4
BE GONE, GRAINS, ROOTS, AND FRUIT
Now we’re getting into the nitty gritty. Let’s dig into my seven high Sugar Impact food categories to get a better understanding of what impact each is having on you and how you can make better choices. Keep in mind that your primary goal will always be to eat as close to nature as possible. Whole foods that are closest to their natural state give you more nutrients than food with a label.
LOSE THE HIGH SUGAR IMPACT GRAINS
They’re the medicine you need to lose weight, fight disease, and slow down aging. What’s not to love?! The problem with many grains is that we don’t eat them the way nature intended us to. To lower your SI, you’ll swap grains—especially refined grains (a top ingredient in many processed foods)—for natural, whole foods like beans, nuts, and seeds.
Grains weren’t part of our ancestors’ diet, so we don’t need them to survive. But we’ve been told that whole grains like wheat, barley, and rye are healthy and good for us, and to eat more of them. Compared to more processed, refined grains, they are healthier—but don’t buy into the myth of whole grain goodness.
By the time grains make their way into our diet, they’re usually refined, meaning pounded into powder with all the nutrients and fiber sucked out of them. That’s even worse than it sounds, which I’ll explain in a bit. On the other hand, beans, nuts, and seeds are nutrition powerhouses, dense with protein, healthy fat, fiber, antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals.
ENERGY IN THE FORM OF STARCH
Grains and beans are packed with energy in the form of starch. The starches in plants are mostly made of long strings of glucose, which we easily break apart for fuel. All starch turns into glucose. But not all sugar is created equal. Starch is metabolized differently than, say, sucrose (table sugar), which is half-glucose, half-fructose. When you eat sucrose, you’re actually ingesting glucose and an equal dose of fructose. You know the domino-like effect fructose can have on your health and weight.
Starches, or slow carbs, take longer to digest than fast carbs, as their names would suggest. Plus, your body uses enzymes to break down slow carbs and get to the glucose, so you burn some energy during that process. That digestive process begins in your mouth with enzymes in your saliva—right then and there, starch starts turning into sugar.
How fast that happens depends on how the food was processed and prepared and its molecular makeup. So whether it’s raw or cooked, whole or processed, liquid or solid determines how quickly it will turn into sugar. Cooked foods are more easily digested than in their raw form, so the sugar in cooked foods is more accessible to your body and hits your body faster. And, of course, when you eat whole foods, the fiber in it slows the rate at which sugar hits your bloodstream, whereas processed food and liquids don’t have the fiber and give sugar a free pass.
The good news is, grains, beans, nuts and seeds are loaded with fiber. Fiber puts the brakes on stomach emptying, which keeps you full longer. It helps feed the good bacteria in your small intestine and improves nutrient absorption. It also pushes food through your intestinal tract (scrubbing all the way) and provides bulk to the stool so that you produce poops you can be proud of (yep, I really said that).
But wait, there’s more. Fiber prevents free fatty acids from accumulating in your bloodstream. You want and need this. Your body should metabolize and use those free fatty acids; they shouldn’t be hanging out in your blood! Free fatty acid buildup can create insulin resistance and diabetes, and they’re often elevated in obese people.
Your colon also puts fiber to good use: it converts it to short-chain fatty acids, which gives it the energy it needs to keep metabolic machinery humming along.
SHOW ADDED SUGAR THE DOOR
Obviously, eating as close to nature as possible is the deal. If you’re serious about wanting to lose weight fast and shift your health back to great, you’ve got to eliminate foods that contain added sugar, as well as refined grains like bread and pasta. It’s the path toward the light, out of that dark diet maze, and the key to throwing off the cloak of conditions that keep you from really living and loving your life. If you struggle with eliminating sugar and refined grains completely, you’ll find that once you go through Cycle 2 you don’t even miss them, especially when you discover low SI swaps you like even better (promise!). Most people who bought into the “high-carb, low-fat” myth have wrestled with their weight and health but have no idea what they’re doing wrong. And, sadly enough, they feel like they’ve failed, when they’re just following the wrong set of rules.
Clearly there’s a lot to be gained by eating the right kinds of foods, but the right amounts matter, too. The problem is that when you overdo the carbs, you can prevent fats from being used for energy and stimulate an increase in fat production and storage. Your body has a limited capacity to store excess carbohydrates. That’s one of the reasons elevated blood sugar follows overeating: more is more, and lots of carbs equals lots of blood sugar. If you’re eating too many carbs and you’re not able to immediately use all the sugar you eat—and you’re not likely to unless you’ve got some seriously intense physical activity going on—there isn’t any more room to store it as glycogen.
So one of the ways your body avoids dangerously elevated blood sugar is by converting those surplus carbs into fat, usually around your belly. Not pretty!
