I need help in counting carbs in this

[Zippy1st]

Hi… I have been at a friends tonight and she gave me what we thought was a light carb supper but I have just tested at 11.6. I had five oak cakes… total 29 carbs. Numerous different cheeses. Two large strawberries. One piece pineapple. Half one fig. Small piece of cake made with almond flour, olive oil ,honey, and organ covered with whipped elmlea cream. 2 large glasses red wine. Red wine and cheese never affect me so where is the culprit? I am pretty gutted. I have been an average of 6.2 for a while and now this.any thanks

 

[Zippy1st]

Ps: my friend said honey has no effect on diabetics….thats why she used it in the cake… is that true? My feeling is that foods affect everyone differently?

 

[lovinglife]

Ok it’s a bit difficult to be accurate as we don’t know how big your strawberries were or your piece of pineapple or your piece of cake etc but you ask where the culprits are so everything that has carbs basically so
Oatcakes
Strawberries
Pineapple - quite high in sugar
Figs - pure sugar bombs
Honey in the cake - your friend is wrong I’m afraid honey is just liquid sugar
I’m presuming you mean orange - more fructose or fruit sugars
Elmlea “cream” not great for diabetics it’s very far from cream a bit like margarine is to butter - it’s full of sugar - your much better if with fresh double cream or whipping cream

So if your oatcakes were 29g carb I’m guessing depending on portion sizes you’ve had between 70 - 100g carbs - a lot if it sugar so that’s probably where the answer lies.

The good things to eat would have been the cheeses, the strawberries, the cake sounds like it would have been fine without the honey & you’d had proper cream

 

[MrsA2]

It's just the cumulative effect, and wine (alcohol) may be blurring the picture too as the liver tries to deal with that rather than dealing with the sugars. Usually lowers it at first though.
Oat cakes are highish carb (I find oats spike me more than they should).
Pineapple and fig are high, as is honey and Elmlea isn't real dairy cream, it's seed oils dressed up and marketed heavily .

But if you had a nice evening, don't dwell on your bg, learn and move on.
I have cheese evening with friends, they have the crackers and oat cake, I just have the cheese. Use real cream, have 4 strawberries, skip the other fruit and cut wine to 1 glass, or spread it over 2 and see if that gives a better result but still means you have a nice evening

 

[MrsA2]

Cross posting, but agreeing with @lovinglife

 

[KennyA]

Hi… I have been at a friends tonight and she gave me what we thought was a light carb supper but I have just tested at 11.6. I had five oak cakes… total 29 carbs. Numerous different cheeses. Two large strawberries. One piece pineapple. Half one fig. Small piece of cake made with almond flour, olive oil ,honey, and organ covered with whipped elmlea cream. 2 large glasses red wine. Red wine and cheese never affect me so where is the culprit? I am pretty gutted. I have been an average of 6.2 for a while and now this.any thanks

Agree with lovinglife above. A considerable amount of carb in what you ate, depending on portions.

The other thing to be aware of is that the alcohol in the red wine will have probably lowered your post-meal reading somewhat. This is because the alcohol stops the liver adding glucose to your bloodstream while it's being metabolised - this is a way of fooling the meter for a while but it's important not to fool yourself. The carbs still went in and still have to be processed and managed.

 

[Zippy1st]

Agree with lovinglife above. A considerable amount of carb in what you ate, depending on portions.

The other thing to be aware of is that the alcohol in the red wine will have probably lowered your post-meal reading somewhat. This is because the alcohol stops the liver adding glucose to your bloodstream while it's being metabolised - this is a way of fooling the meter for a while but it's important not to fool yourself. The carbs still went in and still have to be processed and managed.

Thank you all for your comments … the oat cakes were only 5.8 carbs each and we had lots of red wine in Greece recently and it did not affect me. I even had a spaghetti carbonara and three glasses of red wine and was 5.6 after two hours so I thought I may have kicked the pre diabetes. What I ate last night seemed tame by comparison to holiday so I am really confused. I looked at elmlea as nutritional data and it says 4 g ( 3.9 is sugar) per 100 ml. That doesn’t seem bad. I am thinking it’s the honey but it still shouldn’t have been 11+. Does your emotional state affect things? My friend is very intense ( in a nice way) and I get a bit worked up.

