GI News—July 2012

• Prof David Katz on the perils of a sugar-coated scapegoat;
  
• Might fructose actually be good for us?
  
• Why people with diabetes don't need special diabetic foods;
  
• The scoop on pasta with Emma Stirling;
  
• Nicole Senior explores the myth that humans don't need to drink milk;
  
• Can a low GI diet reduce the risk of birth defects? Prof Jennie Brand-Miller investigates.
  

‘For far too long, we have diverted public health from the benefits better eating would confer by bogging down in one-nutrient-at-a-time boondoggles,’ says Dr David Katz in Food for Thought. While Prof Winkler makes the point that our goal should be to make the healthy choice the cheaper choice. It’s hard to argue with such common sense. For Diabetes Awareness Week (8 to 14 July), Dr Alan Barclay reminds us that people with diabetes don’t need to splurge extra dollars that they can ill afford on special diabetic foods, as a healthy low GI diet will do the job.

Good eating, good health and good reading.

Editor: Philippa Sandall
Web management and design: Alan Barclay, PhD
Contact email (for questions or permission to reproduce stories from this newsletter): info@gisymbol.com for technical problems or faults please contact smb.ginewstech@sydney.edu.au

Food for Thought

Perils of a Sugar-coated Scapegoat.
It has been some time since Dr. Robert Lustig emerged as the messianic nemesis of added sugar – or perhaps specifically fructose. It has been some time since his meme took hold, engaging high-profile adherents and apostles. And it has been some time since I first started expressing my opposition to this ‘sugar is poison’ platform. Consequently, it has been some time since I started receiving a bounty of hostile correspondence that would make my mother pass out, my wife wince, and my children cry.


Dr. David Katz

Confronting fervour is ever perilous, and I likely owe the filter of cyberspace for the fact that I have only suffered rhetorical violence. The fainting, wincing, and weeping notwithstanding, I am sticking to my figurative guns. Excess dietary sugar is harmful, and among the salient liabilities of the modern food supply. Sugar is not poison, however. And yes, I think the distinction matters enough to keep fighting for it. Here’s why.

1) The follies of history. I am convinced a fixation on sugar (or fructose) as poison will result in net harm to public health – and quite possibly a lot of it. I am equally convinced that process has already begun. This is not because we don’t consume a large excess of sugar; we do. It’s not because that large excess doesn't contribute mightily to our prevailing public health ills; it does. It’s not because there are no metabolic differences between fructose and sucrose; there are some, although I don't think they matter all that much in the real world. And it's not because I own stock in Sugar Smacks, or because the sugar cartel is holding my first-born hostage; I don’t, and they aren't. It’s because when the truth gets too hyped-up and too dumbed-down, it ceases to be the truth. It turns, instead, into propaganda – or at least fodder for the flames of propaganda. And the food industry will be only too happy to stoke those flames, as history has shown us.

What history? We decided oat bran was good for us – and saw a wild proliferation of products (including potato chips!) with trivial essence of oat bran in the ingredient list, but great big banner ads about it on the front of the package. This no doubt convinced a lot of shoppers they could have their donuts and Danish and eat their oat bran, too – but it was all marketing hype, exploiting a narrow fixation on a particular nutrient.

The history of our fixation on dietary fat is even more notorious. We didn't start eating more fruits and vegetables – we started eating SnackWell cookies and the like, and all got fatter and sicker.

So we switched to a fixation on cutting carbs, and along with throwing out the baby with the bathwater we fell victim to the same capacity of the food industry to leverage our tunnel vision. We got low-carb brownies rich in trans fat, and guess what? Since the advent of low-carb eating, obesity and diabetes rates have gone up.

There are many other examples of the dangerous liability of focusing on any one nutrient property at a time – but that should suffice. It is, alas, a well-trod path. In my opinion, there is a comparable and very grave danger in focusing preferentially on sugar, and that much more so by focusing preferentially on fructose, as our current dietary concern. Perhaps you have already seen some soda and/or ketchup ads noting ‘now made with pure sugar!’ as if sucrose is trading up from high-fructose corn syrup. It is not.

Sucrose is a 50/50 mixture of glucose and fructose; high-fructose corn syrup is, at most, a 45/55 mixture of the same monosaccharides. The notion that a 5 percent differential in fructose content has much of anything to do with current public health ills is more than a little far-fetched. The net effect of sugar excess is detrimental, no matter the sugar.

As for pure fructose – it doesn’t have a big role in the food supply. The only places one tends to find it is in fruits (which all concerned acknowledge are NOT the problem, but let’s recall that fruits did get tossed out of diets at the height of the low-carb, low-glycemic frenzy, and we could find ourselves there again if we aren't careful) – and in juices made from fruits. Juices are, arguably, a small part of the obesity problem. But I really don't know anyone inclined to blame epidemic obesity or diabetes on orange juice.

If we now focus public health concerns preferentially on fructose, we will surely see the dawn of the ‘FRUCTOSE-FREE!’ banner ad era, as such proclamations populate the packages of innumerable processed foods that are in many cases new versions of old junk. People getting the message that fructose is bad, and seeing those banners will be led right down the old garden path, through no fault of their own. They’ll think they are trading up, while making a lateral move.

And that may not be the whole story. Perhaps we’ll see a whole new crop of artificially sweetened starchy foods, boasting they are ‘now sugar-free!’ and belying the facility with which our bodies turn starch into sugar. And maybe, feeling virtuous about eschewing sugar, we'll eat twice as much – and get fatter and sicker.

As someone who has worked in nutrition, public health, medicine, and the media for decades – trust me, the food industry is salivating over the ‘fructose is poison’ message. If we get the public totally mesmerized by one nutrient concern at a time, we’ve created a gaping loophole for a whole battalion of new, high-profit, low-nutrient, just-what-you've-been-asking-for foods. They are already on the assembly line. My job is to defend against that, and I intend to keep doing it – no matter the weeping, wailing, and wincing. Excess sugar intake – and not just fructose – is one of the great liabilities of the modern diet. But it’s just one of them. Until we devise campaigns that leave the industry with no loopholes so their only option is to make and market foods that are actually better for us, and until we educate ourselves to demand the same, we will keep getting fatter and sicker, and the sellers will keep getting richer, presumably while laughing at us.

2) The dose makes the poison. Iron, oxygen, cholesterol, and sugar – in the form of glucose – all circulate in the blood. All are essential for life. In the absence of any one of them, we die. And the body manufactures some of them, sugar included. When sugar levels in our blood dip, our body manufactures glucose in one of two ways. It breaks down a fuel called glycogen, stored in muscle and liver, directly into glucose in a process called glycogenolysis. If glycogen stores are depleted and sugar levels dip, the body manufactures sugar out of any other fuel source – carbohydrate, protein, or fat [glycerol from triglycerides]– in a process called gluconeogenesis.

Iron, which is essential for carrying oxygen, is vital to life – but highly toxic in excess. It, too, might be called a poison – except that we die of oxygen deprivation at the cellular level without it. And for that matter, oxygen, in excess, is far more virulently toxic than sugar. The harms of excess fructose intake accumulate over years. Exposure to 100 percent oxygen is lethal within hours to days, and this is of practical concern in the hospital setting. But it does not induce us to call oxygen poison; if so inclined, try getting along without it.

Delivery vehicles for fructose include blueberries and cherries. We really can't have it both ways. If fructose is a poison, blueberries are poisonous. If blueberries are not poisonous, fructose is not a poison. Rather, the dose makes the poison – of fructose, or any sugar, or oxygen. Why fuss about the difference? For the reasons above. The well-travelled path that leads through the garden of dietary good and evil doesn't lead us any place we want to go.