Here’s how it works. Any carbohydrate not immediately burned by your body as fuel is stored in the form of glycogen, a long string of glucose molecules linked together. Your body has two primary storage sites for glycogen: your liver and your muscles. Once the glycogen levels are filled in both your liver and muscles, surplus carbs are converted to fat and stored in your adipose, or fatty, tissue.
So the fact that carbs are considered “fat-free” is, at best, misleading. Worse yet, they can sneak into your diet in huge amounts if you’re eating processed and packaged foods, or if you’re a mindless muncher. Here’s a tip and some label-reading shorthand to prevent that from happening to you: when you see refined grains on a food label, think of them as “hidden sugar,” and when you see sugar, think of it as “hidden fat.” Bye-bye, pretzels!
Even a meal or snack high in slow carbs like beets or yams is packed with those long chains of glucose molecules that raise your blood sugar, regardless of whether they’re mitigated by fiber. To compensate, your pancreas secretes insulin, which then brings your blood sugar back down. The problem is that insulin is essentially a storage hormone, and its primary function is to hoard carbohydrate calories in the form of fat. Excess carbs keep insulin busy padding you with as much fat as you’re willing to make available. Sure, that was great when our ancestors were wandering the savannah hoping to hunt or gather something. But today, scarce calories—and the savannah—are not everyday issues in our world, are they? As a result, this protective mechanism actually sabotages your health. When you eat too much sugar, bread, pasta, or any other processed grain products, you’re sending a hormonal message, via insulin, to your body that says “store more fat, please!”
But that’s not even the worst of it. Insulin triggers the release of the hormone leptin, which comes out of your fat cells to tell you you’re full. Chronically high insulin from excess carbs means your leptin never comes down, either. When leptin stays elevated, your appetite control center eventually tunes it out and no longer hears the message to curb hunger. And you go crazy trying to figure out why you still feel like you’re starving after you’ve just eaten. So excess carbs help make you fat, and tell you to eat more. Devious!
REACH FOR THESE CARBS
I’m not saying that you should avoid carbs completely. I eat carbs, too! Processed sugary carbs are the culprit in obesity and insulin resistance, not nutrient-dense carbs. Nutrient-rich slow carbs don’t spike your blood sugar and accelerate fat storage the way empty fast carbs do. Stay close to nature and you’ll be fine. Whole, unprocessed carbs come packaged with immune-supporting, anti-aging nutrients and blood sugar–balancing fiber. Besides, nobody ever got fat eating asparagus.
My personal top slow, low carb faves are quinoa, hummus, wild rice, black beans, and lentils. Stick with those and you’ll be making nutritious choices that aren’t the blood sugar equivalent of a taser. Also check out the great swaps I have for you later in this chapter (see here). Make those easy trades and you’ll never feel deprived. Instead, you’ll just feel energized and giddy about thinking clearly, the weight falling off, your skin looking brighter, and your aches and pain evaporating.
GONE WITH GLUTEN
Some grains deliver more starch than others. And several, such as wheat, barley, and rye, also contain the sticky protein gluten.
We get a lot of our gluten from wheat. Wheat sounds wholesome enough, but don’t be fooled by the halo—it might as well be the devil in disguise. Wheat serves up a platter of diseases, conditions, and weight-gain cocktails, and it’s slipped into thousands of things we eat. Today’s wheat is essentially an engineered food product created (yes, I said created) within the last 50 years that has an entirely different effect on our digestive system than the wheat your Great Aunt Betty ate.
This newer dwarf wheat has been genetically manipulated to endure harsher conditions than its natural predecessor so that it delivers a higher yield. But what’s good for agriculture isn’t necessarily good for us. This genetically engineered wheat contains much more gluten and starch, including a compound called amylopectin A. According to Dr. William Davis, author of Wheat Belly, amylopectin A is a complex carbohydrate unique to wheat. Wheat’s amylopectin A is more digestible than other amylopectins in unprocessed carbs like legumes. He writes: “Because wheat carbohydrate, the uniquely digestible amylopectin A, causes a greater spike in blood sugar than virtually any other food—more than a candy bar, table sugar or ice cream—it also triggers greater insulin release.”
To drive the point home, Dr. Mark Hyman, author of The Blood Sugar Solution, calls amylopectin A a “super starch.” He says amylopectin A is behind those big, fluffy slices of wheat bread we love to slather with PB and J. And as a super starch, it doesn’t just bump your blood sugar. Dr. Hyman says “two slices of whole wheat bread will raise your blood sugar more than two tablespoons of table sugar.”
