Issue 5.3.19 “3rd Cause of Inflammation – Carbs” – Your Health Detective

Almost everyone loves carbohydrates – breads, pasta, sweets, desserts – many form American diet basics. However, these foods come at great cost to our health. Let’s take a look at what carbohydrates do in our bodies and steps to prevent inflammation.

Consequences of High Carbohydrate Foods (click on image to enlarge)

Starches (high carbohydrate foods) and refined sugar enter the bloodstream quickly, causing sugar spikes. Then, your body produces insulin (hormone) that drives sugar from bloodstream into cells. Eventually excessive insulin levels make muscle cells lose sensitivity to the hormone – leading to type-2 diabetes and heart disease. Now, fat cells are another story – they always remain sensitive – insulin spikes lock fat into them, so you CAN’T use it for energy but propels weight gain.

How To Break the Carb/Sugar Inflammation Cycle?

Happily, you don’t need a faddish extreme diet. The first step is reduced blood sugar spikes producing sharp insulin increases. Most responsible for these surges is starch (carbohydrates), anything made from potatoes, rice, most flours, corn, or other high carb grains –– cut out these entirely.

Wouldn’t it be great if there is a way to solve the problem without completely eliminating tasty foods? There is! My new cookbook is all about learning to use alternative foods that not only control blood sugar but also DO NOT induce inflammation!

Learn to blunt blood sugar-raising effects by taking advantage of natural substances in foods that slow carbohydrate digestion and entry into the bloodstream. Here are three powerful tips you can use to reduce carbohydrate impact and create for yourself the Anti-Inflammation Advantage™.

Advantage Tip Number 1

Have a fatty snack 10-30 minutes before meals – helps you remain fuller, providing more satiety.

At the stomach outlet is a muscular ring, the pyloric valve – regulates speed at which food leaves your stomach and enters small intestine. This valve is all that stands between the ziti in your stomach and a surge of glucose in your bloodstream. But you can send your pyloric valve a message to slow down. Fat triggers a reflex that constricts the valve and slows digestion. As little as a teaspoon of fat – a handful of nuts or a piece of cheese – does the trick, provided you eat it BEFORE your meal.

Advantage Tip Number 2

Have some apple cider vinegar (ACV) containing the “mother” – it slows breakdown of starch into sugar. The high acetic acid content in vinegar deactivates amylase, the enzyme that turns starch into sugar. Because ACV acts on starch only, it has no effect on the absorption of refined sugar – helps if you eat bread, not candy. Bonus Benefit: ACV also increases the body’s sensitivity to insulin. Drink the vinegar at the START of your meal…OR…in salad dressing, sprinkled on meat or vegetables – vinegar brings out the flavor of food, as salt does.

Advantage Tip Number 3

Include protein with your meal. Starchy Vegetables – potatoes, corn, green peas, raise blood sugar levels.

Here’s a paradox: You need to blunt insulin spikes, to do that, you need to start secreting insulin sooner rather than later – like a fire department responding to a fire, the quicker the alarm sounds, the fewer firefighters needed to extinguish the blaze.

Even though protein contains no glucose, it triggers a “first-phase insulin response” that occurs so fast, it keeps your blood sugar from rising high later…AND…reduces total amount of insulin you need to handle a meal…SO…have meatballs with your sweet potatoes!

Yes, I’m Your Health Detective and Creator/Executive Chef of “Dr. Gloria’s Kitchen” along with my business partner and Sous Chef who patiently and trustingly was propelled into our taste-tester and worked diligently as a master graphic designer/producer to create a book that is easy to understand, easy to cook, and has “flavor” to make it “appetizing” and inspiring.

I created the cookbook and instructional videos because so many of my patients were un-inspired, un-motivated or downright intimidated in their kitchen when it came to finding tasty, easy recipes for their health maladies, particularly the underlying inflammation. More and more each day I was asked how I can travel and eat out, cook and eat gourmet food yet not induce inflammation and all the disorders that ensue as a result like fibromyalgia, arthritis, gout, diabetes, gluten-intolerance, candida, etc.

My motivation was seeing the positive results in myself and my patients when specific dietary modifications are made. I knew it was time to get my Cooking Institute in full gear and we began to work on the project that I’d personally began more than fifteen years ago…putting my well-researched time-tested proven anti-inflammatory recipes in print and video. I live what I teach, and all my cooking has paid off because I’m free of inflammation and happily have a more satisfying and healthy quality of life than I’ve ever had…food IS my medicine, and it CAN be yours as well!

Since there are only 24 hours in a day (although I constantly try to find a way to get more but haven’t succeeded…will let you know when I do)! I subsequently launched the Cooking Institute division under my Institute for Wholistic Rejuvenation. In addition to me taking your hand in the kitchen and guiding you to wellness, we’ll have guest chefs sharing some of their “secrets” to successfully cooking for clients with food allergies, inflammation and some regional favorites adapted to be anti-inflammatory.

Update on My Global Patient Consulting: Many have asked if I continue to consult with patients worldwide via telephone and email, the answer is definitely, YES. I also continue to write and publish (this is my 29th book) …AND…I’m determined in my 72nd year not to slow down – I figure that way old-age never catches me!

SPECIAL OFFER to all those who have followed My Health Detective Blog since its inception, if you haven’t yet, click on the link BELOW to download a FREE copy of my 40+ page recipe sampler “The Anti-Inflammation Advantage” in full-color. As recipes are added you will automatically receive all updates via email at NO CHARGE. This delivery method allows you to begin creating your own “Anti-Inflammation Recipe Library” either electronically or in print.

The instructional videos will be explained via email to all who take advantage of the FREE eBook. As our continued commitment to provide our followers and patients Health thru Education™, there will NEVER be a charge for the recipes. I can proudly say that this isn’t your ordinary cookbook, it also goes into detail about the causes and contributing factors of inflammation including, but not limited to:

Foods that “ignite” inflammation
Food additives/preservatives/flavor enhancers
How specific grains convert to sugar and healthy alternatives
Sugar/Artificial Sweeteners
Nightshades
Candida (yeast over-growth)
Dangerous trans-fats
The role of pH in inflammation

Don’t miss this opportunity, CLICK the link to download your FREE cookbook now and the opportunity to join-in on our virtual cooking classes: drgloriaskitchen.com/healthdetective/

AND…share the link with your friends and family so they too can be inspired to cook healthy and gain the “Anti-Inflammation Advantage”.