For the many disciples of Dr. Lustig, I hasten to note that his focus on the harms of excess sugar intake did real good up to a point. He was directly involved in getting the American Heart Association (AHA) to count sugar among its concerns, something I for one felt was long overdue. I have long railed against the one-nutrient-at-a-time (ONAAT) fallacy, and the AHA and cardiologists have been perpetrators of it. They worried about saturated fat, while sugar calories were driving an epidemic of obesity that was driving an epidemic of diabetes that was in turn a major driver of trends in heart disease. It made no sense for the AHA to ignore sugar, and thanks in part to the efforts of Dr. Lustig, they no longer do.

But the fact that sugar should be ON everyone’s list of dietary concerns is a long way from saying that sugar – let alone fructose – should BE everyone’s entire list of dietary concerns. That leads us right back to the ONAAT fallacy, just through a different door.

For far too long, we have diverted public health from the benefits better eating would confer by bogging down in one-nutrient-at-a-time boondoggles. For far too long, we have created monstrous loopholes for a food industry only too happy to tell us what we say we want to hear, while inventing new variations on the theme of junk food. The costs of this have been high,
as the costs of looking for a single scapegoat rather than owning the full scope of our issues are always high. Sometimes, calamitously high.

Added sugar is among the more salient liabilities of the modern food supply, and this requires a remedy. But the ills of modern eating are not due to just one misaligned star, but to a whole constellation of factors we have aided, abetted, invented, and condoned. We must look to ourselves and muster the resolve to fix this comprehensively. Turning one of many dietary concerns into a scapegoat for all threatens to substitute the propaganda and procrastination we’ve seen with past follies for the genuine progress we urgently need. Let’s not go there ... again.

Dr. David L. Katz
www.turnthetidefoundation.org
For more by David Katz, M.D., click here.

What’s New?

Could fructose actually be good for us?

A new study in Diabetes Care by researchers at St. Michael's Hospital suggests that fructose may not be as bad for us as previously thought and that it may even provide some benefit. ‘Over the last decade, there have been connections made between fructose intake and rates of obesity,’ said Dr John Sievenpiper. ‘However, this research suggests that the problem is likely one of overconsumption, not fructose.’ The study reviewed 18 trials with 209 participants who had type 1 and 2 diabetes and found fructose significantly improved their blood glucose control. The improvement was equivalent to what can be achieved with an oral antidiabetic drug. Even more promising, Dr. Sievenpiper said, is that the researchers saw benefit even without adverse effects on body weight, blood pressure, uric acid (gout) or cholesterol. In the trials reviewed, diets with fructose had the same amount of calories as the ones without and the fructose was incorporated or sprinkled on to test foods such as cereals or coffee.


Adrian Cozma

‘Attention needs to go back where it belongs, which is on the concept of moderation,’ says Adrian Cozma, the lead author and a research assistant with Dr. Sievenpiper. ‘We’re seeing that there may be benefit if fructose wasn’t being consumed in such large amounts,’ Cozma said. ‘All negative attention on fructose-related harm draws further away from the issue of eating too many calories.’ Although the results are encouraging, longer and larger studies are still needed say the authors.

Damning fructose: what’s the evidence?


Dr Bettina Mittendorfer

‘Rather than damning fructose, efforts should be made to promote a healthy lifestyle that includes physical activity and fresh fruits and vegetables while avoiding intake of excess calories until solid evidence to support action against fructose is available,’ write Dr Luc Tappy and Dr Bettina Mittendorfer in their comprehensive review that evaluates the evidence that that fructose may be toxic and involved in obesity, diabetes and even cancer in Current Opinion in Clinical Nutrition & Metabolic Care. ‘Public health is almost certainly to benefit more from policies that are aimed at promoting what is known to be good than from policies that are prohibiting what is not (yet) known to be bad.’

Make the healthy choice the cheaper choice.



‘Taxes on “bad” foods are the dish du jour in nutrition policy,’ says Prof J.T. Winkler in an editorial in the BMJ commenting on a new study whose authors though recognising that most taxes are small, based on flawed evidence and have limited, even negative, effects propose more taxes – just a bit higher. ‘These are unlikely to be adopted and would be ineffective if they were,’ writes Winkler who makes the point that the goal should be to make the healthy choice the cheaper choice. And who can argue with this? He suggests a range of options to achieve this including agricultural policy, government catering and corporate margins.

Getting the facts to make the healthy choice …


Catherine Saxelby

These days, most of us head for Google for the seemingly endless amount of nutrition information just a click away. But as you trawl one site after another, it’s very easy to become confused by all the conflicting information along with a fair amount of total rubbish. Who can you trust? What’s the real deal? How can you sort fact from fiction? One of our regular contributors, Catherine Saxelby (author of the best-selling Nutrition for Life), has just published a comprehensive, 400-page A to Z guide on all the popular food and nutrition topics from acai and additives to zeaxanthin and zinc. So, if you want to have on hand a resource you can trust with all the up-to-date evidence, check out Catherine Saxelby’s Complete Food and Nutrition Companion HERE.

A plant-based diet – good for us and for the planet.


Rosemary Stanton

Nutritionist Dr Rosemary Stanton, who reviewed the evidence in a series of papers produced by the Medical Journal of Australia, has provided us with a summary of the findings. ‘Most people are aware of the vital roles that vegetables, fruits, wholegrains and nuts can play in a healthy diet. And yet, meat eaters get prickly and many doctors and dietitians tack warnings onto any discussion of vegetarian diets. Are fears of nutritional adequacy for plant-food based diets valid? After reviewing the papers, I wrote an accompanying editorial. I’m not a vegetarian but I acknowledge the wealth of evidence supporting the healthfulness of plant foods. In my current work, I’m also aware of their vital role in reducing our ecological footprint. And as a lover of good food, I don’t understand why we neglect so many great tasting plant foods.

So how does the evidence stand up? In a general sense, a well-planned plant-based diet turns out to be associated with a lower incidence of cardiovascular disease, bowel cancer, type 2 diabetes and obesity. For Australians, the bowel cancer aspect is particularly relevant because it’s a disease for which we score gold medal status. The World Cancer Research Fund’s band of unconflicted experts now rates the evidence as ‘convincing’ that red meat increases the risk of bowel cancer. Some plant foods, by contrast, are protective. The MJA papers show that we can also drop our warnings about deficiencies of protein, iron and zinc.

When writing textbooks in the 1970s, I spent hours poring over lists of amino acids in foods, adding up data to find combinations of plant foods that would equal the protein in meat. Modern biochemistry shows the body can take the amino acids from foods over a day or more and we can stop fussing over which seed goes with which cereal.

Warnings about iron and zinc deficiency are ubiquitous and certainly relevant in countries where people struggle to find enough to eat. In Australia and other western countries, vegetarians can relax because they are no more likely to suffer iron deficiency than meat eaters. It’s true that the haem iron in meat, poultry and seafood is absorbed better than the non-haem iron in plant foods. However, those who need more iron absorb more non-haem, iron with absorption increasing as high as almost 60% absorption during pregnancy. Old studies checked iron absorption after only a single meal taken by meat eaters. Zinc is found in abundance in grains, legumes and nuts, but many nutritionists have been concerned about competition for absorption caused by levels of compounds called phytates in the plant foods. Here the news is also good because of the way we prepare our foods, Adding yeast to breads, soaking legumes and roasting nuts decreases the effects of phytates.

The one relevant warning for plant-based diets is vitamin B12. This vitamin is found naturally only in animal products – although that does include dairy products and eggs. Those who avoid all animal foods will need a supplement or one of the soy foods with added B12.’

Get the Scoop with Emma Stirling

The scoop on pasta.


Emma Stirling APD

I’ll never forget the night my (misguided) girlfriend on a low carb diet, ordered a spaghetti marinara with a blithe, “hold the spaghetti”. I thought the Italian waiter would keel over. Pasta is often tainted as a “carb culprit” but did you know that it has a low GI? Check the database at www.glycemicindex.com (or The Shopper's Guide to GI Values) for the GI of your favourite brands. To enjoy pasta, manage your BGLs and have a healthy weight too, just follow my four step guide.