The food business is a mega-machine, and gluten has become its go-to ingredient in everything that sits on a shelf. While gluten may be getting applause for its sticky, stretchy ability to shape muffins, it’s not being so helpful to you, unless you appreciate how it helps you store belly fat. People with a condition called celiac disease—a severe reaction to gluten—get sick if they eat even a small amount of gluten. But even in people without celiac disease, gluten can also trigger leaky gut and inflammation (and the onslaught of conditions that follow).
Odds are you’re being negatively affected by gluten. It’s estimated that 30–40% of Americans have a sensitivity to it. I find that estimate to be just a little low; about 90% of the people I pull off gluten feel enormously better without it (and I’m convinced the other 10% didn’t really get it all out). If you haven’t identified gluten as a problem for you yet, maybe this will help: symptoms of intolerance include weight gain or inability to lose weight, cravings, digestive upset, headaches, joint pain, anxiety, depression, brain fog, and especially leaky gut. Hmmm.
GLUTEN AND LEAKY GUT
Gluten can trigger the release of the protein zonulin, which regulates the permeability of your intestines. When zonulin is out and about, it loosens the tight junctions in your gut. Suddenly, proteins and toxins not meant to penetrate your gut wall slip into your bloodstream and incite an immune response. But the manifestation of that response—as joint pain, brain fog, gastrointestinal problems, anxiety, depression, and more—can be delayed hours or even days. So you can give yourself a break for missing the connection between the headache you have one morning and the wheat pasta you ate the night before. Leaky gut has also been linked to chronic conditions like rheumatoid arthritis and diabetes, in addition to gastrointestinal issues.
Gluten can even sneak into foods that are naturally gluten-free. Oatmeal is a great example. Oats are not a grain that contains gluten, so oatmeal shouldn’t contain gluten, either—and pure oatmeal doesn’t. But commercial brands of oatmeal are often cross-contaminated in the facilities where they’re made, so they can contain little bits of wheat, barley, or rye. If you’re hankering for some oatmeal in the morning, make it pure steel-cut or rolled for the lowest SI. Flavored instant oatmeals are always a bad choice; they’re just reservoirs of added sugar.
CUT THE CORN
Then there’s corn. The “vegetable” we all grew up loving at backyard parties and barbecues. There we were, zinging it along our teeth, feeling truly American. The trouble is, corn is not a vegetable. Corn is a grain, and a very starchy one at that. It turns to sugar right there in your mouth and becomes a gusher headed for your bloodstream. Yep, corn = sugar.
That’s one of the reasons industrial farms feed their cows and pigs corn—to make them fat, fast! Knowing that, it’s a little hard to believe it’s doing anything different to you. To heighten the concern here—and it should be heightened—the corn (and other grains) factory-farm animals are fed is often genetically modified, which means you end up eating those GMOs, too. (And remember, you are what you eat, ate.)
GMOs are plants that have been genetically altered to increase crop yield or shelf life. They’re engineered by inserting foreign genes into the DNA of the plant. Even scarier, according to the American Academy of Environmental Medicine, there are serious health risks associated with genetically modified food.
Studies show there’s a direct through line to obesity when you eat GMO corn or GMO corn-fed animals. And there’s mounting evidence that GMO crops are connected not only to obesity, but also to immune issues and a host of gastrointestinal problems like leaky gut.
China and most of Europe already require GMO labeling, but in the United States we have to work a little harder to figure out how to dodge GMOs in our food. Until GMOs are on our labels and highlighted in red, it’s worth the additional legwork to sleuth them out. GMOs are in as many as 80% of the processed foods available in the United States. For more information and a complete list of where they might be slipping onto your plate, visit www.responsibletechnology.org/buy-non-gmo and download the non-GMO shopping list. Also, look for the certification of the nonprofit organization Non-GMO Project; it puts its seal on brands it verifies as GMO-free, so you can buy worry-free.
SAY NO TO SOY
For years, a lot of us have been led to believe soy is a health food. Nothing could be further from the truth. That pretty glow around soy was put there by (you guessed it!) soy companies. So let me be the one to break it to you—there’s no joy in soy! Here’s its rap sheet: soy has been linked to impaired thyroid function, reproductive disorders, cognitive decline, digestive problems, and lower sperm count. In evolutionary terms, it’s relatively new to our food supply, so many people respond to it as an allergen. And nearly all soy has been genetically modified, which means it’s likely to contain high amounts of pesticides. It also contains the anti-nutrients phytates and lectins.
PHYTATES AND LECTINS: ANTI-NUTRIENTS
Phytates can block mineral absorption, leading to nutrient deficiencies, including iron-deficiency anemia. Lectins can cause leptin resistance and result in increased hunger. I’m guessing the last thing you want is to eat food that makes you hungrier, am I right? Lectins are part of a plant’s defense mechanism, so they’re born to fight. Lectins in grains, beans, nuts, seeds, and other plants have been shown to damage intestinal cells, leading to leaky gut. Read on to learn how to eat beans, nuts, and seeds without worrying about lectins.
