60 Ways to Lower Your Blood Sugar

by Dennis Pollock

  Another issue that raises the cost of low-carb foods is that these days you can’t find many of them in regular grocery stores. You can find low-carb products through various specialty stores on the Internet. If you live in a big city there are probably a few low-carb stores scattered throughout the city, but you aren’t likely to find many of these foods at Walmart or Kroger.

  Going to a low-carb store is the essence of mixed emotions. At first your eyes light up as you see all kinds of low-carb foods, candies, syrups, desserts, mixes, muffins, and so forth. But then you start checking the prices. Suddenly your elation turns into dismay. The prices seem ridiculous, far higher than those for their starchy, sugar-filled counterparts at your local grocery store. If you are cheap and not all that wealthy, and a little bit stubborn (guilty on all counts!), you tend to rebel. You buy a token product or two and leave most of the pricey items for others.

  There is hope! While you cannot do away with paying a little above and beyond the normal cost of eating, you can modify the cost quite a bit. First, you can make a number of foods yourself. At one point I got excited about low-carb bread. I had been eating bread with about 8 net grams of carbs per slice, but found there was one for sale that had only 1 net gram of carbs for each slice. Wow! The bread looked great in the picture, it had all kinds of fiber, and I decided to track down the one store I could find in the Dallas area that carried it.

  But when I arrived at my destination my excitement turned to disappointment. The bread sold for about eight dollars a loaf. And the loaf was soooo scrawny! I was intending to buy two loaves, but changed my mind and picked up one instead. But I never got out of the store with it. As I carried it around, looking for other products, I became more and more upset with the idea of spending this much money for a puny little loaf. I knew I would never be able to make this my “go-to” bread, and sadly placed it back where I found it, next to its high-priced brothers.

  The story sounds discouraging, but it has a happy ending. I went home and started checking out low-carb bread recipes. I found one that looked encouraging, bought a bread machine, and made myself a delicious loaf of low-carb bread. Not only was it much cheaper (I estimate the ingredients might have cost a little over $2) but it was a larger loaf. And with the bread machine there was very little work to it. I simply dumped the ingredients in, turned it on, and a few hours later had wonderful low-carb bread. And to make the whole process even more of a deal (now, don’t tell anybody this!), I found the bread machine in great condition at a garage sale for $20.

  Another cost-cutting step is to refuse to be bullied by complex recipes. You will find a number of recipes that call for all sorts of spices and other small items that can safely be forgotten about. Remember that recipes aren’t the Bible—they are not divinely inspired. You can leave things out, and you can substitute a cheaper item for a pricey one.

  Feel free to experiment. When my low-carb muffin recipe called for a third of a cup of club soda I tried it that way. But I never use club soda for anything else and it seemed a waste to buy a liter of it for the sake of the one-third cup. So the next time I tried good old tap water and couldn’t see or taste any difference. Au revoir, club soda!

  There are so many low-carb recipes for great foods, snacks, muffins, breads, and desserts on the Internet that you could spend a hundred lifetimes trying them all and still never be finished. With a little effort you can find all sorts of foods and recipes that won’t raise your blood sugar much and will allow you to eat to your heart’s content. And check out the low-carb Internet websites. Their shipping fees are painful, but by ordering a lot you bring the price per item down. Freeze what you won’t eat for a while. Low-carb bagels are often hard to come by in stores, and by ordering six or more packages and then freezing all but one, you won’t do too badly.

  Yes, low-carbing will probably cost you a bit more than what you would spend on the standard American diet. But in truth you are saving, not losing. The extra money you spend is one of the best investments you’ll ever make, and could end up saving you a fortune in medical bills, lost time spent in hospital rooms, and years of your life cut off. Make the necessary sacrifices, and spend the money and time required to live a healthy lifestyle. You’re worth it!

  There is a price to be paid in time spent when you make foods from scratch. Being the cheapo that I am, I am nearly as tight with my time as I am with my money. But the way to keep this from being too much problem is to make large recipes and freeze part of the food.

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  The Humble Yet Mighty Flaxseed

  When our Creator designed the flax plant, He surely must have had diabetics in mind! The flaxseeds it produces are nutritious, tasty, bursting with fiber, and have almost no net carbs. Any diabetic who does not become close friends with flax is missing something good. Laura Dolson, writing for about.com, comments,

  The flaxseed carries one of the biggest nutrient payloads on the planet. And while it’s not technically a grain, it has a similar vitamin and mineral profile to grains, while the amount of fiber, antioxidants, and Omega-3 fatty acids in flax leaves grains in the dust.9

  The amazing thing about flaxseed is that when you compare the total carbs with the fiber carbs they are nearly one and the same. My box of milled flaxseeds lists 4 grams of total carbohydrates per 2 tablespoons, and then lists 4 grams of dietary fiber for this same amount. This means almost none of what you are eating is having any effect on your blood sugar. You will totally stuff yourself on flax long before you ever do any serious raising of your blood-sugar level.