Step 1 - Go low GI Somewhat surprisingly, most pasta in any shape or form has a relatively low GI value (35–60). In the early days of GI research, it was assumed that pasta's low GI value was because the main ingredient was semolina (durum or hard wheat flour), and not finely ground wheat flour. Subsequent research has shown, however, that even pasta made entirely from plain wheat flour can have a low GI value. The reason for the slow digestion rate and subsequent low GI value is the physical entrapment of ungelatinised starch granules in a sponge-like network of protein (gluten) molecules in the pasta dough.
Top tip:

• Canned spaghetti in tomato sauce and packet mix macaroni cheese are not low GI — they have medium to high GI values.
  

Step 2 - Harness wholegrains You can also boost nutrient intakes by choosing a product from the increasing range of wholemeal and wholegrain pasta options including the spelt and kamut pasta options.
Top tip:

• Wholegrain pasta lends itself beautifully to a lunchtime salad with vegetables or legumes, nuts, seeds, canned fish and fresh herbs.

Step 3 - Keep portions moderate While the GI results are great news for pasta lovers, portion size is very important. It's crucial to keep your portion to around ½-1 cup cooked pasta to keep the GL (glycemic load) moderate. Remember, if you eat too large a portion of even a low GI food the glucose load becomes too large.
Top tip:

• Instead of piling your plate, why not pad out your pasta with a sauce laden with vegetables, lean meat or fish and seafood? this way you’ll turn one cup of cooked pasta into a satisfying volume of food and a complete meal.

Step 4 - Cook like an Italian Al dente ‘firm to the bite’) is the best way to eat pasta — it’s not meant to be soft. It should be slightly firm and offer some resistance when you are chewing it. Although most manufacturers specify a cooking time on the packet, don’t take their word for it. Start testing about 2–3 minutes before the indicated cooking time is up. Overcooked pasta is very soft and swollen in size and will have a higher GI.
Top tip:

• Adding egg to the dough lowers the GI further by increasing the protein content.

Buon appetito!



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.



Blueberry-lemon buttermilk pancakes
We have beautiful fresh blueberries now (a month earlier than past years), so I was inspired to put them in pancakes. Italians don’t eat pancakes. They eat something similar, called ‘frittelle’ which may be savory and served as a light main course, or sweet and served for dessert. I’ve noticed that it doesn’t take too long for my Italian house guests to adjust their morning palates to the scrumptious taste of this favorite American breakfast food. These are quite hearty pancakes and very filling. You can easily double the milk and make thinner, less cake-like pancakes. Because of the flour, the GI is probably moderate.
Makes 6 pancakes.

For the coulis
2 cups fresh blueberries, washed and pat-dried
1/3 cup sugar (use low GI LogiCane in Australia)
1 tablespoon lemon juice

Blend all ingredients in a food processor for approximately 2 minutes. Warm before use.

For the pancakes
½ cup unbleached all purpose flour
½ cup whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon nutmeg, freshly ground
1 egg
¼ cup egg substitute or 2 extra egg whites
½ cup fat-free buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla
½ cup part-skim ricotta cheese
1 tablespoon lemon zest
½ cup blueberries, washed and pat-dried



Mix the flours, baking powder, baking soda and nutmeg in a small bowl.
Whisk the egg, egg substitute, buttermilk, vanilla, ricotta cheese and lemon zest in a medium bowl. Gently stir the dry ingredients into the egg mixture until just mixed.
Prepare a large skillet (frying pan) with vegetable spray and place over medium heat.
Pour 1/3 cup of batter into the skillet and add a few blueberries on each pancake. Cook for 1½–2 minutes or until the edges appear brown then flip and cook the other side for another 1½ minutes.
Place 1 or 2 pancakes on each serving plate topped with a little of the warmed blueberry coulis.

Per pancake with a little coulis
Energy: 873kJ/204cals; Protein 8g; Fat 4g (includes 1.5g saturated fat and 44mg cholesterol); Available carbohydrate 34g; Fibre 3g


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 our Money Saving Meals recipes including Smoked salmon and dill pasta salad from The Low GI Diet Cookbook (Hachette Australia and Da Capo Press in the US) and tips on making pasta salads from Money Saving Meals (Hachette Australia).

Smoked salmon and dill pasta salad
This works just as well with canned salmon and tuna and is a delicious way to add some omega-3 to your life (so much tastier than a fish oil capsule!). If you like you can replace some or all of the onions in the salad with roughly chopped marinated artichoke hearts. To make a meal of it, pop a big salad of mixed green leaves on the table. Serves 4.

Salad
250g (9oz) penne rigate (or your favourite shape)
100g (3½oz) smoked salmon cut into strips
6–8 cherry tomatoes (about 100g) halved, or quartered if large
4 medium spring onions (scallions), thinly sliced, diagonally (including the green tops!)
1 small red (Spanish) onion cut into thin rings, slices separated

Dressing
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
3 spring onions (scallions), chopped
juice of ½ a good juicy lemon
½ cup chopped dill
freshly ground black pepper



To make the dressing, combine oil, onions, lemon juice and dill in a food processor and puree until smooth. Season with pepper.
Cook the pasta in plenty of boiling water until al dente following packet instructions for timing. Drain well then rinse under a stream of cold water and leave to dry. Return to the pan in which it was cooked.
Pour the dressing over the pasta. Add the salmon, tomatoes and spring onions, stir gently to combine and serve.

Per serve
1,800kJ/430cals; 21g fat (includes 3g saturated fat); 4g fibre; 14g protein; 45g carbohydrate

Making a success of pasta salads
A pasta salad can sometimes taste a bit bland despite all your creativity, no one eats it and you end up throwing it out. Here’s how you have a no-waste, sure-fire success on your hands.

• Be creative but keep it in the family rather than opting for fusion confusion. Combine the tried and true ingredients that go with pasta and suggest the Mediterranean. The same goes for Asian-style noodle salads. Stick with the culture and cuisine.
• Proportion matters too – you need plenty of other ingredients (vegetables, legumes, mushrooms, meats or seafood) to combine with the pasta for flavour, colour and texture. Allow around 50–60g (2oz) dried pasta per person
• Boost flavour by making the most of stronger tasting ingredients – feta or Parmesan cheese, herbs, finely sliced spring onions (scallions), chopped red onion, capers, sun-dried tomatoes or capsicum, olives, a little spicy salami, toasted nuts. A little goes a long way.

Busting Food Myths with Nicole Senior

Nicole Senior

Myth: Humans don’t need to drink milk
Dairy foods (milk, yoghurt, cheese) are rich in nutrients and have assumed such importance in our diet as to warrant their own food group. This is because they are nutrient-dense and provide a package of nutrients that are not found in the same amounts in other foods. This means that health experts and governments around the world have reviewed the evidence and concluded our health and wellbeing are enhanced by including dairy foods in our diets.


WPA Art Program poster for Cleveland division of Health 1940

There is a lot to recommend dairy foods. They are high in calcium needed for healthy bones and provide the majority of calcium in the diet for most people. Dairy foods also contain a bunch of other essential nutrients, including protein, phosphorous, potassium, magnesium, zinc, riboflavin and vitamin B12. They have a low GI and help lower blood pressure when consumed in a diet with plenty of vegetables and fruits. Regular milk drinkers have a lower risk of heart disease and stroke, and emerging research is discovering beneficial ‘bio-actives’ in dairy such as lactoferrin which enhances bone and immune health.

With so much to recommend them, why are there so many ‘dairy-free’ claims on food these days? Why do naturopaths seem to routinely suggest people avoid dairy foods? Why are there websites devoted to the ‘dangers of dairy’?