IMPORTANCE OF SPROUTING, SOAKING, DEHYDRATING, AND SLOW-ROASTING
Nuts like almonds, walnuts, and Brazil nuts and seeds like pumpkin and hemp are rich sources of protein, fiber, healthy fats, antioxidants, and vitamins and minerals. And they can be healing. They’re also effective soldiers against free radicals, inflammation, and aging, so even though they have phytates and lectins, I want you to incorporate some of them into your diet. The key is to soak and sprout them to lower the antinutrient load, so you get all the good without the bad. The same goes for grains. All grains can raise your blood sugar and insulin, so go easy on them, but when you do indulge, the most ideal choice is sprouted grains, which have been soaked and germinated and are more nutritious and less refined than others.
How does this help? Sprouting reduces lectins in beans and seeds, because once the seed starts to germinate and form a wee plant, a lot of the lectin gets broken down to feed the growing baby (some of it hangs behind to protect the seedling).
Or, if you can, buy your beans (and grains) dry, and rinse and soak them before cooking them. They’ll be more nutritious, lower in salt, and less expensive than canned beans. Soaking also ensures they’ll cook evenly and cuts down on the gas they generate.
There are two main ways to soak beans: the long soak method, and the quick soak method. To long soak, rinse the dried beans, put them in a bowl, and add enough water to cover them by about 3 inches. Then just put them in the fridge overnight, and they’ll be ready for you to drain, rinse, and cook in the morning. When you’re in a hurry, pour the beans into a large pot and add water until they’re covered by about 3 inches. Boil for 1 minute, then cover and let stand for an hour. When the beans are tender and have doubled in size, they’re done and ready to drain.
Slow-roasting nuts and seeds is essentially the same process. You soak them overnight in a bowl with water that covers them by about 3 inches. In the morning, with most of the work done, you drain them, spread them out on a baking sheet (or place them in a dehydrator), and bake them at 140° for 8 hours.
YOUR SUGAR IMPACT SWAPS: GRAINS
These swaps will help you effortlessly reduce the impact starchy grains are having on your metabolism, digestive tract, and fast weight loss. They’re just as tasty as the high-SI choices, and I guarantee you’ll like them even better, knowing they’re releasing you from the grip of foods that are sabotaging your health and holding your weight hostage. Don’t feel limited by this list, though—experiment with your own, then let me hear about them!
YOUR SUGAR IMPACT SCALE: GRAINS
Let me introduce you to the Sugar Impact Scale for grains. Remember, the framework for these categories is based on the amount of sugar in them and the impact they’ll have on you: how much they’ll spike your blood sugar and insulin and send your body the message to store more fat. So get excited about stopping that message in its tracks!
In Cycle 1, you’re going to swap high-SI foods for medium-SI choices, then in Cycle 2 you’ll swap the medium SIs for lows. Ready? Go!
LOW SUGAR IMPACT
Lentils
Black beans
Black turtle beans
Boston navy beans
Broad beans
Cannellini beans
Chickpeas
Fava beans
French green beans
Great Northern beans
Green beans
Kidney beans
Lima beans
Mung beans
Pinto beans
Wax beans
Quinoa
Hummus
Wild rice
Groats
Long-cooking oatmeal (rolled or steel-cut)
Shirataki noodles
Lentil soup
Chili (homemade, no sugar added)
Coconut wraps
Coconut flour
Dehydrated unsweetened coconut
Roasted chestnuts
Almond flour
Pumpkin seeds
Sunflower seeds
Flaxseeds
Chia seeds
Sesame seeds
Hemp seeds
Pecans
Brazil nuts
Cashews
Hazelnuts
Macadamia nuts
Walnuts
Almonds
Pine nuts
Pistachios
Poppy seeds
Peas
Unsweetened nut butters
Peanuts*
MEDIUM SUGAR IMPACT
Rice pasta
Arrowroot
Amaranth
Buckwheat
Millet
Rice tortillas
Sprouted whole grain breads
Brown rice
Fermented soy
Ezekiel brand sprouted cereal
Quinoa flakes
Quinoa pasta
Chili (store-bought, sugar added)
Amaranth, rice, millet, or buckwheat flour
Garbanzo flour
Quinoa flour
Fava bean flour
Black bean flour
Rice crackers
Rice chips
Bean chips
Lentil chips
Nut chips
*Note: if a small amount is used in a recipe (e.g., 1 tablespoon for 4 servings), this is safe for Cycle 2.