  Along with spinach, cucumbers, chicken, fish, and a number of other foods, here is a food you can enjoy and indulge in without any concern. If only there were a way to incorporate this stuff in our diets. The good news is—there is! The long-ignored flaxseed is starting to get the press it deserves, and we are beginning to see it pop up all over the place in various recipes for diabetics and low-carbers. Of course one of the simplest ways to use it is to add it to various foods you are already eating. It has a delicate, nutty taste that will most likely improve them in flavor, help fill you up, and provide you with nutrients without adding a smidge of blood-sugar-raising carbs. (Okay, maybe it will add a smidge, but not more than that. Definitely not three smidges!)

  Milled flaxseed got a major boost in popularity when a fitness trainer showed a television doctor how you can make a muffin in a mug in your microwave, using flaxseed as its primary ingredient. This sounds unbelievable, and when I first heard about it I had my doubts. But when I tested it I found it not only produces a muffin, but the muffin tastes pretty good. Here is the recipe:

  Flaxseed Muffin-in-a-Mug

  Ingredients:

  1/4 cup of ground (milled) flaxseed

  1 teaspoon of baking powder

  2 teaspoons of cinnamon

  1 teaspoon of coconut oil

  1 egg

  1/2 packet of stevia (or any sugar substitute)

  Instructions:

  Thoroughly beat the egg in a mug first, then add the other ingredients and mix until well blended. Put the mug in your microwave and set it for about 90 seconds. Voilà! The muffin pops easily out of the mug and you can put butter on it or cream cheese and have a real treat. Granted, it doesn’t brown this way as muffins do in the oven, but the taste is decent, especially with a little sugar-free jelly on it. And you almost feel guilty enjoying something this much, fixing it this easily, and knowing that it has almost no effect on your blood sugar.

  There are an infinite number of variations and substitutes that you can incorporate. You can leave out the cinnamon if you don’t care for it. You can use regular cooking oil instead of coconut oil. You can add all sorts of low-carb items, like a few berries, sliced almonds, or sunflower seeds. You can also microwave the mixture in a large bowl or a plate with upturned edges rather than in a mug, and it will turn out more in the shape of flat bread. You could even make a couple of these and use them as hamburger buns.

  This is just one example o
f what you can do with flax. You can use milled flaxseed to make extremely low-carb pizza crust, you can use it in bread recipes (see chapter 10), you can make hot cereal with it, you can use it in making protein fiber shakes, and there is even a recipe for “miracle brownies” based on flaxseed. And if pure flaxseed is too much for you, in many recipes you can substitute a corresponding amount of soy flour for about half the flaxseed called for, which will produce a slightly milder taste.

  Get on the Internet, go to your favorite search engine, type in “flaxseed recipes,” and start trying things. And don’t be afraid to experiment and make changes to suit your taste, as long as you are not substituting a high-carb product for a low-carb one. To keep your meals from being boring and increase your chances of staying low-carb for life, you need as large a repertoire of meals, snacks, and recipes as possible. Flaxseed can be one of your go-to ingredients that helps to enlarge that repertoire.

  One word of caution: when you start eating quite a bit of flaxseed you will probably be ingesting more fiber than your body is used to. It may take some time for it to get used to it, and there may be some protest at the beginning. So you may want to go a little slow at first and gradually work your way to more fiber.

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  Bean Power

  High in protein, high in fiber, rich in antioxidants, and loaded with minerals, the humble bean is a powerhouse food. Studies abound that show positive effects of beans for diabetics and prediabetics. Trading in pastas and regular bread for beans has been shown to lower overall blood sugar, as well as fasting blood sugar, and prevent the post-meal spikes in blood sugar that are so common for insulin-resistant diabetics.

  The bean has been blessed with over-the-top levels of fiber—far more than most other foods. These fibers not only can be deducted from the total carbohydrate count, since they don’t raise blood sugar, but they actually work to prevent other foods from spiking your blood sugar as they make their way through the intestines. From myhealingkitchen.com:

  Beans also are high in soluble fiber, which binds to carbohydrates and slows their digestion into the bloodstream, preventing wild swings in blood-sugar levels. They also contain generous amounts of resistant starch, which means that beans are less digestible than other carbs in the small intestine, so they move into the large intestine faster. Once there, they behave like a dietary fiber, limiting the sharp rise of glucose levels and insulin that can follow a meal, even one that is filled with refined carbohydrates.

  One could write a large book about beans, but for our purposes we focus on the knowledge that you really need to get them in your diet.

  First, though, we do need a few words of wisdom about beans. Beans do have significant carbohydrates, and even with their high fiber content, there are still a number of carbs that can raise your blood-sugar level.

  Second, canned beans are always going to be worse, in every way, than a bag of dried beans you cook yourself. They will have more salt, often added sugar, and they will affect your blood sugar more. Give up the canned beans and invest a little time working with the dried ones.

  Beans are slow to digest, so your blood-sugar levels will take longer to reach their peak after eating beans rather than other foods. When you first try a meal heavy on beans, you should check your blood sugar an hour after you finish your meal, and then check it again in 30 minutes, and then again 30 minutes later (two hours after the meal). You will likely find that it keeps rising a bit in that second hour. But in most cases, if your portion of beans was moderate, your blood sugar should fall within acceptable levels.