Even though whole dairy foods do contain mostly saturated fat, this is easy to avoid by choosing low-fat versions, and limiting hard cheese. Although some still believe milk is fattening, studies have demonstrated dairy foods may actually help with weight loss. The World Cancer Research Fund-American Institute of Cancer Research conclude that the evidence suggesting milk and dairy products increase prostate cancer risk is limited, and consuming milk probably reduces the risk of bowel cancer and may reduce the risk bladder cancer.

Milk allergy affects up to 5 per cent of children at most (and more likely 2 per cent), and 1 per cent of adults. Lactose intolerance is an issue for a lot more people worldwide; however, complete dairy avoidance is not usually necessary. The anti-dairy argument is hard to reconcile with the idea that humans have been eating dairy foods for thousands of years – the Masai tribes in Tanzania still live principally on milk, blood and meat.

What’s the alternative? If you cannot, or choose not, to eat dairy products there are alternatives such as soy milk and rice milk with added calcium. There are also soy yoghurts (check that these have added calcium), soy cheese as well as fun foods such as dairy-free frozen desserts. Life can go on when you’re dairy-free, but it is a little more challenging to ensure your nutritional needs are met, and the taste can take some getting used to. For those who have chosen the dairy-free path, I’m sorry to say there are a plethora of websites also attacking the safety and goodness of soy milk.

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


Woman milking a cow from a medieval bestiary

Editor: If you want to know more about milk and how, when and why humans began to drink it past weaning, turn to Hannah Velten’s Milk, A Global History from Reaktion Books’ deliciously digestible Edible series of small format, fully illustrated books on food and drink. It’s packed with fascinating snippets and perfect to dip into for a quick read or check out when you want something a little more tantalising than The Oxford Companion to Food or Wikipedia.

GI Symbol News with Dr Alan Barclay

Dr Alan Barclay

Why you don’t need special ‘diabetic foods’
Browse through your average diabetes magazine and you will find a special range of biscuits and cookies, cakes, ice cream, chocolate, lollies and candies that are sugar free or have no added sugar prominently advertised for people with diabetes. As our stalwart myth-buster Nicole Senior says: ‘If you ask anyone walking down the street what they think a diet for people with diabetes should include, chances are the first thing they’ll say is “no sugar”. It’s one of the most pervasive and persistent myths about diet and health ever, I reckon. Yet it is a myth.’ Where did it start?

Back in the 1920s, research by Dr Fred Allen on pancreatomised dogs (very unfortunate dogs whose pancreases were removed) led to the conclusion that glucose was more rapidly absorbed than starch. Not long after, this principle was expanded to include all sugars. Based on this research, low sugar diets were recommended to people with diabetes throughout the world for most of the remainder of the 20th century and doctors began recommending high fat diets for their diabetic patients, because they knew that fat didn’t break down to become blood glucose. Unfortunately, most of the fats that were commonly used were animal fats – high in saturated fat and cholesterol that only hastened the development of heart disease, the most frequent cause of death among people with diabetes. But that’s another story.

Back to diabetic foods, a growth industry. In order to make these foods taste sweet, manufacturers use a range of nutritive sweeteners (e.g., maltitol, mannitol, xylitol, etc...) and non-nutritive sweeteners (e.g., aspartame, sucralose, stevia, etc...). Indeed, with careful formulation they can make these products taste much the same as the regular sugar-sweetened alternative. And to be fair some of them do contain less kilojoules/calories than their counterpart, but usually at a cost – a dollar cost or because they have side effects like wind, bloating diarrhoea, or unpleasant after tastes and unusual textures.

Most diabetic foods, however sweetened, should be saved for special occasions just like other special occasion foods. Just because a food is low in sugar or contains no added sugar does not automatically make it a healthy choice. In fact, many of these foods are still high in kilojoules, saturated fat and highly refined starches, so they will still contribute to weight gain, elevated blood cholesterol and glucose levels just like their regular biscuits/cake/cookie counterparts if eaten regularly and/or in excess.

In terms of both your health and mental wellbeing, it makes much more sense to enjoy a small amount of traditionally sweetened food on an occasional basis and to really enjoy its full flavour and texture, than consuming large amounts of a poorer quality substitute on a regular basis. The most recent food and nutrition position statement from the American Diabetes Association says ‘… intake of sucrose and sucrose containing foods by people with diabetes does not need to be restricted because of concern about aggravating hyperglycemia [high blood glucose]. Sucrose can be substituted for other carbohydrate sources in the meal plan or, if added to the meal plan, adequately covered with insulin or another glucose lowering medication.’

What to do? Read the ingredient list and remember Michael Pollan’s key food rules: ‘Don’t eat anything your great grandmother wouldn't recognise as food (rule 2); Avoid food products containing ingredients no ordinary human would keep in the pantry (rule 3); Avoid food products containing ingredients a third-grader cannot pronounce (rule 7).’


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 with Prof Jennie Brand-Miller

Prof Jennie Brand-Miller answers your questions.



Can a low GI diet reduce the risk of birth defects?
Moderation is a good thing and that applies to glucose levels in the blood. Very high glucose levels are toxic to cells. That’s why people with diabetes, who are not properly controlled by diet or medications, develop complications such as blindness, kidney failure, nerve damage and cardiovascular disease. High glucose levels are also implicated as one of the causes of a birth defect called a neural tube defect. This is an opening in the spinal cord or brain that should have closed during development. Normally, in the second week of pregnancy, specialised cells begin to fuse and form the neural tube. By week four, the neural tube closes but if it does not close up completely, a neural tube defect develops. In some instances, the brain and/or spinal cord are exposed at birth through a defect in the skull or vertebrae (back bones), a condition known as spina bifida. Unfortunately, neural tube defects are one of the most common birth defects, occurring in approximately one in 1000 live births.

Foremost among the causes of a neural tube defect is a relative deficiency of the vitamin folate. Many women don’t consume the recommended amount of folate as part of a normal diet, and this is the reason why folic acid supplements are routinely recommended for pregnancy.

Diabetes, a condition characterised by high blood glucose levels if not properly managed, is also associated with a having a higher risk of baby with a neural tube defect. For this reason, a woman with type 1 diabetes who is planning to have a baby should do her best so make sure she has optimal glucose control before she conceives.

The concern is well justified because of the known toxic effects of excess glucose in the blood of the mother on the embryo. At this early stage, the embryo has no beta cells and is unable to secrete insulin or regulate their own glucose levels. Studies have confirmed that markedly elevated glucose concentrations contribute to the development of birth defects.



This is an extract from my new book (with Dr Kate Marsh and Prof Robert Moses), The Bump to Baby Low GI Eating Plan for Conception, Pregnancy and Beyond (Hachette Australia). In the book we share the latest science to help women enjoy a healthy pregnancy while safeguarding their baby’s future wellbeing. It’s available from bookshops and online in Australia and NZ and as an eBook from Amazon, iTunes etc. We now have a website too, where you can visit us, learn more about our book (and look inside), find pregnancy friendly recipes, keep up to date with the latest news about the importance of lifestyle for pregnancy and preconception, download information and weight charts, contact us and link to other useful information. Visit us HERE.

New values from GI Labs
Going to the Nth Degree
Specially created for endurance, performance and energy, Nth Degree Low GI Performance Drinks were launched in May 2012. Unlike many sports drinks with high GI values (70–100), this new range with no artificial colours, flavours or preservatives has a low GI thanks to the use of isomaltulose (Palatinose) a slow-release sweetener derived from sugar beets. The drinks are also fortified with B vitamins and a balance of electrolytes such as sodium (sea salt), potassium, magnesium and calcium. Available flavours include Orange, Raspberry, Lemon Citrus & Fruit Punch.