HIGH SUGAR IMPACT
Gluten-free flour blend
Mung bean noodles
Honey-roasted peanuts
Cornstarch
Potato starch
Glazed nuts
Sweetened nut butters
Instant oatmeal
Instant rice
Baked beans
Puffed rice
Puffed millet
Rice cakes
Polenta
Corn
Cornbread
Wheat bread
Pasta
Tortillas
Couscous
Soy cheese
Muffins
White flour
Cakes and pies
English muffins
Scones
Biscotti
Cream of Wheat
Pop-tarts
Grits
Macaroni and cheese
Matzoh
Pita
Risotto
Muesli
Quick breads
Sugar cereals
Edamame*
Barley
Farro
Graham crackers
Water crackers
Animal crackers
Wasa crackers
Oyster crackers
Popcorn
Corn tortillas
Corn chips
Cookies
Crackers
I hope you can already see how fun and easy this is going to be. Pretty soon you’ll also see results! Now that you have a grip on grains, it’s time to kick roots to the curb.
GIVE HIGH SUGAR IMPACT ROOTS THE BOOT
Now let’s swap those high-SI roots for low-SI veggies and squashes. This closer look at roots and vegetables is all about shifting the balance on your plate away from those high-SI carbs you’re relying on, like mashed potatoes, to lower-SI carbs like pumpkin and non-starchy veggies like Brussels sprouts and red peppers. Do you remember how big the non-starchy section of your Sugar Impact Plate is? You’ve got some filling to do!
And my guess is that right now the slow, low carb and non-starchy vegetable sections of your plate are parked in each other’s spaces. But there’s no need to overthink how you’ll flip the equation; this is an easy category. Focus on eating from the rainbow. Let color be your guide. And I want you to go hog wild on the low-SI veggies—there’s no limit to how many you can have! Try to overdo it. I’ve yet to get an SOS call from someone who has binged on broccoli.
Root Vegetables
Root vegetables are the edible underground part of a plant, but they’re not always literally roots. They store their energy in the form of carbohydrates in that tube you yank out of the ground. Think potatoes, carrots, parsnips, radishes, beetroot, sweet potatoes, yams, and turnips. There are also different categories of root vegetables—taproots (like beets and jicama), tuberous roots (like sweet potatoes and turnips), tubers (yams), and bulbs (like garlic and onions).
Root vegetables are typically starchy, and most (though not all) are high on the glycemic index. Potatoes have the highest glycemic index of any vegetables, so the carbs in them turn into sugar and get absorbed into your blood fast. (Don’t worry—I’ve got plenty of swaps here so that you don’t miss your mashed potatoes.)
I want you to be aware of which roots impact your blood sugar and insulin—and your energy, mood, weight, and more—for better or worse. Of course, the Sugar Impact Scale will be your guide for that.
Non-Starchy Vegetables
Non-starchy is essentially the name given to veggies that don’t contain much starch. They’re usually lower in sugar and higher in fiber than starchy vegetables, and many of them are green and juicy. Why are you always being told to eat your veggies, and why am I saying you can have as many as you want? Impact, impact, impact. As a rule, you can eat more non-starchy vegetables and get fewer carbs (and calories) than when you eat fruits, whole grains, or starchy vegetables. That results in less of an impact on your blood sugar, insulin, and, ultimately, your weight. They’re a great source of fiber, so pile them on your plate to hit that goal of 50 grams a day (for a list of your best choices, see here). Plus, non-starchy veggies are loaded with phytonutrients. (More on that in a bit.)
Beet This
In some circles, beets and carrots have gotten a bad rap because they’re higher on the GI than other vegetables. But as you know, the GI doesn’t tell the whole story.
Carrots have a GI rank of 39—but their GL is only 2. So please, munch on. The same green light goes for beets. While they have a pretty high glycemic index—with a rank of 64, their glycemic load is only 4. Compare this to a russet potato with a GI rank of 111 and a GL of 33.
The amount of carbs in carrots is so low, you’d have to eat more than 4 cups of them to get 50 grams worth of carbohydrates. That’s a lot of carrots! Eating that much in one sitting hardly seems possible. But there are 50 grams of carbs in just one large potato; I’m guessing you’ve hardly thought twice about that, until now.
Vitamins and Minerals
Non-starchy vegetables are also vitamin and mineral rock stars. They’re packed with the energy-providing, bone-building nutrients we need to keep our metabolism revved and humming, like the finely tuned machines we’re meant to be.
Vitamins don’t yield energy directly when they’re broken down; instead, they work in concert with enzymes to release energy from carbohydrates, proteins, and fats. For example, green leafies like spinach give us B vitamins that support energy metabolism and nerve function, and colorful red bell peppers and tomatoes give us vitamin C to promote a healthy immune system, collagen synthesis, and help iron absorption.
