Advanced Mediterranean Diet Blog

Any diet that contains carbohydrates can be ranked as being either low-, medium-, or high-glycemic, referring to the glycemic index or load.  This ranking system would apply to both weight-loss diets and habitual ways of eating.

Specific foods with significant amounts of carbohydrate have been tested for their ability to rapidly raise blood sugar levels as compared to eating pure glucose, a type of sugar.  The number generated by the test is the glycemic index (GI) and ranges between 0 and 100.  For details, see my blog post of April 11, 2009.

Here are some GI values from Wikipedia’s entry on glycemic index:

Low GI (55 or less)

• most fruit and vegetables (except potatoes, watermelon), grainy breads [made of or resembling grain?], pasta, legumes/pulses, milk, products extremely low in carbohydrates (fish, eggs, meat, nuts, oils), brown rice

Medium GI (56 - 69)

• whole wheat products, basmati rice, orange, sweet potato, table sugar, most white rices (eg, jasmine),

High GI (70 and above)

• corn flakes, baked potato, watermelon, croissant, white bread, extruded cereals (eg, Rice Krispies), straight glucose (100)

You figured it out, didn’t you, Spanky?

Yes, low-GI diets encourage the low-GI foods.  High-GI diets favor the high-GI foods.  Etc.

The Human Nutrition Unit at the University of Sydney (Australia) maintains a free online database of glycemic index values of various foods.  For example, the GI of Doritos is 42 (corn chips, plain, salted, 1998).

A near-future post will review some of the chronic diseases that might be associated with or caused by high-GI eating by the general public.

Steve Parker, M.D.

Additional Resources

GI News: The Official Glycemic Index Newsletter

“The Official Website of the Glycemic Index and GI Database”

This entry was posted on Monday, April 13th, 2009 at 8:42 am and is filed under Glycemic Index. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.