• The actual GI value of these drinks hasn’t been released for publication, but they are certified low GI by GI Labs in Toronto who carried out the clinical testing.
• The 20oz (600ml) bottle delivers 37g carbs. To keep the GL low (under 10), stick to a standard serving of 1 cup (8oz).

During exercise, sports drinks are an ideal way of providing fuel to the working muscle as well as helping with that vital rehydration. In addition, a key benefit of a low GI post-exercise beverage or meal if you are exercising primarily for health, fitness or for weight loss is that it may help your body maintain a higher rate of fat burning (oxidation). For more product information on this new range visit: www.nth4u.com.

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—June 2012

• Going with the grain – low GI of course says CSIRO;
  
• New GI values for creamy Carisma mashed potato and healthy ‘fries’;
  
• Beans, rice and glycemic response;
  
• Add almonds at breakfast for better BGLs;
  
• Johanna Burani's ‘Early bird’ tomato soup;
  
• Nicole Senior checks out the myth that raw foods are best;
  
• The scoop on raising a vegetable lover with Emma Stirling.
  

It pays to be picky with vegetables. In an exclusive, edited extract from Keys to Good Cooking (published by Hodder & Stoughton RRP AUD$49.99) Harold McGee explains why in Food for Thought. There's more on veggies this issue, too. Lots more. We look at a couple of recent studies from the University of Newcastle that have found that although the school garden was an effective strategy to increase kids’ willingness to taste vegetables and also improved their ratings for some vegetables, it did not noticeably up intake. Prof Philip Morgan concludes that: ‘changing vegetable consumption in children is complex.’ (Most parents will agree with this!) And in the GI News Kitchen there are recipes to help you (and your kids) up your veggie intake, deliciously.

Good eating, good health and good reading.

Editor: Philippa Sandall
Web management and design: Alan Barclay, PhD
Contact email (for questions or permission to reproduce stories from this newsletter): info@gisymbol.com for technical problems or faults please contact smbginewstech@sydney.edu.au

Food for Thought

It pays to be picky with vegetables says cooking guru Harold McGee.
‘Vegetables aren’t sweet and soft and easy to love the way fruits are. It takes a cook to make tubers, stalks, and leaves lovable. That’s because plants not only didn’t design them to be delicious as they did fruits, many tried to protect them by making them really unpleasant.



The flavours of most vegetables – and the fresh herbs that we use to add flavour to dishes – are actually there to serve chemical warnings and weapons and deter insects and other creatures from eating them. This is more obvious for such strong flavoured foods as garlic and onions and their relatives, bitter chicories, mustard greens and radishes and the other members of the cabbage family, and chillis. But even “green” flavours of lettuces and spinach and artichokes, and the earthy aromas of mushrooms and beets, come from chemicals that irritate and repel. We can enjoy all these foods because cooking alters and disarms or disguises their weaponry, or in the case of herbs, because we eat them in small quantities as accents rather than the main course.

Apart from seed-carrying fruits that we treat as vegetables, notably the tomato, most vegetables don’t ripen the way fruits do. They’re edible when they are a freshly sprouted seed and remain edible until they’ve become too fibrous to chew. Much of the produce we see in markets. Farmers’ markets included, has been harvested late in its edible life, for maximum mass and durability. Until I had a chance to grow some vegetables myself and chew on them every day or two through the season, I hadn’t noticed that big romaine (cos) lettuce leaves often taste rubbery, or realized how unlike their usual oversize versions midsize chard and collards are, tender and mild after just a few minutes of cooking.’

McGee goes on to say that when shopping for vegetables and herbs, remember that ‘Fresh vegetables and herbs are alive and breathing, and any that grow above the ground should look like it. (Root vegetables and onions look dormant and are.) The best quality fresh vegetables are the most recently harvested and most carefully handled.

Extra-large vegetables are usually the most mature and can be coarse in texture and flavor; tiny “baby” or “micro” vegetables are immature, mild in flavour and expensive. Choose vegetables and herbs with deep colours, a firm, full appearance, and freshly cut stems. Avoid vegetables that look dull, wrinkled, dented, bruised, slimy, mouldy; or that have brown, dry cut stems, or that have started to sprout. At farmers’ markets, avoid vegetables that have been sitting in the sun and are hot to the touch.
Precut vegetables are convenient but more vulnerable to spoilage than intact vegetables, and are often wilted. Refresh them in ice-cold water before using.
Frozen vegetables can equal or better the quality of fresh, especially vegetables that lose flavor and tenderness rapidly after harvest. These include green peas, and lima beans and sweet corn. Choose packages of frozen vegetables from the coldest corners of the market freezer, and just before you check out. Bag frozen foods together, and transport them home in a cooler. Repeated thawing and refreezing damages the quality of frozen foods.’

Harold McGee writes about the science of food and cooking: where our foods come from, what they are and what they're made of, and how cooking transforms them. On this site you can find out more about him, his books and his column in the New York Times.

News Briefs

Going with the grain – low GI of course.
A new report from Australia’s CSIRO has revealed that the simplification of complex nutritional messages has resulted in grain foods like bread and pasta becoming the ‘scapegoat’ for weight gain and bloating, despite ample research to the contrary. Prof Manny Noakes, Dr Jane Muir and Dr David Topping share the latest findings on the benefits of grain foods in your diet in their report What’s to Gain from Grains? Prof Noakes highlights the importance of quality carbs. ‘Cutting out highly refined or fat and salt laden carbs is a good idea, but culling high fibre and low GI grain foods at the same time is just throwing the baby out with the bath water,’ she said. ‘Studies show wholegrains may have a critically important impact on body composition, particularly in being able to reduce abdominal fat.’ You can find out more or view a webcast of the conference HERE.



Add almonds at breakfast for better BGLs.
A small (14 adults with impaired glucose tolerance) randomised, 5-arm crossover study in Journal of Nutrition and Metabolism reports that including almonds (whole almonds, almond butter, defatted almond flour, almond oil) into a 75g available carb-matched breakfast (orange juice and prepared Cream of Wheat) not only decreased blood glucose concentrations, it increased satiety significantly – and after lunch as well. In concluding, Prof Richard Mattes from Purdue and his researchers write: ‘Overall, daylong glucose and insulin concentrations were attenuated in the whole almonds and almond oil treatments, indicating an improved hormonal profile with their consumption. Importantly, the absolute magnitude of the blood glucose-lowering response equals that achieved with acute administration of acarbose in individuals with IGT [impaired glucose tolerance] suggesting the physiological relevance and applicability of the current findings.’ Commenting on the study, Mattes says: ‘When a low glycemic food is added to the diet, people spontaneously choose to eat less at other times throughout the day,’ adding that while the calories need to be taken into consideration as part of a person’s overall diet, almonds can be incorporated in moderate amounts without an effect on body weight.