Non-starchy vegetables also provide sodium and potassium, which help maintain electrolyte balance, and magnesium, which helps maintain healthy blood sugar levels and is involved in hundreds of essential metabolic functions. Of course, many non-starchy veggies and herbs like artichokes, parsley, spinach, and broccoli can also be a rich source of iron, which is an essential part of the process of carrying oxygen to your cells. That’s always nice to have.
Phyto Superstars
Non-starchy vegetables are also universally high in phytonutrients (literally nutrients “from plants”), making them the most nutrient-dense foods on the planet. Phytonutrients are bioactive chemicals that support a plant’s immune system by warding off bacteria, viruses, bugs, and other threats to a plant’s survival. Fruits and starchy vegetables are also high in phytonutrients, and they’re found in grains, nuts, and seeds as well.
Studies over the past 30 years have confirmed the benefits of eating 5 servings of fruits and vegetables a day. The Harvard-based Nurses’ Health Study and Health Professionals Follow-Up Study tracked the dietary habits of almost 110,000 men and women for 14 years. People who averaged 8 or more servings of fruit and vegetables a day were 30% less likely to have had a heart attack or stroke. Evidence also suggests fruits and vegetables protect against a laundry list of other diseases and chronic health conditions, including high blood pressure and diabetes.
The phytonutrients in cruciferous vegetables such as broccoli, cauliflower, and Brussels sprouts make them disease-fighting warriors. They contain sulforaphane, an antioxidant and natural detoxifier, which studies suggest has powerful cancer-fighting properties. Cruciferous veggies are also high in indole-3-carbinol, another potent anticarcinogen.
Of the many classes of phytonutrients, there are two that pack a real punch: carotenoids and flavonoids.
Carotenoids
There are more than 600 carotenoids, which give fruit and vegetables their red, orange, and yellow color—think carrots, bell peppers, tomatoes, and pumpkin, to name a few. Carotenoids like the beta carotene in carrots are thought to protect against certain cancers, heart disease, and vision loss. Studies show that people who frequently eat spinach or collard greens, plants high in the carotenoid lutein, have a decreased risk of age-related macular degeneration compared to those who eat them infrequently. Are you beginning to see why I want you to eat a rainbow? You knew it wasn’t just so your plate will look pretty (though it will!). Eating a variety of colorful veggies gives you an infusion of immune-boosting phytonutrients.
Flavonoids
Flavonoids include catechins (found in green tea and known for their anti-cancer potency) and flavonols. Flavonols like quercetin are found in onions, apples, berries, and some other plant-based foods. Quercetin has been linked to reduced risk of certain types of cancer and cardiovascular disease.
YOUR SUGAR IMPACT SWAPS: ROOTS
Now, the moment you’ve been waiting for—specific swaps for roots. I promise you’ll never miss those mashed potatoes!
YOUR SUGAR IMPACT SCALE: ROOTS
Here’s the complete Sugar Impact Scale for roots. Remember, these lists categorize foods as low, medium, and high SI for a reason—they’re moving you away from high-SI carbs that spike your blood sugar and keep you burning, and craving, sugar. Instead, they’ll load you up with heaps of low SI, non-starchy veggies that will keep you full, energized, and burning fat. Go to town on the Lows!
LOW SUGAR IMPACT
Acorn squash
Artichoke
Asparagus
Bok choy
Broccoli
Brussels sprouts
Butternut squash
Cabbage
Carrots
Cauliflower
Celery
Chard
Cucumber
Eggplant
Escarole
Ginger root
Jicama
Kabocha squash
Kale
Kale chips
Leeks
Lettuces
Maca
Mushrooms
Mustard greens
Okra
Onions
Peppers
Pumpkin
Radicchio
Radish
Snow peas
Spaghetti squash
Spinach
Sprouts
Sugar snap peas
Turnips
Water chestnuts
Watercress
Zucchini
MEDIUM SUGAR IMPACT
Beets
Parsnips
Rutabaga
Sweet potatoes
Yams
HIGH SUGAR IMPACT
Beet juice
Carrot juice
French fries
Mashed potatoes
Potato chips
Root veggie chips
Sweet potato fries
White potatoes
FORGO FORBIDDEN FRUIT
Surprise! Yes, fruit. It may not shock you that fruit is full of sugar, but I bet you didn’t think it was one of the foods that could be contributing to your sugar addiction, slavery to cravings, and inability to drop that unwanted weight. What?! It’s natural! It seems so healthy! True, some of it really is. But spreads, juices, and sorbets all slapped with a “made with real fruit” label are anything but. They’re loaded with added sugar and sabotaging your weight and health.
