distributing food to those in need, they turn excess food into a resource and save thousands of kilograms of food from being dumped as landfill each year.



It all began when founding director Ronni Kahn decided that she was not prepared to be part of the waste cycle that is a natural outcome of the hospitality industry. Being part of this industry for over 20 years, she saw a lot of food thrown away. Researching options for dealing with excess perishable food, she found there was no organisation in Sydney that could collect the food on a regular and professional basis, so she set up a food rescue charity herself. Backed by The Macquarie Group Foundation which provided funds and Goodman International which provided a van and office space, OzHarvest was established and collected its first meal in November 2004.

Share your favourite low GI recipe making the most of left-overs OzHarvest is now celebrating collecting and delivering ten million meals to disadvantaged Australians by creating cookbook called Ten Million Meals which will weave together personal stories and recipes using left-overs. It will feature recipes from Jamie Oliver, Neil Perry, Matt Moran, Maggie Beer, Kylie Kwong and Bill Granger along with recipes from the rest of us who feed our families every day. How about sending in your favourite low GI one? They'd want to know a little about your recipe too. Is it a family favourite? Has it been passed down through generations? Or is it something you recently whipped up with left-overs in the fridge? The closing date for submission is 19 December 2011. Check out the guidelines HERE and let your recipe be part of a program where food builds bridges to friendship.