So, what’s so special about almonds? These tasty tidbits pack a nutritional punch. They are rich in protein, calcium, vitamin E and arginine (an amino acid that helps to keep your blood flowing smoothly). They also contain good amounts of fibre, iron and zinc. Because they contain relatively little carbohydrate, they are a low glycemic food, but they don’t have a GI value as they don’t have enough carbohydrate to be GI tested. Although they are high in fat, it’s largely the heart healthy poly and monounsaturated types. Studies have shown that almond skins contain some 30 different antioxidant compounds. So buy the whole natural ones with the skin on and enjoy a handful for a snack or add them in your cooking. Here are 5 tips on how to get more almond benefits from dietitian and author of Eat to Beat Cholesterol, Nicole Senior:

• Add slivered or chopped almonds to muesli or fave low GI breakfast cereal
• Top fruit and yoghurt with slivered or chopped almonds.
• Bake some healthy mini muffins using almond meal instead of flour
  
• Sprinkle oat porridge with a drizzle of honey and flaked almonds
• Make a blueberry almond pancake recipe like this ONE
  

Anneka Manning’s Breakfast Couscous This recipe from the Low GI Family Cookbook is a good one for those who have to make an early start as you can prepare it the night before. Although couscous has a medium GI, Anneka has lowered the glycemic effect by adding the almonds, fruit, orange juice and yoghurt. Serves 2–3

½ cup freshly squeezed orange juice or unsweetened apple juice
1/3 cup water
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 cup couscous
2 tbsp dried apricots or peaches, chopped, or currants
120g (4oz) low fat plain yoghurt
3 tsp pure floral honey, or to taste,
2 tbsp slivered almonds, toasted



Combine the orange juice, water and cinnamon in a small saucepan and bring to a simmer. Place the couscous and apricots, peaches or currants in a small heatproof bowl and pour over the hot orange juice mixture. Cover the bowl with a plate or plastic wrap and set aside for 5 minutes or until the liquid is absorbed. Meanwhile combine the yoghurt and honey. Use a fork to stir the couscous and separate the grains. Spoon into brekkie bowls and serve topped with the honey yoghurt and almonds.

Does the answer lie in the soil?
‘This being the year of the farmer, it is timely to reflect and acknowledge these amazing folk who provide, often against unimaginable challenges, safe wonderful food for us year round’ writes Kate McGhie, president of the Australian Association of Food Professionals in a recent issue of their newsletter. ‘It is also an ideal time to capture the hearts and minds of youngsters far removed from understanding the source of their food. A recent survey in Australia of year 6 and 10 students found yawning gaps in young people's knowledge of basic food origins. Many thought yoghurt came from a plant and in a hypothetical lunch box of bread, cheese and a banana, only 45% in year 6 (12-year-olds) could identify all three as food from farms. It was against alarming trends like these, that the visionary Alice Waters from Chez Panisse in San Francisco kick-started the global phenomena of school kitchen gardens 16 years ago when she and a small group of teachers and volunteers turned over long-abandoned soil at an urban middle school in Berkeley and planted the Edible Schoolyard. The schoolyard has since grown into a universal idea of ‘Edible Education’ that integrates the school curriculum with growing, cooking, and sharing wholesome, delicious food. This ‘revolution’ has since inspired chefs and educators in many countries to follow suit.’


Kate McGhie

However, the jury is still out on how well these programs achieve their well-intentioned goals as empirical evidence is ‘relatively scant’ as Ramona Robinson-O’Brien notes in her 2009 review of the impact of garden-based youth nutrition programs in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association. A couple of recent controlled intervention studies from the University of Newcastle in Australia, have found that although the school garden was an effective strategy to increase kids’ willingness to taste vegetables and improved their ratings for some vegetables, it did not noticeably up intake. In the study published in Public Health Nutrition, Prof Philip Morgan concludes that: ‘changing vegetable consumption in children is complex (most parents will agree with this).

Their follow up 2011 paper (same study) in Health Education and Behaviour evaluates the impact of a school garden-enhanced nutrition curriculum on fruit and vegetable preferences and intake and investigates whether there were differences between boys and girls taste preferences. Prof Clare Collins et al conclude that: ‘Although a school garden did not increase fruit and vegetable intakes, limitations, including that the study was potentially underpowered to detect gender differences and particularly the variation in teacher experience and enthusiasm, may explain the inconsistent findings in favor of the additive effect of a school garden to a nutrition curriculum. Positive results for vegetable preferences may translate to improvements in intake over a longer time-frame. Further research is warranted to determine whether a school garden approach can be used to optimise fruit and vegetable intakes, particularly in boys. Interventions should aim to further engage parents and incorporate more activities focusing on increasing taste exposures.’

Beans, rice and glycemic response.
Beans and rice, the classic food combo in many parts of the world, can reduce postprandial glycemic elevations in people with type 2 diabetes, according to an American study published in the Nutrition journal. A study in Nutrition Journal on the glycemic response of bean and rice traditional meals that compared to rice alone in adults with type 2 diabetes concludes that that ‘promoting traditional foods is a non-pharmacological way to manage type 2 diabetes’. Donna Winham et al gave four different test meals in random order to 17 men and women with type 2 diabetes. Three meals contained ½ cup of white long grain rice mixed with either canned pinto beans, black beans or dark red kidney beans or a control meal of 180g (6oz) of steamed white rice. The bean and rice meals produced a reduced glucose response in comparison to rice alone. All study ‘treatments’ reduced the average 2 hr postprandial glucose below 140 mg/dL or 7.8 mmol/L. The pinto and black bean and rice combinations had the lowest glycemic response overall. ‘While promoting traditional foods is a non-pharmacological way to manage type 2 diabetes, knowing which beans are most effective can help improve dietary adherence with an appropriate cultural twist’ they conclude.



IFT Annual Meeting and Food Expo.
GI Labs will be exhibiting at this major event for the food industry. They'd be delighted if GI News readers would visit them at booth #2059 at the Las Vegas Convention Center. When? June 26-28, 2012.

Get the Scoop with Emma Stirling

The scoop on raising a vegetable lover.


Emma Stirling APD

Were you forced to eat your broccoli before getting dessert as a child? Are there veggies your dad didn’t eat and now as an adult you bypass them too? With international nutrition surveys showing that kids are not meeting daily vegetable targets, many even failing to eat one serve a day, it’s time to plant some fresh ideas.

Do as I do It is believed that food preferences are partially inherited (like bitter-taste sensitivity) but they are also malleable and one of the biggest drivers of vegetable consumption appears to be parental role modeling. It’s important to realise, if you serve it, they may not automatically eat it. But if you all sit down to eat together and watch Dad love the six veg stir-fry, your chances of raising a vegetable lover sky rocket. In today’s fast paced world, the responsibility for positive role modeling doesn’t stop at home but extends to childcare workers and teachers too and the influence of peers starts to play.

Repeat eat That face a baby or toddler pulls when trying spinach for the first time is priceless. But be careful you don’t fall in to the trap of thinking they don’t “like” a new vegetable. Neophobia is the term used to describe the dislike of trying new things, including unfamiliar foods. Research shows that it is very common in children aged two to five and in fact, a natural part of development. Studies show parents often give up after three to five tries of a new food, when a minimum of nine exposures may be needed before acceptance. So don’t give up and always plate it up without pressure. Perhaps just a lick today will do the trick tomorrow.

A recent preschool intervention study reported in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics aimed to increase consumption of three unfamiliar or disliked vegetables by repeated exposure over lunch during a six week period. The researchers were interested in the power of positive peer influence – did little Johnny eat more vegetables as he sat next to Jack who loves beans, broccoli, Brussels sprouts and the whole garden patch? Yes he did, by a small but significant amount.

Play dress up How you prep and dress your vegetables is also key. My daughter’s favourite vegetable (not boasting and still a little shocked) is globe artichoke. How did I achieve this? With great fanfare and a load of seasoned olive oil. Peeling the leaves of the prickly looking vegetable to dip into oil is a very different eating occasion. And one where I’ve let her from an early age slip in a little too much oil, shaved parmesan, toasted nuts or garlic, or herb butter, just to help the veggies go down. In another recent study, bitter sensitive children who were offered a dressing dip with their vegetables in a childcare setting ate 80% more broccoli compared with those served plain.

Health by stealth? Finally, there’s plenty of debate around the idea of sneaking hidden vegetables into kids meals and snacks like beetroot in chocolate muffins or vegetable puree in burger patties. The key is to make sure your kids grow up appreciating the different tastes and textures of whole foods and look at hidden secrets as a boost not the daily deal.

Michelle Obama has just announced the launch of Birdseye’s GenVeg initiative as part of the Partnership for a Healthier America. With the promise of innovative products, role modeling in popular shows like i-Carly and $2millionUSD per year devoted to marketing kids and veg, this dietitian is hopeful the garden will grow.