Here’s another blow: fruits we’re told to eat every day—like apples—can actually be some of the worst offenders for sneaking more sugar into your diet than you ever imagined, especially because you’re probably giving yourself a pass to eat up. Don’t despair, though—you don’t have to give them up entirely. I’ll help you take back your fruit. You’ll make some simple swaps to get you on course for fast fat loss and feeling good. You’re going to ditch the juice, jam, and dried fruit for berries, grapefruit, and other low SI fruit. As a bonus, you’ll retrain your taste buds to once again truly appreciate the exquisite sweetness of whole fruit.
THE BIG PICTURE
First, a look at fruit from 5,000 feet. What we call a fruit is normally the fleshy (or dry) part of a plant that contains the seed, and it’s usually edible in its raw state. Plants want the seeds in their fruits to live on and prosper, and they’re very crafty about making them attractive and delicious so we animals will eat and deposit them elsewhere. We mostly think of fruits as being sweet, but that’s not always the case—think cranberries and coconuts. Believe it or not, avocados are considered fruits, too, as are olives and tomatoes.
Fruits are a crazy good source of vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients, like antioxidants. Antioxidants boost our immune system and fight off carcinogens and predators that we ingest or that are in our environment. Colorful fruits like blueberries and blackberries get their pigment from the antioxidants anthocyanins. Others, such as apples, give us antioxidants like quercetin through the chemical defenses in their skin. Studies show that a diet rich in antioxidants and anti-inflammatory agents may slow cognitive decline and the risk of developing chronic disease.
Fruits can be wet and juicy and filled with water, so they count as hydrating; they’re great at satisfying your thirst as well as your hunger. They can also be an amazing source of fiber. Fruits can deliver an experience when you eat them, too. You know what I’m talking about! Some are succulent and tender and transport you to the tropics. Others are exotic and weirdly shaped and take you to the far-off place they grow.
I’m not here to deny much of the goodness that is fruit, unless you’re talking dried fruit or fruit juice, which are different things entirely—and we’ll get to those in a bit—but only to make some fine distinctions. As with most things, some fruits are simply better for you than others, and you should know which are which.
FRUCTOSE
Too much sugar is never a good thing, even from foods we consider healthy. The increased sugar load you punish yourself with when you eat a three-banana smoothie doesn’t behave any differently in your system than it would if you ate a candy bar. And if too much sugar is bad, too much fructose is worse. In Chapter 1, I explained why fructose can be so damaging. Despite having the lowest GI ranking of any sugar, fructose is more easily and quickly turned into fat (usually belly fat) than glucose.
Fructose is naturally occurring in many foods, and it’s the primary (but not the only) sugar in fruit. Our consumption of it went up 19% from 1970 to 2005. That’s dramatic, and it’s not because we’re inhaling 19% more fruit. You’d be surprised at the ways fructose may be sneaking into your diet. Fruit juice concentrates are one of the most popular sweeteners on the market. You may be fooled into thinking you’re choosing a “no-sugar-added” product, only to find that it contains fruit juice concentrate.
Remember, when you connect the dots between what you eat and the result you get, it’s simple—a high-sugar diet is a high-fat diet. So if you want to lose weight, a good place to start is to cut way (way) back on fructose. And you’ll feel better, too, because in a bit I’ll share with you the other damage fructose does to you besides making you jiggle around the middle.
Just as not all sugars are created equal, not all fruits have equal amounts and kinds of sugar. Most foods that contain fructose have about an equal amount of glucose. But many fruits have more fructose than glucose, and some have even more than others. Plums have less than half as much, but apples and pears have significantly more fructose than glucose—in fact, twice as much. That’s one reason their juices are worse for you than full-sugar sodas—they have more sugar in them than the equivalent amount of drinks made with high-fructose corn syrup. They’re pure liquid fructose bombs!
MAKE ROOM FOR MORE
Your capacity to absorb fructose increases the more you eat it. If that sounds like your body doing the good work you want it to do (you don’t want that gastrointestinal distress!), not so much. When you eat more and more fructose, the building blocks of a transport system for it, known as Glut 5, also increase. So you just get better and better at sending it sailing to your liver, making sure all the extra fructose gets stored as fat, fast. And your fructose absorption really shoots up when fructose is paired with glucose. So when you eat fruit, which has both, you absorb a lot more fructose than if you were just to eat fructose alone.
It’s not that you can never enjoy fruit again (although thinking about that last bit of information may make it a little less appealing), it just makes it mission-critical that you sleuth out and ditch all the worst-offending fruit sugar in your daily diet. Fruit based sauces, jams, and juices, which have a ton of added sugar, should jump to the top of your list. It’s also important to know which whole fruits (and how much of them) are okay on a regular basis, and I’m going to help you with that.