  Because beans do have a significant amount of carbs (even deducting their fiber) you want to be moderate. A large bowl of beans in a soup with little else but beans is probably not the way you want to go. It is far better to put a more moderate amount of beans over a very low-carb bread. With the low-carb bread as a base you don’t need as many beans to fill you up.

  Now by low-carb bread I don’t mean any bread you find on your grocery-store shelf. Even the double-fiber breads are probably going to be too much for you when you add the beans. Remember this simple rule: “Don’t allow two major sources of carbs in the same meal.” Below is a simple recipe for a low-carb bread you can make in your microwave in 90 seconds. The bread’s tiny amount of carbs—about 2 grams—will allow you to enjoy a generous portion of cooked beans on top without straining your pancreas or overloading your blood-sugar-processing system:

  Bread in a Bowl

  1. Melt 1 tablespoon butter in a bowl.

  2. Add one egg to melted butter.

  3. Mix in 2 tablespoons of flaxseed meal.

  4. Mix in 1 tablespoon of soy flour.

  5. Mix in small amount of baking powder.

  6. Mix everything very thoroughly.

  7. Mix in 1 packet of stevia.

  8. Cook in the bowl in a microwave for 1 minute 30 seconds.

  9. Now pour a generous portion of your cooked beans all over the bread and enjoy. When I first enjoyed this meal I could hardly wait to test my blood sugar an hour later to see if this was going to be an acceptable food. When the results were well within the limits I set for myself (145 mg/dl or lower) I knew I could start enjoying this as one of my go-to lunches. It was a great day for me! And when I found out that my wife could cook a mean lentil soup that also proved acceptable, I was doubly blessed!

  While most beans are pretty close in terms of total carbs, there are significant differences in their percentage of fiber, and therefore the net grams of carbs. Below is a table of some of the common types of beans you will find on your grocer’s shelves. You will notice that some are far lower in net carbs than others. (Pinto beans can vary a lot, depending on the brand you buy). Naturally you should gravitate to the beans that have the higher fiber and the lower net carbs. The values below are based on 1/4 cup of dried beans. You would do well to eat primarily those beans that have a net carb gram value in the single digits.

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  Strawberries—You Gotta Love ’Em

  I am happy to announce some really great news: Strawberries are relatively low in carbohydrates! And what makes that such great news? Well, if I tell you that cucumbers are low in carbs, or that celery is low in carbs (which are both true), you will add that bit of knowledge to your knowledge base, but it probably won’t make you leap for joy, because these foods are simply not that exciting. After all, whoever heard of celery shortcake or cucumber shortcake? But everyone has heard of strawberry shortcake!

  I grew up loving this taste sensation and still do. But when I developed blood-sugar problems I figured I had to give it up. I was wrong! I can still enjoy strawberries, thanks to the wonderful news that an average-sized strawberry has about one gram of net carbs. This means I can enjoy a bowl of seven or eight strawberries and not do that much to my blood sugar. I can slice several of these babies and put them in a salad. I can slice up three or four and put them in my low-carb cereal. And I can add several to low-carb yogurt in my blender and make a delicious smoothie.

  Not only are strawberries relatively low-carb and tasty; they are also nutritious. They can give oranges a run for their money when it comes to vitamin C (bet you didn’t know that) and they contain all sorts of minerals, other vitamins, and antioxidants, which do the body good. And on top of all of this they come in a pretty red color. Who could ask for more?

  But for me, the greatest and tastiest form of strawberries is in strawberry shortcake. And while this can be safe for the diabetic, the one thing you cannot do is use the little yellow, spongy shortcakes that you find in your local grocery store. Just one of those scrawny little cakes has between 17 and 20 grams of carbs with almost no fiber. We will have to come up with a low-carb version.

  But low-carb does not mean bad-tasting! There are a number of low-carb shortcake recipes available. Some of the ones that come closest to the original yellow cakes are a bit complicated, and I don’t like complicated. So I have come up with a few of my own that do the job nicely, as far as I’m concerne
d.

  A simple way to have strawberry shortcake is to use any low-carb muffins you have on hand (recipe in chapter 16). Just split the muffin into two or three slices, add about four sliced and mashed strawberries, and spray a little whipped cream on top. Or you can take any low-carb muffin recipe, bake the batter in a pan rather than in a muffin tin, and then divide into individual sizes when it is done. Another option is to simply put strawberries on a couple of low-carb pancakes (recipe in chapter 19).

  The only caveat concerning strawberries is that carbs will eventually add up, so you can’t just fill a bowl with 20 or 30 of these babies and eat to your heart’s content. And, of course, if you are allergic to them you need to avoid them altogether. But for most of us, strawberries can really add a little pizzazz to a low-carb diet.

  Another idea for strawberry shortcake: you can take a slice of the low-carb bread made in your bread machine (see chapter 10), cut off the edges, and use that as the base of your shortcake. It has a spongy texture that will remind you a bit of the store-bought shortcakes, and by the time the strawberries and whipped cream are poured on it, it is pretty good.

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