diabetic food
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Bitter Melon
Bitter Melon or Bitter Gourd has been widely discussed to be good for diabetics to lower their blood sugar.
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Hi Vijayan.
Many diabetics (like me) use many vegetables in their low-carb diet. There are the common stand-bys of "green leafy vegetables" -- lettuce, cabbage, spinach, etc., as well as broccoli, cauliflower, most of the gourds and squash (like spaghetti squash, yum!), cucumbers (and dill pickles), celery, a small amount of tomato, and onion (though dried onion adds flavor without adding too much carb).
As you can see, salads with low-carb or no-carb dressing can make up quite a bit of the meal plan! Hope this helps.
Jaye Marno
** Set your goals, how to achieve them, and measure your progress along the way. **
the vegtables that are lower carb are good. corn or carrots, that kind of thing are higher carb.
I get a lot of mileage out of things like sauerkraut & spaghetti squash. Summer squashes like zucchini are good. Also use a lot of spinach - both fresh & frozen. And a coupla high fiber options are artichoke hearts & hearts of palm, which come canned and have a long shelf life. Same with the pickled baby ears of corn - they're a nice addition to a salad.
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The patients with diabetics should eat green leafy vegetables like Ghiya, Tinda, Tori, Kheera, Cabbage, Lettuce, Muli Palta, Palak, Capsicum etc. He should at tomatoes, bitterguard (Karela), amla powder, methidan powder, Jammu beej powder, Goondkatira (in milk), Garlic. Diabetic patient should have tea without sugar, lemon water (without straining), Clear vegetables and Dal soup, whole pulses, plain aerated water, clear tamarind (imli), water, Jaljeera, coconut water, diluted khatti lassi (buttermilk),
Hi,
I'm new to this site and as I said in my introduction, I have been a diabetic for about 4 years. I am also intrigued by things I read about diabetic foods. From the onset of my diabetes I have taken the position that regular foods are good enough. Sure, you have to change the way you eat regular food and you have to exercise some common sense about it. As an example, if you plan to eat pasta at one of your meals, don't eat bread that day. I find that "planning" my meals really helps. Perhaps it has just been my good fortune that controlling my blood sugar in this way has done the trick for me.
Is there anyone who has a similar experience where eventually they had to make more severe changes in diet?
I firmly agree with you, Zeb, USE SOME COMMON SENSE! lol!
Regular food is fine - it's even BETTER in most cases - but just not ALL regular food and not in unlimited portions. Plus there's a difference for the patient who takes insulin and is better able to control a spike after it happens, than the one who's on oral meds, or perhaps just diet/exercise, and if that one experiences a steep spike, just has to wait it out or else exercise vigorously if possible, to bring levels back down.
I learned at the outset to avoid anything processed, and especially those ones that advertise as sugar-free, no-sugar-added, or diabetes-friendly. Another thing to watch out for is the low-FAT products. These are likely to be higher carb since the manufacturers remove the fat & replace it with other modified (and usually carby) substances.
My instructions at diagnosis were to keep carbs under 100g per day. Doc warned me that if I ate a big baked potato for supper, I'd see it on my meter in the morning. So I scratched on the baked potatoes, but continued to enjoy my homemade whole wheat & sourdough breads, pasta, brown rice. etc. But soon found that I could not attain a reading under 140 by any combination of foods/menus. So then I had to learn that even the regular foods like bread, rice, pasta, potatoes, etc., would need to be limited if not completely avoided if I were to attain my target glucose levels.
Once I trimmed my carb intake down between 50 & 65 grams per day, I began to get the meter readings I want to see - clustered round 100 and no higher than 130. And I've now found certain brands of pasta, breads, etc., that I can enjoy without exploding my meter!
I dearly LOVE Dreamfields pasta & can eat it with abandon. Certain brands of low-carb tortillas work much better with my glucose than the usual cheap flour ones. LaTiara makes a wonderfully thin crispy corn tortilla shell that's only 4g of carbs per shell. Nature's Own bakery has taken the step of removing HFCS from all their bread products! Yay!!! I can have a slice of buttered toast again!
So yes, regular foods really are the ticket - just choose wisely.
Regular food is fine - it's even BETTER in most cases - but just not ALL regular food and not in unlimited portions. Plus there's a difference for the patient who takes insulin and is better able to control a spike after it happens, than the one who's on oral meds, or perhaps just diet/exercise, and if that one experiences a steep spike, just has to wait it out or else exercise vigorously if possible, to bring levels back down.
I learned at the outset to avoid anything processed, and especially those ones that advertise as sugar-free, no-sugar-added, or diabetes-friendly. Another thing to watch out for is the low-FAT products. These are likely to be higher carb since the manufacturers remove the fat & replace it with other modified (and usually carby) substances.
My instructions at diagnosis were to keep carbs under 100g per day. Doc warned me that if I ate a big baked potato for supper, I'd see it on my meter in the morning. So I scratched on the baked potatoes, but continued to enjoy my homemade whole wheat & sourdough breads, pasta, brown rice. etc. But soon found that I could not attain a reading under 140 by any combination of foods/menus. So then I had to learn that even the regular foods like bread, rice, pasta, potatoes, etc., would need to be limited if not completely avoided if I were to attain my target glucose levels.