NOT-SO-HEALTHY SWEETENERS AND SWEETS
It’s really common for me to hear fruit juice and fruit juice concentrates recommended as “healthier sweeteners.” In reality, they’re often worse than other sweeteners. They’re extremely high in fructose, and they don’t have any nutrients or fiber, so that fructose barrels into your liver like a freight train.
Then there’s dried fruit. I know you want to consider it the same as fresh, whole fruit. It’s tidy and bite-size, and you don’t need napkins or to eat it over the sink. The problem is that when food companies remove the water, they condense the sugar, and they often add other things, whether it’s sulfur dioxide to preserve color or syrup to make it even sweeter. And in that case, it’s just flat-out candy. Plus, if it’s not organic, those little raisins are just pesticide pellets. Even if it is organic and nothing is added, dried fruit has the same amount of sugar and calories as its water-logged counterpart, but the pieces are so much smaller you’re guaranteed to eat more (and get more sugar) than you would with whole fruit. I suppose you could argue that it’s better than fruit cocktail drowning in heavy corn syrup, but it’s close enough. Give dried fruit the red X.
DON’T DRINK YOUR SUGAR
Above all, don’t drink your sugar. When you turn fruit into juice, you basically unwrap it from its fiber and set it free to give you a big sugar hit, fast. That includes those cool, funky juices that scream healthy and jump up and down about being made with real fruit. Fruit juices and sugary (sometime fruit-based) drinks are often infused with added sugar or high-fructose corn syrup, which is a lot sweeter than sugar, setting up a vicious cycle of craving and addiction that ensures high volumes of fructose get to take a shot at your weight and health with every drink. The fructose and glucose in high-fructose corn syrup aren’t bound together, and without having to be broken apart, they work fast once they’re ingested. The fructose races to your liver, and glucose almost instantly spikes your blood sugar and insulin.
MY IMPACT!
Lynn Kelly
Starting weight: 204 lbs.
Current weight: 194 lbs.
Total lost: 10 lbs.
I am a family practice nurse practitioner with no education regarding diet—hard to believe! The Sugar Impact Diet explicitly spelled out for my husband and me how to live in the real world and still take care of our nutritional needs.
I am diabetic and have heart disease. I now know that my body’s responses to sugar and gluten are similar. My glucose has improved dramatically, and my goal is to get off many of my medications. I really have hope for that now. I feel so much better and have much more energy!
When I started the Sugar Impact Diet, I felt insecure about yet another “plan,” even though I had done the Virgin Diet and trusted JJ. Now my husband and I are both singing JJ’s praises!
Peers have always told me that I’m a gifted teacher, and I’m hoping to use that on this very subject with family, friends, at my church, and at an underserved clinic where I volunteer! The Sugar Impact diet changed my life—now all I want to do is share it with others!
YOUR SUGAR IMPACT SWAPS: FRUIT
With the Sugar Impact diet, you’ll swap your juice, jam, and dried fruit for low-SI, whole fruits. And here’s a simple rule to live by, or at least stick on your fridge: if it tastes sweet, don’t eat!
YOUR SUGAR IMPACT SCALE: FRUIT
The Sugar Impact Scale for fruits will help you navigate your transitions and swaps for high SI fruits. Look them over while you’re here and reference them often during your cycles. See you back here soon!
LOW SUGAR IMPACT
Acai berries (no sugar added)
Avocado*
Blueberries
Cantaloupe
Cranberries
Gazpacho*
Grapefruit
Guava
Lemons*
Limes*
Nectarines
Olives*
Oranges
Peaches
Persimmon
Raspberries
Star fruit
Strawberries
Tomatoes
MEDIUM SUGAR IMPACT
Apples
Apricots
Bananas
Cherries
Dates
Fresh figs
Grapes
Honeydew
Kiwi
Mango
Papaya
Pears
Pineapple
Plums
Pomegranate
Sun-dried tomatoes
Tangerines
Tomato juice
Tomato paste
Tomato sauce
V8 Juice
Watermelon
HIGH SUGAR IMPACT
All dried fruit
Fruit leather
Fruit juices
Jams
Preserves and conserves
Nectar
Sorbet
Fruit juice concentrates
Canned fruit cocktail
Fruit juice Popsicles
I hope you can already see how fun and easy this is going to be. Pretty soon you’ll also see results! The Sugar Impact Diet will redefine your relationship with food to food, with benefits. The swaps for grains, roots, and fruit are delicious and give you a huge bang for your lower-impact buck. This is clearly not a diet that tells you what to give up and wishes you luck!