Carbohydrates provide your body with energy to burn calories, but they’re not all created equal. Learn which to reach for all the time and which are rare treats, from Lyssie Lakatos and Tammy Lakatos Shames, authors of Fire Up Your Metabolism: 9 Proven Principles for Burning Fat and Losing Weight Forever.
Carbohydrates are in the hot seat. As a consumer, you have heard it all. First, you hear you want a diet high in carbs, then you hear that you want a diet low in carbs, and then, just as you feel utterly confused, you hear that if you want to lose weight you should eat a diet with no carbs. What is the scoop on carbohydrates — those foods you love to love yet that many popular diet books love to hate? Well, forget what you’ve heard. Here’s the real deal.
You can eat carbs and lose weight.
In fact, you should eat carbs because they provide your body with energy to burn calories. You can even eat a cookie, pasta, or a roll with dinner without guilt. Although these are not the best carbohydrates to choose, you don’t have to swear off them.
Carbs fuel your muscles, central nervous system, and red blood cells. Without them you won’t have energy. Without energy, you will become too lethargic to engage in activity. You will even conserve energy by cutting back on the smallest of movements (for instance, you won’t get up out of your office chair as frequently, or when you are standing, you’ll lean on something rather than support your own weight), and you’ll hardly burn a calorie.
You will be exhausted and conserve energy every chance you get. The resulting inactivity will lead to weight gain. So even small amounts of carbohydrates must be part of every meal in order to give you a continuous energy boost throughout the day.
Some carbs are much better than others. We’ve broken them down into three groups: “always” carbs should constitute over half of your daily calorie intake and should be chosen nine out of ten times you have carbs; “sometimes” carbs should be limited, not chosen more than two times out of ten; and “rarely” carbs should be saved for special occasions and eaten no more than one out of every ten times you eat a carb. It’s imperative to learn which are which.
“Always” Carbs are made from whole grains and include unrefined plant foods — vegetables, fruits, and legumes. They take a long time to digest, which makes them metabolism-friendly.
They provide ample carbohydrate with little or no fat. In theory, these plant foods (carbohydrates) are as good as it gets — wholesome food grown straight from the soil, the child of our very own Mother Nature. Changed minimally, if at all, by the time they reach our plates, they are so nutritious that the American Heart Association and the American Diabetes Association recommend eating more whole grains, fruits, vegetables, and beans, all of which are carbohydrates. And the National Cancer Institute recommends that we get at least five servings of fruits and vegetables a day. (Some new research shows that we should get twice this — ten servings a day.)
Carbs that are rich in fiber — such as brown rice, oatmeal, whole wheat bread, Raisin Bran, and fruits, vegetables, and beans — can take as long as two to four hours to digest because the fiber slows digestion. As a result, you feel full longer, and your body receives a longer lasting supply of energy. The longer your body is energized, the more active you will be, and the more calories you will burn.
BUYER BEWARE: Just because the bread is darker in color doesn’t mean it’s whole wheat; it may just mean that caramel color has been added. Be sure to read the ingredients label.
“Sometimes” and “Rarely” Carbs include white rice, white bread, cookies, candies, and cake. These foods have been so processed that their nutrients and fiber are gone by the time they get to you.
Usually the fiber is replaced with metabolically detrimental ingredients, like sugar and additives. You digest these processed “sometimes” and “rarely” carbs so quickly that you get a sugar “high,” only to be followed by a “crash.” This energy low causes the brain to signal that it needs more fuel (food) so that it can get some energy. You turn to the food that will provide you with energy the fastest — sugar and more refined “sometimes” and “rarely” carbohydrates. The bad news, of course, is that your brain is craving food even though you have just eaten. That’s overeating.
“Always” carbs, conversely, keep energy levels stable, which in turn prevents sugar highs and crashes and, most important, the subsequent overeating and inevitable weight gain.
We know it’s not always easy to find “always” carbs. Processed food is everywhere. However, by simply learning which carbohydrates you should “always” choose, and which you should “sometimes” and “rarely” choose, it will be easy for you to recognize your best metabolism-revving choices. You will be able to locate an “always” carbohydrate almost anywhere you go, and the good news is that all vegetables and all fruits (unless they are canned in syrup) are “always” carbohydrates.
So grains, not fruits and vegetables, can fall under the less desirable categories. Keep your eye on these. Be sure to choose the “always” grains nine times out of ten times that you eat a grain serving.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Lyssie Lakatos and Tammy Lakatos Shames, authors of Fire Up Your Metabolism (Copyright © 2004 by Lyssie Lakatos and Tammy Lakatos Shames), are registered dieticians, nutritionists, and personal trainers, and are the founders of Healthy Happenings, Inc., a company that provides nutrition consultations to more than 300 corporations. Their advice has appeared in Self, Family Circle, Woman’s Day, and Good Housekeeping. They live in New York City.
MORE ARTICLES BY THE AUTHOR
- Spicing Up Your Diet With Metabolism-Saving Foods
- The Quickie Weight Training Regimen That Will Fire Up Your Metabolism
LEARN MORE
- Read the Introduction to Fire Up Your Metabolism: 9 Proven Principles for Burning Fat and Losing Weight Forever
- See the book’s Table of Contents
