Lifestyle Choices

Keeping your GL low and your blood sugar level stable depends not only on what you eat but also on how you cook what you eat. Cooking encourages the carbohydrate in foods to be released faster. The longer you cook something and the higher the temperature, the faster the carbohydrate in the food is released. The best method is actually leaving the food raw, but steaming, boiling, poaching, steam-frying, waterless cooking, baking and grilling are all good, too, in that order. Avoid frying food as much as possible. Deep-fried foods are definitely to be avoided.

Steaming

The best way to cook green, leafy, less-starchy vegetables is to steam them, as this will preserve a lot of their vitamins, as well as enhance their flavour. The method can be used for most food, especially fish, but is less successful for starchy vegetables such as potatoes and parsnips, and is not ideal for red meat. (more…)

Now that you understand the core principles of low-GL eatingand have decided on your personal goals, it is time to take a closer look at what you can eat, and how much you can eat, on the Alford Low-GL Diet. You won’t need to worry about rigid discipline, hunger pangs, expensive foods or excluding foods. Just focus on eating low-GL foods and the rest will take care of itself.

There are two main stages to the Alford Low-GL Diet:

Stage one The weight-loss diet will take you to your target weight.

Stage two The maintenance diet is a diet for life.

And there are five main rules for the weight-loss diet:

1 Eat no more than 40GL a day (or 55L on the maintenance diet).

2 Have an additional 5GL for drinks and desserts for 10 GL on the maintenance diet). (more…)