Glycemic Index and Sweeteners
Glycemic Index and Sweeteners
The Glycemic Index is a ranking from 0-110 that rates carbohydrates on how quickly they are consumed in our body. The faster the carbohydrate is used, the more of a spike it produced in our blood sugar – spikes are bad for weight loss and for our body overall.
The baseline is glucose, which measures up at 100 on the GI scale. Typically you want to use the sweeteners that are lowest in GI, and may find it more beneficial (taste wise) to use a mixture of two or more low GI sweeteners.
The lower the GI number, the better a food is – an item with a number lower than 55 is considered “Low GI” and will not produce significant insulin spikes. Sugar GI Index is 65.
Why avoid insulin spikes ? When our blood sugar goes too high, our body produces insulin to bring it back down. Insulin lowers blood sugar by converting excess sugar into stored fat. To make matters worse, rapid blood sugar spike can cause our body to produce too much insulin meaning we end up with low blood sugar, hunger and fatigue !
Consume foods with lower Glycemic Index to control your insulin spikes and avoid weight gain.