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.



‘Early bird’ tomato soup.
At some point in October, Italians harvest the last of their homegrown tomatoes. They will not taste the luscious flavor of just-picked, perfectly ripe tomatoes again until early summer. That’s when the first tomatoes of the season are sent to market from Naples. The flavors in this recipe improve as the season wears on, but even those “early bird” tomatoes don’t disappoint! Servings: 4 x 1½cup servings

1 dry pint organic grape tomatoes, washed
1 medium vidalia onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, sliced
1 tsp sea salt
¼ teaspoon black pepper
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
880g/28oz can of San Marzano tomatoes
3 cups vegetable, chicken or beef stock/broth (home-made if you can)
1 tsp fresh thyme
10 fresh leaves basil (or more to taste)

For the croutons
120g/4oz sourdough Italian bread, cubed
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 tbsp basil pesto



Preheat the oven to 200ºC/400ºF. Spread the tomatoes, onion and garlic in a shallow baking pan. Sprinkle with salt and pepper, then drizzle oil over the vegetables. Mix well. Roast for 40–45 minutes or until tomatoes and onion are caramelized, turning 2–3 times. In the meantime …
Add the canned tomatoes to a medium-sized stock pot. Using your hands, crush the tomatoes into small pieces. Add the broth and the herbs. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low–medium and slow cook, uncovered, for 20 minutes. When the tomatoes are ready, add them to the stock pot and continue to cook, partially covered, for another 20 minutes. Turn off the heat. Using an immersion blender, carefully puree the soup until it appears velvety smooth. Adjust seasonings as needed. Ladle soup into a dish and add the croutons. This soup may be served either hot or at room temperature.

To make the croutons:
Place the bread cubes in a mixing bowl. Combine the oil and pesto in a small dish. Drizzle over the bread and mix well. Transfer the bread cubes to a shallow baking pan. Bake for 5–6 minutes at 200ºC/400ºF, turning once.

Per serving
Energy: 1032kJ/246cals; Protein 8g; Fat 9g (includes 1g saturated fat and 0mg cholesterol); Available carbohydrate 34g; Fibre 5g

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 our Money Saving Meals recipes including Cottage Pie Pots from Money Saving Meals (Hachette Australia) and the Cherry Tomato and Zucchini Bake from Catherine Saxelby's and Jennene Plummer's Zest (Hardie Grant). Zest is available from bookshops and online; eBook editions available from Amazon and iTunes etc.

Cottage pie pots.
Allow about an hour for these cottage pies – but it’s hands-on for much less than half that time. Use a lower GI potato suitable for mashing if Carisma isn’t available in your area. This is also delicious with golden sweet potato mash or even a potato and parsnip mix. Makes 6 pots.

1 tbsp olive oil
1 medium onion, peeled and finely chopped
1 medium carrot, peeled and grated
1 celery stalk, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
500g (1lb) beef mince
1 tbsp plain flour
2 tbsp tomato paste
1–1½ cups hot beef stock
1 tbsp seeded mustard
2 tbsp chopped flat leaf parsley
4 Carisma low GI potatoes
½ cup grated tasty cheese for topping



Preheat the oven to 180ºC/350ºF.
Heat the oil in a large frying pan and sauté the onion, carrot, celery and garlic until the onion is soft.
Move the vegetables to the side of the pan and brown the beef over medium heat, breaking it up with a wooden spoon. Stir in the flour, then add the tomato paste and 1 cup of the stock and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and simmer, uncovered, for about 20 minutes, until most of the liquid has been absorbed (add a little extra stock if it looks too dry). Stir in the mustard and parsley, taste and season with salt (if using) and freshly ground black pepper. Meanwhile …
Boil the potatoes, then mash them your favourite way (using olive oil and a little of the cooking water or butter and milk) until smooth and creamy.
Spoon about 2/3 cup of the beef mixture into 1-cup ovenproof pots, top with a good scoop of mashed potato, fork over to even out and top with cheese. Place on a baking tray (to catch any gravy that bubbles over) and bake for about 20 minutes until the meat sauce is piping hot and the topping golden and just crusty.

Per serve
1200kJ/290cals; 13g fat (includes 5.5g saturated fat); 4g fibre; 24g protein; 15g carbohydrate

Kate McGhie’s perfect potato purée.
For tips on creamy restaurant-style mash at home (without quite so much butter and cream!), we turned to Kate McGhie, Australia’s most trusted source of kitchen wisdom who has provided invaluable cooking advice to millions of readers in her legendary weekly column in Melbourne’s Herald Sun. Kate says: ‘Although many chefs use a mouli or ricer to mash potatoes, home cooks can achieve a silky smooth potato mash by following this method. Peel and cook the potatoes in salted water until cooked through, then drain well. Put the potatoes back into the pan over moderate heat to dry and then mash with a potato masher until smooth (or mash roughly then whisk with an electric whisk). Blend in soft butter and boiled milk with a wooden spoon adding more milk until the mash reaches the consistency you like and season to taste. The milk must be hot or the potatoes will not be light and fluffy. Do not boil the puree. For a ‘soft’ garlic flavour, place unpeeled cloves in the water when boiling the potatoes. When tender, squeeze out the flesh and add to the potatoes before mashing. For a stronger flavour, oven-roast the cloves then gently squeeze the flesh into the puree and mix well.’

Cherry tomato and zucchini bake.
This tasty combination of flavours is perfect as an accompaniment and satisfying when you just want a light meal. If you don’t have cherry tomatoes, use 500g (about 1lb) tomatoes, roughly chopped. Serves 4 as an accompaniment.

2 x 250 g (8 oz) punnets cherry tomatoes, halved or quartered if large
2 zucchini (courgettes), thinly sliced
1 tablespoon oil
1 smallish leek, sliced
1 cup fresh grainy (low GI) bread breadcrumbs
1 cup grated reduced-fat tasty cheese



Preheat the oven to moderate 180ºC (350ºF). Spray a 5-cup ovenproof dish with oil. (Catherine uses a ceramic baking dish that 35 x 23cm (14 x 9”) that she can take to the table to serve.)
Heat the oil in a deep pan and sauté the leek for 2-3 minutes or until soft. Add in the tomatoes and zucchini. Toss well to coat with the oil. Spoon into the ovenproof dish.
Mix the breadcrumbs with the cheese and sprinkle over the vegetables. Bake for 40–45 minutes, until golden on top and bubbly.

Per serve
680kJ/160cals; 8g fat (includes 4.5g saturated fat); 4g fibre; 11g protein; 10g carbohydrate

Keep an eye out for Catherine's new book: Catherine Saxelby's Complete Food & Nutrition Companion. It goes on sale in Australia on June 18th. We'll tell you more about it in our July issue.

Busting Food Myths with Nicole Senior

Nicole Senior

Myth: Raw foods are best.
I love vegetables! All kinds, including the uncooked ones. Nothing beats the crunch of a raw carrot or the crispness of lettuce and cucumber in a salad. However, you can take a good idea to extremes. There is a whole diet tribe who only eat raw foods, believing it to be best for health, wellbeing, longevity and prevention of disease. It’s kind of like the advanced, super duper version of the vegan diet. Raw food diet followers exist on raw vegetables, fruits, nuts, seeds, sprouted beans and seaweed – none of which can be heated above 37.8°C (116°F), about body temperature – or else they believe enzymes will be destroyed and the food won’t be as well digested and absorbed. This is a load of rubbish. The enzymes are for the plants’ benefit, not ours.

