Pasta

SophiaW · Jun 13, 2012

I have a question about pasta that maybe someone knowledgeable here can answer. I know that pasta is high in carbs and I know that the time taken for those carbs to affect the blood glucose levels is slow. I also know that pasta is made from fine white flour and eggs. So why does pasta have such a slow effect on blood glucose? It's not high in fat which I could understand would slow down the absorbtion of carbs, it is high in white flour which to me should be quick acting. I don't understand why it's a slow acting carb, my logic tells me it should be quick acting. Just something that puzzles me and I'd like to understand why it works this way

Grazer · Jun 13, 2012

Not sure if it IS always slow. I get some quick responses sometimes. Think it depends what you put with it. People often have a lot of cheese with it, and the fat slows the absorption.

SophiaW · Jun 13, 2012

No we don't have a lot of fat with pasta. I make a homemade tomato and herb sauce - lots of tomatoes, an onion, garlic, red pepper and some herbs, sometimes I might add some minced beef but often not. It is slow for my daughter, we have to set an extended bolus on her pump otherwise she goes hypo within 2 hours. It's exactly the same every time we eat pasta, has to be the extended bolus otherwise we run into problems.

Grazer · Jun 13, 2012

Don't know is the answer, and don't want to try and guess as I don't use insulin so haven't experienced how different pasta might be for someone using insulin. Good question though; can't see why it should be slow. Wonder if freshly made pasta might be different?

lucylocket61 · Jun 13, 2012

I think that dried pasta doesnt contain egg. Fresh pasta, which my hubby makes for us, does contain and egg and also olive oil.

THat might make a difference?

hanadr · Jun 13, 2012

Good thinking from someone Iassume isn't a chemist[ I don't mean to sound patronising, but few people are educated in the sciences]
Pasta isn't slow
that idea is based on a false assumption
Pasta is largely made of starch, which is composed of long chains of glucose molecules. Someone decided that it takes the body a long time to separate out the individual glucose molecules. I've used enzymes to break down pure starch in the laboratory and it happens very fast.It's always gone in minutes.
Perhaps the someone who said it's slow assumed that the starch chain is dismantled sequentially, from the end, one piece at a time, whereas in fact many of the bonds are broken simultaneously.
All starches are all broken down pretty fast. There are slight differences depending on whether the chains are straight or branched. However none is really slow.
Hana

SophiaW · Jun 13, 2012

I've tried dried and fresh pasta from the shop, also have made my own fresh pasta at home. All seems to have the same effect. It's not a problem because with the pump we can set the extended bolus, but I'm just curious as to why

Hana, just seen your post. Don't know how to answer that then, the readings my daughter gets indicates that it takes a while for the bulk of the pasta to affect her blood glucose and then takes a lot longer to stop affecting her bg. Yes some of it affects her bg straight away, that's why some of the bolused insulin (30%) is delivered straight away, but the rest (70%) is delivered over several hours. The only other food we experience this with is pizza and I can understand with that because there is a lot of fat involved from the cheese.

phoenix · Jun 13, 2012

Food processing, heating, adding water, normally alters starch 'granules They swell up so their crystalline structure is destroyed making them more easily digested. This is gelatinisation
Think what happens when you gradually add flour to water and heat it (to make a sauce or gravy). The thickening is the result of gelatinisation.
The processing method used for pasta makes the starch more resistant to gelatinisation.
According to Montignac

Comparatively, there is a natural technical process which tends to block starch hydration: Pastification of coarse wheat. Extruding wheat paste through a drain heats the food in such a way that it produces a protective coating which slows down starch gelatinization.
While this applies to spaghetti and certain tagliatelles which are “pastified” (extruded under great pressure), it does not hold for raviolis nor lasagna and not even for fresh pasta which are hand cut and thus have a much higher Glycemic Index even if they are also made from durum wheat flour.

As we can see, we can use the same flour and end up producing foods with quite different Glycemic Indexes, at times they can be twice as high: raviolis 70, spaghettis 40.

Cooking at home also affects our food’s Glycemic Indexes.

Cooking al dente (5 to 6 minutes), for example, allows us to keep spaghettis GIs as low as possible while prolonged cooking (from 15 to 20 minutes) will raise GIs since it accelerates starch gelatinization

http://www.montignac.com/en/the-factors ... c-indexes/
( this is the best one page explanation of the whys and wherefores I know of)

lucylocket61 · Jun 13, 2012

Is a higher GI value good or bad?

viviennem · Jun 13, 2012

It may depend on how you cook it. If you like it firmly 'al dente' it will probably take longer to hit the blood than if you cook it nice and soft like I used to .

Just a thought!

Viv 8)

Lucy, low GI is best. Higher hits quicker. Mashed potato is one of the worst; also white bread.

xyzzy · Jun 13, 2012

Same as Phoenix says (I think). To reduce the BG raising effects of pasta (or potatoes etc.) you can "retrograde" them. Effectively cook them, put them in the fridge until cold and then heat them up again. This causes the starch to change chemically and become less digestible.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retrogradation_(starch)

Do a search for "diabetes retrograde starch" which should pick up some examples.

Paul_c · Jun 13, 2012

bad, you want a lower GI or else fewer carb grams per 100 grams of pasta

It's why I now go for wholewheat pasta when buying it dried and further lower the GL for the meal by cooking it al dente and using a low GI sauce and plenty of olive oil.,

I don't use shop bought sauces anymore as they have added sugar.

SophiaW · Jun 13, 2012

Thank you Phoenix and Xyzzy for that info, that seems to explain it. Xyzzy, when you put them in the fridge, do they need to be reheated again for that effect to happen? I'm wondering because when I make a potato salad (cooked then chilled) it seems to affect Jess' bg more slowly than boiled potatoes that haven't been chilled. The potato salad isn't reheated so wondering if this effect only takes place when something is reheated or if the cooling process is what causes it.

xyzzy · Jun 13, 2012

The potato thing is very interesting. The site (forum) this comes from has the following post

I am trying my luck at retrograding mashed potatoes. I will know how it well I did at lunch time today.

Here is what I have done:

Cut up 3-4 small Russet potatoes into 1/2 inch cubes. Placed in a large pot with lots of water. Boiled them until they were soft enough to mash.

Drained the water, added butter, half/half, salt pepper and a small amount of Rice vinegar (to help retrograde the starch).

The hardest part of this recipe is not eating the hot mashed potatoes, I did taste them, (it was burst of all the holidays past)

I have read that the retrograding process has to take place in the refrigerator, and can be as high as 30%. So if you have cup of potatoes that has 17g of carbs, and you retrograde 30% of them you now have about 12g carbs, along with the fat from the butter and half and half.

I will heat one cup of these at lunch time and let you know what happens.

Below is just one paper that has been written about retrograded starches (potatoe) if you are interested.

ScienceDirect - Carbohydrate Polymers : Resistant starch formation in temperature treated potato starches varying in amylose/amylopectin ratio

If you g**gle search "I am trying my luck at retrograding mashed potatoes. I will know how it well I did at lunch time today" you will find the forum with the diabetics who did the experiments :wink:

The science bit

http://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...serid=10&md5=b724790c1b064835fc733529a10165c8

Oh and anyone who goes and looks may spot a familiar name :lol:

SophiaW · Jun 13, 2012

Thank you for the info, going to try red potatoes for my potato salad next And that explains why potato salad seems to give better readings for Jess

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