White bread is a refined carbohydrate, which should be consumed in moderation.

Anyone who knows me knows I’m not one who shuns carbohydrates.  I enjoy my carbs, I’m just careful about what kinds of carbohydrates I consume.

Carbohydrates supply the body with the nutrients it needs to perform daily tasks that require effort (even the slightest effort).  They replenish the body’s glycogen stores and keep the body energized.

Some people in the health profession, though, advise avoiding carbohydrates entirely.  They say that all they do is add weight to the body, and that the easiest way to lose weight is to cut back on carbs.

There’s no question that cutting back on carbohydrates will help you lose weight.  But cutting back entirely on carbohydrates is not the answer.  In fact, I’ve found that it’s a recipe for gaining more weight down the road, as the body is starved of carbs for so long that it will eat them voraciously sooner or later.

The best way to lose weight – and keep it off – while remaining energized is to consume the right kinds of carbohydrates.  By not consuming carbohydrates, you’re making other nutrients do carbohydrates job.

For instance, protein is supposed to replenish and repair muscles that get broken down, not serve as the body’s source for energy.  But by not consuming carbs, you’re stretching the role of protein too thin, making it far less effective in replenishing broken down muscle.

At the same time, though, we shouldn’t be consuming carbohydrates that ramp up our blood sugar levels  too quickly.  Simple carbohydrates are an inefficient source of energy – where our energy levels peak, but go down quickly soon thereafter.

An overconsumption of simple carbohydrates also increase our risk for long term heart health problems, like heart disease, the leading cause of death in the country.

And we now know why simple carbohydrates tend to increase our risk for heart problems, as a recent study published in the Journal of American College of Cardiology explains.

The risk is not necessarily that carbohydrates make us fatter – though they can when eaten in exorbitant amounts – but rather in how they affect our arteries, making them far less elastic.

This is precisely what Dr. Michael Schecter from Tel Aviv University envisioned before conducting this study, and his envisions were realized when he observed the arterial function of 56 people after a high carb meal.

He had four groups of 14 people each consume high carbohydrate meals.  One ate pure sugar, another ate corn flakes with milk (one of the higher foods on the glycemic index) and another ate bran flakes (not as high on the glycemic index, but still high).  The last group was the placebo group, so they abstained from a meal.

Dr. Schecter and his colleagues found that each member of each group had endothelial function that diminished after their meal compared to prior to their sugary cereal servings – even those that ate bran flakes.  The one group whose endothelial function remained healthy?  You guessed it, the placebo group.

Endothelial function is just a fancy word for describing the lining of the arteries.  When foods high in sugar and high on the glycemic index are consumed, there’s undue stress put on those arteries, so much so that the arteries become dysfunctional for a short period of time, according to Dr. Schecter.

While Schecter is quick to point out that this dysfunction is sudden and only temporary, it doesn’t take a study of his to know that that endothelial dysfunction will become permanent the more often a person eats foods high on the glycemic index.

Maintaining a healthy heart is not accomplished by cutting out carbohydrates from your diet but rather to eat carbohydrates low on the glycemic index.  These should be complex carbohydrates, like oatmeal, 100 percent whole wheat bread (make sure it says “100 percent,” as many breads that claim to be “wheat” are made with refined flour), beans, nuts, and seeds.

You can’t go wrong with fruits and vegetables either, but just be aware that they tend to vary on the glycemic index considerably (e.g. cherries have a low GI of 22, while watermelon has a high GI 72; potatoes have a high GI of 82, while broccoli has a low GI of 15).

Sources:
sciencedaily.com
southbeach-diet-plan.com

In life, we often need to be reminded of why we do the things we do.  For example, we all know that eating foods high in fiber and low in fat help us avoid obesity and disease, thus increasing our chances of living a long, healthy life.  But there are times when we question just how important it really is:  Is it really THAT important to have wheat bread rather than white?  Does it really make any difference if I have white rice instead of brown?  After all, they’re both about the same in calorie and fat content.

I’m here to serve as that friendly little reminder of why whole grain carbohydrate choices are always better than refined carbohydrates.  Allow me to give you a brief history lesson: 

Before the refining process came along, food spoiled quickly.  But with the advancement of technology, the refining process made spoilage a thing of the past.  With refining, breads, cereals and rice could sit on store shelves for longer periods of time, ushering in the boom of supermarkets and their aisles of food choices.  This is all well and good, but it came with a cost.   Refining strips foods of vitamins, nutrients and minerals – the same nutrients that help the body turn carbohydrates into energy.  Without these vitamins, the energy conversion process halts, and carbohydrates are stored as fat.

Thanks to government intervention, foods once stripped of vitamins and minerals were replaced, or fortified, with vitamins and minerals like vitamin B, folic acid and calcium.  This fortification process helped alleviate the wealth of people dying from vitamin deficiencies in the early years of refining. 

Today, there are other health maladies associated with consuming vast amounts of refined carbohydrates, despite their fortification.  Obesity is the most common one mentioned, but others include diabetes, hypertension and heart attacks.  If that wasn’t enough, a recent study links the rise in refined carbohydrates to the rise in throat cancer diagnoses. 

This disturbing trend was discovered by a group of Ohio-based researchers, all affiliated with Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland.  By looking at the rate of throat cancer diagnoses between 1973 and 2001 and comparing those with food consumption numbers compiled by the National Nutrient Data Bank, researchers found a “strong correlation” between throat cancer diagnoses and carbohydrate consumption.  

In addition to carbohydrates, they also found a correlation between throat cancer and gastroesophageal reflux, a disease characterized by an abnormal backward flow of gastric juices that affect the esophagus.  And it just so happens that gastroesophageal reflux – acid reflux disease for short – is strongly correlated with obesity and high carbohydrate intake. 

The specifics of how the researchers made these connections can be found in the American Journal of Gastroenterology. 

The researchers are reticent to make any broad-based conclusions about individuals’ likelihood of getting throat cancer and consuming large amounts of refined carbohydrates (you guessed it, more research needs to be done before that can happen).  Nevertheless, they and yours truly view the link as another reminder of why choosing whole grain carbohydrates over the refined kind is so important.