Once I trimmed my carb intake down between 50 & 65 grams per day, I began to get the meter readings I want to see - clustered round 100 and no higher than 130. And I've now found certain brands of pasta, breads, etc., that I can enjoy without exploding my meter!
I dearly LOVE Dreamfields pasta & can eat it with abandon. Certain brands of low-carb tortillas work much better with my glucose than the usual cheap flour ones. LaTiara makes a wonderfully thin crispy corn tortilla shell that's only 4g of carbs per shell. Nature's Own bakery has taken the step of removing HFCS from all their bread products! Yay!!! I can have a slice of buttered toast again!
So yes, regular foods really are the ticket - just choose wisely.
Thanks, Shanny, for that reply. It was really interesting to me.
I must be really fortunate to this point, but perhaps I should be more cautious at the same time. Here's why. Before becoming a diabetic I was a great lover of "sweets", especially cakes, WITH FROSTING! Of course that all came to an end, but I did look around for "sugar free" type sweets. I found them and I do eat them, so far without problems. Perhaps I should take your advice and exercise a little more caution with regard to these "goodies". Thanks again.
That's the trick right there . . . working out the things that work for YOU. It's wonderful that you're able to find sweets that don't upset the balance! Go for it!
As you could tell from my other post, my downfall is bread, and I've been that way since I was a child. My mom baked her own & I remember coming home from school & having buttered toast nearly every day. So I grew up baking my own bread too, and if I let myself dwell on it, I really REALLY miss it! I intend to work on my bread recipes until they don't spike me - I just haven't had a chance to do it yet.
We can all kick in & describe our successes and our failures, but at the end of the day, each one of us has to eat the food, test our blood and determine if our reading is acceptable or at least worth the joy we got from eating something that really spiked us. heheh
As you could tell from my other post, my downfall is bread, and I've been that way since I was a child. My mom baked her own & I remember coming home from school & having buttered toast nearly every day. So I grew up baking my own bread too, and if I let myself dwell on it, I really REALLY miss it! I intend to work on my bread recipes until they don't spike me - I just haven't had a chance to do it yet.
We can all kick in & describe our successes and our failures, but at the end of the day, each one of us has to eat the food, test our blood and determine if our reading is acceptable or at least worth the joy we got from eating something that really spiked us. heheh
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Since being diagnosed last year, I've tried more different vegetables in six months than I did in the previous 46 years!
Pumpkins are one of the super foods everyone should try. My suprmarket has a carribean section and they sell it is Jamacan pumpkin or Jamaican squash (they usually sell it in small sections rAther than awhole pumpkin). It has the taste and texture of butternut squash. I dice it up and add it to homemade soups and stews.
I eat a lot of cabbage in cole slaws...oil and vinegar dressings, no may.
Sweet potatoes have taken the place of regular potatoes. Again I cube them and add them to stews or buy them frozen as french fries.
Swiss chard, kale and spinach are super healthy and super easy to make. Just throw a little olive oil in a pan. Sautee some garlic then toss in the leaves (Tear the swiss chard into smaller pieces). Within about a minute or two it's ready to eat.
Celeriac (celery root). Treat it like a potato. Cube it, boil it and mash it with a little roasted garlic. Sometime I throw boiled new potato to give it a more potatoy taste
Pumpkins are one of the super foods everyone should try. My suprmarket has a carribean section and they sell it is Jamacan pumpkin or Jamaican squash (they usually sell it in small sections rAther than awhole pumpkin). It has the taste and texture of butternut squash. I dice it up and add it to homemade soups and stews.
I eat a lot of cabbage in cole slaws...oil and vinegar dressings, no may.
Sweet potatoes have taken the place of regular potatoes. Again I cube them and add them to stews or buy them frozen as french fries.
Swiss chard, kale and spinach are super healthy and super easy to make. Just throw a little olive oil in a pan. Sautee some garlic then toss in the leaves (Tear the swiss chard into smaller pieces). Within about a minute or two it's ready to eat.
Celeriac (celery root). Treat it like a potato. Cube it, boil it and mash it with a little roasted garlic. Sometime I throw boiled new potato to give it a more potatoy taste
Boy Finnegan . . . you have this covered! I love the winter squashes too - there's a huge butternut & a huge spaghetti squash on my counter right now, just waiting for the right moment! I usually cook them whole - just don't have the strength in my hands anymore to cut up a raw one.
The sweet potatoes have taken the place of regular potatoes over here too; they get baked just the same, and dressed the same way - butter/salt/pepper - mebbe a few bacon bits.
There's sure nothing dull about our diabetic meals, is there?!
Your mention of kale reminds me I have a soup recipe around here somewhere . . . going to look it up & if it's diabetes-friendly, I'll post it!
The sweet potatoes have taken the place of regular potatoes over here too; they get baked just the same, and dressed the same way - butter/salt/pepper - mebbe a few bacon bits.
There's sure nothing dull about our diabetic meals, is there?!
Your mention of kale reminds me I have a soup recipe around here somewhere . . . going to look it up & if it's diabetes-friendly, I'll post it!
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