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The penny has dropped using info I found on net

Motherhen2014

Well-Known Member
Messages
563
Location
London
Type of diabetes
I reversed my Type 2
Treatment type
Diet only
Dislikes
People shouting while on their phones.
I have now realised how wrong I have been.Thinking vegetables are a staple for my diet and dropping potatoes and a lot of bread I found by going on line to find out how many carbs are in vegetables they all have them. I am now after doing all the slimming clubs having to really look at what I am eating.I will update you after this week how I have done.
 
If you keep to a general rule of above ground veggies are best, root vegetables are the worst culprits for carbs. Peas and beans are quite high too as officially they are pulses. Sweet corn too as it’s a grain really.
 
Don't beat yourself up @Motherhen2014. Cutting out the bread and potatoes will have been beneficial. Cutting down on below ground vege is the next step, and don't forget that fat can be a friend if you feel hungry. Small steps are the best way to make permanent changes. The sooner people realise that the slimming groups are commercial enterprises and therefore rely on people coming back time and time again. They need people to lose weight but then to put it back on again, not to make a life change in what they eat. Diabetics have that change forced on them if they want to take back control.

I look forward to reading your next post.
 
Well, all I know the veg above ground is nowhere near the carbs of bread, pasta, rice, cakes, nor have they got lots of sugar that is going to harm me. You are forgetting the fibre aspect of the veg. There is sugar in bread also. I have lost weight eating veg as a staple with my meat. I lived on diet food and what w/w slimming world recommended, and I gained weight. I noticed that all these slimming companies push deserts. Next time you go shopping look at how much sugar is in the w/w products whether they are ready meals or deserts. Same with slimming world. Eating those foods for years made me gain weight and end up with prediabetes. Now the food that I am eating gives me lower BG levels after testing. It's a no-brainer for me
 
I used to work for a food company and they were always looking to change the mixes to include more of the cheaper ingredients - or to develop new products which were a new way to use the cheaper end of the inventory. It was all in the pursuit of profits.
 
Don't forget, North American websites will count dietary fibre as carbs, too. In the UK / EU we subtract that out of the total. It can be very misleading to see that a vegetable has a high carb total - make sure that you're using a UK website (or check a UK supermarket website) and be certain that you're looking at the total carbs less fibre before you decide to give up your fave veggies.
 
There is an excellent book, available from Amazon. It is called Carbs & Cals. It has many hundreds of common foods including vegetables, each photographed in different serving sizes on normal plates. It gives the weight, the carbs, calories, protein, fat, and fibre content. Well worth it.

Yes, be very careful when using the net for carbs etc. Make sure it is a UK website. I find Tesco website the best, but other major supermarkets also list the nutrients.
 
I have the carb and cals app on my phone and I use it all the time and it cost me £3 from Google play store and it allows you to see what food you can have and what the nutrition facts are and the size of the meal you want to have and it has pictures of the food and the food that is missing from the list you can add to your foods and you can place the list of dietary requirements in it to and it also allows you to place in your diabetes results and medication if you take any and I can also see what I have done in the calendar which is easy to find so that you can see what your results were for the week
 
This story from the Daily Mail is why I don't use Carbs and Cals

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-5409361/Can-spot-difference-healthy-meals.html
 
rmz80 said:
This story from the Daily Mail is why I don't use Carbs and Cals

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-5409361/Can-spot-difference-healthy-meals.html
Click to expand...

I'm not sure what the comparison is. Carbs and Cals gives individual food items, shown on a plate, and gives the weight of that portion. (Yes, I know it also contains some mixed meals with more than one ingredient). If someone chooses to add an extra egg or an extra piece of apple, or a slug of olive oil of course the calorie count will go up, but that isn't the fault of Carbs & Cals.
I found it invaluable when I was starting out, and still use it now. It served me very well.
 
I need to carb count and estimated carbs from the pictures in Carbs and Cals against MyFitnessPal and some scales together for 2 weeks while double checking the carbs from the food packets and found Carbs and Cals (the pictures) underestimated carbs by 35%
 
I use both Carbs and Cals and MyFitness Pal. I have found that you have to be very careful with MyFitnessPal because some of the entries are from people from USA and they calculate carbs differently in USA. In UK the figure is for carbs with the fibre taken off. In USA the fibre is still included and you have to do another calculation to take the fibre off the carb amount.
 

What are you trying to do?
How low carb are you attempting to go?
I'm happy to give you some info about veg and what's best if you like.
 

I think Carbs and Cals is an excellent way of teaching people to learn which foods have carbs in, and to help people to learn to estimate.

Without a ruler included in each picture to show the size of the plate, the cutlery and the food (to the millimetre) then the pictures will only ever be a rough guide allowing for rough comparisons. That is ok. The book isn’t pretending to be anything more than that.

When we are at home we can be as precise as we like with scales and rulers and calculations. However, when out and about Carbs and Cals comes into its own, allowing estimates of food. Let’s face it, unless we pull a portable set of scales out in a restaurant, we are stuck with estimates, and Carbs and Cals makes that much easier than working blind.
 
Please do I need help I have been piling on the veg except potatoes as I know they are very high in carbs.I want to get as low as 30 carbs daily so I can lose weight at moment I have put on over a stone and lost 4lb but that has gone back on again.I eat meat and veg for meals and just a nut breakfast bar for breakfast of 8 carbs.
 
Personally I have never bothered to worry about the Carbs that are contained in vegetables, and I always eats tons of the stuff.

I couldn't cope with micro-managing my diet to that extent.
 
I am finding it hard as it seems I have to have less of everything except meat cheese and butter I have been so depressed about it and want to make this work but if I have to weigh everything it seems impossible.
 
I agree there are times particularly when eating out you have to estimate cals and carbs by just looking at a plate. The book allows you to practice this. This is what diabetics had to do 30 years ago before apps on mobile phones and even food labels
 
Motherhen2014 said:
I am finding it hard as it seems I have to have less of everything except meat cheese and butter I have been so depressed about it and want to make this work but if I have to weigh everything it seems impossible.
Click to expand...

Weighing stuff is only temporary. You only need to do it once for each type of food. I found it easier to measure by the spoonful after that. This is accurate enough, and counting things like berries, tomatoes and nuts. Once you know how much a spoonful weighs it becomes automatic. It really isn't impossible.
 
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