 

[Melgar]

It does sound like a delicious meal. The only thing that would not affect my blood sugars personally would be the cheeses. They are fairly neutral. I rarely drink, but the two glasses of wine would probably send me low. The almond flour cake, even if it would blow away in a breeze, being so thin, would shoot my blood sugars up. Almond flour is one of those substitute gluten free flours. Gluten free cakes and pastries tend to be high carb. All those fruits would give me rise, the fig is rammed with sugar so that alone would see my blood sugars ascend. And to add to that , stress has quite the impact on blood sugar. I wouldn’t get too hung up on the odd meal, but it’s worth knowing what gives you a rise and by how much.

Were they Staffordshire oatcakes or Scottish oatcakes?

 

[lovinglife]

Spaghetti carbonara is very fatty along with the wine would probably slow your rise down, fat with carbs slows down the rise, google the pizza effect

I think if you’d maybe tested at 3 & even 4 hours post meal you would have been surprised - you were probably higher at 3hrs than 2 and for longer. I’m keto so less than 29g carb a day and I use almond flour on occasion and it doesn’t affect my blood sugars massively.

You can’t really “kick” diabetes even pre diabetes, you can certainly put it into remission by reducing your carbs to a level that doesn’t raise your BG above normal ranges, what happens is if you begin to up your carbs and go back to the carby diet you may have had before then it comes back.

You are in a fortunate place of being pre diabetic- not really a diagnosis in the UK so if you can reduce your carbs to the optimum for you and continue in that vein then you have every chance of never becoming full blown diabetic.

 

[Zippy1st]

Update: my fasting bs was 5.6 which is a little high for me so I skipped breakfast. I had my normal breakfast at 2pm ( 30gm allbran, mik and spoonful of Greek yoghurt) … this would normally not make any impact on bs. I added two massive strawberries and two chunks ( not slices) of pineapple. Before eating bs was 5. After two hours 7.8. Now that really should not have been the case. Still worked up with my friend ( she has a lot of trauma)… do I conclude that high emotional states change the bs profile ( ie my friend is not good for my health!)???

 

[Dave1975]

Figs are pure sugar. But the night sounded fun at least!

 

[lovinglife]

I think it’s probably more the carbs than your friend that is bad for your health, stress can raise BG but I wouldn’t have thought it would carry over until the next day. Another thought is that could you be coming down with something? perhaps a cold or a low lying infection? these kind of things can affect BG too. Even lack of sleep can contribute

 

[vic hill]

2 of the biggest NO NO NO S .... FIGS ALSO PARSNIPS NEED SUPER FAST ACTING SUGARS HONEY FAST STILL IS .
GLUCAGON INJECTON AND IF YOUR TRY GLUCOSE TABLETS 5 MIN TO BREAK DOWN YES MUST BE MY FALSE TEETH
VIC

 

[Resurgam]

Update: my fasting bs was 5.6 which is a little high for me so I skipped breakfast. I had my normal breakfast at 2pm ( 30gm allbran, mik and spoonful of Greek yoghurt) … this would normally not make any impact on bs. I added two massive strawberries and two chunks ( not slices) of pineapple. Before eating bs was 5. After two hours 7.8. Now that really should not have been the case. Still worked up with my friend ( she has a lot of trauma)… do I conclude that high emotional states change the bs profile ( ie my friend is not good for my health!)???

I would eat some full fat yogurt for breakfast, but nothing else which was listed - I would eat strawberries with my evening meal. I eat at 12 hourly intervals as that seems to be a good idea.
Oat cakes, honey, high carb fruits, (Elmlea isn't cream - as others have mentioned) are not on my menu.
To keep my BG numbers normal I stick to under 40gm of carb a day, as that is what my meter indicates is a good thing, and my HbA1c is at the top end of normal, which seems to be considered good enough at my age, 73.

