Jimmy's Oasis

The carbohydrates conspiracy

Jimmy Chen -

Last night, I discovered how difficult it was to find a restaurant meal without white carbohydrates.

These past few weeks, I've had a reasonably stable routine: beans and eggs (and sometimes salsa and/or yogurt) for breakfast; something from REVO/Saucepan for lunch; and an energy bowl from Lokal for dinner.

Yesterday, I had Lokal for lunch instead and forgot to order food from Saucepan for dinner, so I decided to look for something to eat in one of the many restaurants in Xujiahui. I had just two requirements:

  1. I wanted to avoid white carbohydrates.
  2. I didn't want a salad.

After walking around for about 30 minutes, I gave up. There were numerous restaurants I used to frequent across a range of cuisines - Japanese, Thai, Vietnamese, Spanish, Taiwanese, Cantonese, Sichuanese, pizza, burgers - but I couldn't think of any menu items from these places that had no white carbohydrates. I almost succumbed to having Vietnamese pho, but stayed the course and went home without having dinner.

Reflecting on my experience, it's as if the entire restaurant industry was conspiring to make everybody fat and unhealthy. The odds are simply stacked against those of us just want to have whole foods with a focus on legumes and vegetables.

Today, I did some research and found that some white carbohydrates actually have a relatively low glycemic index (GI), which means that they don't spike our blood sugar levels and is conducive to losing weight. What follows is a list of the "best" alternatives for each type of carbs I've found:

  • Grains: whole grain barley has a substantially lower GI (28) than other grains and contains a lot of fiber.
  • Noodles: pure buckwheat soba (GI 46) is gluten-free and a great plant-based protein source.
  • Bread: rye is (GI 35) is a great replacement for wheat breads, as it has a much lower glycemic index and is high in fiber and certain micronutrients.

Here are some examples from other food groups that are good relative choices (with GI in parentheses):

  • Vegetables: asparagus (14); avocado (10); bell peppers (10); broccoli (10); cauliflower (15); mushrooms (10)
  • Beans/legumes: chick peas (33); lentils (25); peanuts (14); soya beans (18)
  • Dairy: soya milk (30); low-fat natural yogurt (14)
  • Fruits: cherries (22); strawberries (40)

Some (surprisingly) high GI examples:

  • Vegetables: parsnip (98); potato (84)
  • Beans/legumes: broad beans (79)
  • Dairy: ice cream (61)
  • Fruits: pineapple (66); watermelon (72)

The above findings don't change much, but do present more options. If we must have white carbohydrates, choose whole wheat where possible and stick to barley, soba noodles, and rye bread. Beans are still great, and as for fruits, prefer berries.

An update on my health: I'm happy to report that I've lost about 3kg over the past month, and I feel much better every day. The two elements I want to work on are my sleeping habits (due to my recent work schedule, I've been sleeping under seven hours per day) and my running (I've been stopping short of 3km on most runs these days).

I'm thinking about how to improve on the above, but without any tangible results so far. At least I've been able to maintain my diet with reasonable accuracy!