Question from LaReeJB
Food I found your Sweet Savvy site by looking for foods I can make to eat after just finding out I am diabetic, type 2. I am a 27 year old mother of lots of little girls. I read your recipe for banana waffles and the mother said that she has to watch the glycemic index foods for her son with ADHD. Because I am very new to the diabetes world, it struck me because almost all the food lists of glycemic indexes put bananas at 70 points. Do the other ingredients sort of counter balance that or what? I notice many foods stating they are good for diabetics, when their ingredient list tops these charts too. I am learning to watch the ingredients better. Sorry, I’m a newb and its great finding somewhere list things as straight forward as you have.
Debra’s Answer
I personally don’t rely on the glycemic index much, as it is a general indicator and bodies are very individual. A high glycermic index will raise your blood sugar a lot, a low glycemic index will raise blood sugar very little or not at all. The best thing I can recommend is to test foods for yourself and see what makes YOUR blood sugar go up.
In general, refined foods have the highest glycemic index, like refined sugars and grains. Also white potatoes, and “starchy” vegetables like winter squash and carrots. Cooking fruits and vegetables increases their glycemic index and processing grains (like “popping” them to make rice cakes) really increases the glycemic index.
The best diet for a Type 2 diabetic is meat, poultry, fish, fats and oils, nuts, beans, vegetables, and some fruits. Green leafy vegetables are amazingly helpful. Fruits should be kept to very small servings.
You can combine high glycemic foods with low glycemic foods and they will “balance.” So a good dessert would be cheesecake or creme brulee or ice cream because the fat lowers the glycemic index of the sweetener.
I’ve found agave to be the best sweetener for diabetics as it has a low glycemic index and a lot of sweetness.
But really the best thing is to reduce the sweeteners, grains, potatoes, and fruits to as little as you can tolerate.