The idea that plant foods should be eaten raw to extract their nutrition is just false. In fact, so called ‘anti-nutrient’ factors in raw plant foods make them harder to digest. Phytates can reduce absorption of minerals such as iron and zinc, and nuts contain enzyme inhibitors in the skin. Of course, the level of some vitamins (such as vitamin C) and antioxidants (sulforaphane) are reduced by the cooking process; however, in a mixed diet this is not an issue (still, don’t boil the life out of your vegetables but lightly steam, microwave, stir-fry or roast them instead).

Processing vegetables by juicing, mashing, pureeing or cooking actually releases more vitamins and antioxidants from vegetables than eating them raw and whole. For example, more lycopene
is absorbed from a tomato pasta sauce than raw tomatoes, and the same goes for beta-carotene from carrots. The physical effects, as well as higher temperature, soften and break the tough cell walls in plant foods so their inner goodies can be released. In fact, an Italian study comparing steaming, boiling and frying found all methods increased the availability of antioxidants in zucchini (courgettes), carrots and broccoli. The availability of cancer-fighting indoles in cruciferous vegetables such as cabbage is also higher after cooking.

Because it is very bulky, high in fibre and nutrient-sparse, a raw food diet carries a very high risk for people with higher nutritional needs, such as children and pregnant women – they need a lot of nutrients the body can easily get at. If you have sensitive bowels, such as Irritable Bowel Syndrome, this diet will only lead to tears (from pain in your gut) because of its very high fibre content. And the taste? I’ll leave that for you to decide, but I contend this is an extreme diet you do out of conviction rather than enjoyment.

Long story short Besides being a heck of a lot of trouble, you do not need to follow a raw food diet to be healthy. Enjoy a balanced diet from all the food groups and a variety of raw and
cooked foods.
Hungry for more? Read Richard Wrangham’s Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human.

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

GI Symbol News with Dr Alan Barclay

Dr Alan Barclay

What, no potato?
While it is the popular whipping boy of many a fad diet, the humble spud has been enjoyed by humans for many millennia. In fact, in many nations today, it is the most popular vegetable in the pantry. In Australia, for example, potatoes account for one third of all vegetables eaten.

A boiled, steamed or microwaved potato eaten with its skin on is a great source of carbohydrate, and is high in fibre, vitamin C and potassium. However, approximately 60% of potatoes are consumed as chips (French fries) and crisps in Australia. The removal of the skin, cooking in fat and addition of salt all decrease the nutritional profile of an otherwise healthy vegetable.

A typical serve of potato containing approximately 15g of available carbohydrate is equivalent to 2 small new potatoes, 1 medium sized (120g/4oz) regular potato or ½ cup mashed potato (120g/4oz).

The average GI of all of the potatoes that have been tested around the world is 77, with a range from 48 to 102. While the way you cook and eat your potatoes does have an influence on their GI, evidence is mounting that it is the potato variety itself that makes the real difference. For example, we recently cooked the world’s first low GI potato Carisma using a variety of techniques (frying with minimal fat and mashing) and found that it made relatively little difference to its average GI value (53) -- see GI Update below for details (and see GI News Kitchen for great tips on mashing potatoes from Kate McGhie.)



Due to their relatively high carbohydrate content and typically high GI, potatoes are in the top 5 contributors to the average daily dietary glycemic load in Australia and many other parts of the world. Therefore, finding lower GI alternatives should be a high priority, along with limiting potato chips (French fries) and crisps to special occasions (they are party foods, not daily fare).

The GI Foundation, University of Sydney and Agrico Australia has been funding a PhD research program for the past three years with the aim of trying to find out what factors affect the GI of commonly eaten potato varieties. We are hoping that this research program will help us to identify many low GI potato varieties that we can eventually bring to your local supermarket no matter where you live in the world.

New baby Carisma potatoes are now available in a 750 g bag in Coles supermarkets throughout Australia. And Australian consumers can be completely confident that they are buying a HOME GROWN product.

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.



I am 30 weeks pregnant. I’m not eating for two. In fact I think I’m pretty much eating what I usually eat. So, how come I’ve gained all this weight?
It’s a very good question! Careful studies in well-nourished women reveal either no change in their food intake during their pregnancy, or only a minor increase that’s so small it simply can’t explain all extra energy (calories) deposited.

Scientists have long been puzzled as to why this is so. Some suspect that physical activity declines and others suspect that absorption of nutrients increases, but at the present time we really don’t know why most women do not appear to eat more during pregnancy yet gain weight.

In women from affluent countries like Australia, the average pregnancy weight gain is about 13 kg. Most is in the second and third trimesters and that’s a cracking pace in anyone’s books – half a kilogram every week for 26 weeks!

For a woman who gains the typical 12 to 13 kg (26 to 28 pounds), the baby weighs on average 3–4kg (6–9 pounds) at birth and the placenta 600g (1.3 pounds). The blood volume also increases, as does the weight of the uterus and breast tissue. Not surprisingly, the biggest variation is in the amount of fat a woman stores. It ranges from no increase at all in some developing countries to 5kg (11 pounds) or more in affluent countries. Here’s what it typically looks like.



But where does the weight come from? For average weight gain of 13 kg, a woman would need to eat around 75,000 calories of additional food energy over about 9 months. This is equivalent to roughly 275 calories (1125kJ) a day. But we know that mum’s appetite doesn’t change much and she’s not eating for two at all. In fact she’s pretty much eating what she usually eats (around 2000 calories/8400kJ a day on average).

A 2011 study in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition which employed a smart little gadget called an IDEEA (Intelligent Device for Energy Expenditure and Physical Activity), helps shed some light on the subject. The study in 32 pregnant and 21 non-pregnant Swedish women, found that the decline in energy expenditure perfectly matched the increase in energy deposition required during pregnancy. But it was a very subtle difference. The pregnant women simply slowed down; they lay down a little longer, they stood less; they walked or jogged or trained at a slower pace – but it amounted to about 225 calories (945kJ) less per day.

To me, these findings have important implications for the slow incremental weight creep that generally accompanies ageing, in both humans and animals. As we gain weight, we don’t necessarily eat more….we just move less. That’s not so surprising because just like pregnancy, a heavier body can be a little awkward and take more effort to lift. In fact, the mathematicians have worked out that our current obesity epidemic can be explained by just 7 excess calories a day over and above our energy needs. In other words that extra bite of apple was your undoing!. Seriously, no one, even a dietitian, can fine-tune calorie intake and calorie output to that fine degree.

The lesson from pregnancy is that obesity is not a disease of gluttony and sloth as so often portrayed, but one where just the smallest effort (the decision to use the stairs instead of the lift, or eat one mouthful less at dinner), has a ripple effect on your whole life.

Prof Jennie Brand-Miller and colleagues Dr Kate Marsh and Prof Robert Moses have just published a book called The Bump to Baby Diet – a low GI eating plan for conception, pregnancy and beyond to share the latest science and help women enjoy a healthy pregnancy while safeguarding their baby’s future wellbeing. It’s available from bookshops and online in Australia and NZ and as an eBook from Amazon, iTunes etc. You can look inside HERE.

New GI values from SUGiRS.
Cooking with Carisma.
Back in 2006 we sat down with chef and potato expert Graham Liney, Australian potato growers and the Dutch potato breeding company Agrico, to bring Carisma, Australia’s first low GI potato to your table. It’s a versatile, general purpose potato that’s full of flavour with a creamy taste and ‘melt in the mouth’ texture. When boiled (skin on) and served slightly al dente it has a GI of 55. We are now delighted to let readers know that Carisma fries and Carisma mash also have low GI values.

• Carisma fries (cooked in olive oil using a Tefal Actifry): GI 53
• Carisma mash (boiled then mashed with olive oil): GI48

A standard 150g (6oz) serving of fries or mash provides 15g carbohydrate and has a glycemic load of 8.


GI testing by an accredited laboratory
North America
GI Labs
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
SUGiRS
Fiona Atkinson
Research Manager, Sydney University Glycemic Index Research Service
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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