 

[Zippy1st]

I would eat some full fat yogurt for breakfast, but nothing else which was listed - I would eat strawberries with my evening meal. I eat at 12 hourly intervals as that seems to be a good idea.
Oat cakes, honey, high carb fruits, (Elmlea isn't cream - as others have mentioned) are not on my menu.
To keep my BG numbers normal I stick to under 40gm of carb a day, as that is what my meter indicates is a good thing, and my HbA1c is at the top end of normal, which seems to be considered good enough at my age, 73.

 

[Zippy1st]

Ok latest…. At home, before evening dinner 4.6…. After spiralised courgettes, loads of tomato laden bolognese and handfuls of cheddar washed down with half bottle of Malbec ( comfort foood and stress drink) post prandial bs 5.3! Surely dress is a thing? If I had had last night food at home… I was predicting 7.6 but got 11+ ? I guess, I am both confused but thinking our exactions are more than the sum of food inputs and outputs?

 

[Zippy1st]

Ok latest…. At home, before evening dinner 4.6…. After spiralised courgettes, loads of tomato laden bolognese and handfuls of cheddar washed down with half bottle of Malbec ( comfort foood and stress drink) post prandial bs 5.3! Surely stress

is a thing? If I had had last night food at home… I was predicting 7.6 but got 11+ ? I guess, I am both confused but thinking our outcomes more than the sum of food inputs and outputs?

 

[KennyA]

Thank you all for your comments … the oat cakes were only 5.8 carbs each and we had lots of red wine in Greece recently and it did not affect me. I even had a spaghetti carbonara and three glasses of red wine and was 5.6 after two hours so I thought I may have kicked the pre diabetes. What I ate last night seemed tame by comparison to holiday so I am really confused. I looked at elmlea as nutritional data and it says 4 g ( 3.9 is sugar) per 100 ml. That doesn’t seem bad. I am thinking it’s the honey but it still shouldn’t have been 11+. Does your emotional state affect things? My friend is very intense ( in a nice way) and I get a bit worked up.

If I'm going to have a couple of glasses of wine with a meal it's not really worthwhile testing around a meal. The impact of the alcohol skews the result that much. I recall in early 2020 having a very nice meal (several courses including pasta, dessert, etc) with sufficient wine and grappa and coming up with a +2 hr post reading that was lower than the pre. I thought I'd solved diabetes, for a day or two, until I learnt (on here) about what the liver does in setting and maintaining BG levels and how alcohol interferes with that.

So I'd be asterisking as "alcohol assisted" any results around a meal plus wine, I'm afraid.

I think it's possible to see "surprisingly" high rises such as your 11+ if you happen to catch the peak when you test. Example - a small latte will take me from 5.2 to 9.6 in about 20 minutes, just from the small amount of lactose in the milk. It's back at 5.2 by one hour, which is fine as control. Pastry in any quantity will take me well into double figures and keep me there for a while. If there's been a sufficient quantity of fat in the meal to slow down the glucose impact, then the peak glucose might well be delayed by as much as a couple of hours, so your system hasn't really begun clearing excess glucose at all at the point your testing at +2. It's a problem with snapshot fingerpricking - you only see what you test for - but it's obvious with a CGM.

 

[Robbity]

Regarding figs, I'd actually beg to differ - small FRESH figs need not be an issue in small quanities, it's essentially the DRIED figs that you need to avoid like the plague.

As a long term T2 who keeps my glucose at pre-diabetic levels by diet alone, I regularly eat a couple small fresh figs (both for their flavour and their nutritional value) as part of one of my salad meals without any problem. But as with everything, if in doubt test and see how you react to them.

 

[Dave1975]

Regarding figs, I'd actually beg to differ - small FRESH figs need not be an issue in small quanities, it's essentially the DRIED figs that you need to avoid like the plague.

As a long term T2 who keeps my glucose at pre-diabetic levels by diet alone, I regularly eat a couple small fresh figs (both for their flavour and their nutritional value) as part of one of my salad meals without any problem. But as with everything, if in doubt test and see how you react to them.

Yes, defo DRY figs. Fresh figs are ok in small amounts