Fruit vs Starch

Carbohydrates are an important part of this diet and any diet, because of the role they play in the body.

It’s your primary energy source while active, and necessary for optimal thyroid function, which is what controls your body’s whole metabolism. Sure the body can convert fats and protein into carbohydrates if it has to for survival. Constantly putting pressure on the body though to do this conversion all day, every day for all your energy needs say in the Keto and Carnivore Diet, is what makes it all fall apart in the end.

It’s like trying to get your body to hold a plank indefinitely. At some point, it’s going to tire and fail.

So carbohydrates are necessary and the choices generally given are these:-

Grains – starch

Vegetables like potatoes – starch

Fruit-like vegetables like pumpkin, squash, zucchini, peppers – combination of starch & sugar

Fruit – mostly sugar but some like bananas are also a combination of starch and sugar

Extracted sugar like honey, maple syrup, refined sugar – sugar

Now as I mentioned on Day 2, the top option – GRAINS – is one of the foods we keep away from. There are many reasons for this and this article explains why – click here.

The only two grain products we can have occasionally are white rice because this is the only grain that doesn’t cause gas, bloating or additional damage to the gut. The other is additive-free white sour dough bread. It should have only 3 ingredients – flour, salt, starter. This is ok because the fermenting process pre-digests the wheat, making it easier to digest and makes it easier on the gut. However they both should only be eaten occasionally, like twice a week because of the starch factor.

In the list of carbohydrates, you may have wondered why I bothered to separate the sources identifying  STARCH and SUGAR. This is an important distinction by Dr Ray Peat pertaining to optimal health.

Starch is problematic in the body in a numbers of ways, here are some quotes from Ray that give you the picture:-

“Because of their glycemia, starches tend to cause blood sugar dysregulation compared to fructose and sugar (sucrose), promoting the effects of adrenaline, cortisol, stored PUFA, endotoxin, and estrogen.”

“Starches increase the stress hormones, interfering with progesterone and thyroid.”

“Rather than the sustained hyperglycemia which is measured for determining the glycemic index, I think the “diabetogenic” or “carcinogenic” action of starch has to do with the stress reaction that follows the intense stimulation of insulin release.”

“Starches can feed bacteria in the lower portion of the intestines if not digested quickly, increasing intestinal toxin burden and fermentation of carbohydrates which can stress the liver and produce changes in the metabolic rate, mood, and mediators of inflammation (like serotonin, estrogen, endotoxin). Excessive endotoxin exposure affects the liver’s production of cholesterol (not favorable).”

So because starch is all glucose, it’s impact on insulin is intense, plus it causes all kind of endotoxin issues in the gut. So fruit and sugar are the preferred carbohydrate source.

A bit mind blowing right?

We’ve been told sugar is the devil for so long now!

Tomorrow I will go into a little more detail about exactly why sugar is favoured.

 

Kristy x