ONE of the most common challenges that people the world over face is that of eating healthy and controlling meal portions.
Some of us struggle with it to help with weight issues, others have to keep an eye on their food intake for particular health conditions while some just want to maintain a healthy lifestyle.
Whatever the motivation, one thing is true for Malaysians–and those with non-Western diets–it is a lot harder to find nutritional information, such as the glycemic index, about local fare as opposed to Western dishes.
A recent collaboration between two institutions–one in Malaysia and the other in Singapore–to chart the glycemic index of Asian foods is the first step in rectifying this.
Dr Sangeetha Shyam from IMU's Centre for Transformative Nutrition and Health (CTNH) says DIETPLUS Version 3 is a programme that works as a Malaysian GI and nutrient calculator.
It was created to support low GI dietary studies in Malaysia. This was in 2010 and this calculator has since been freely circulated to all Malaysian nutrition and health researchers.
However, this has not been enough and with GI gaining a lot more traction from the profession as well as individual folk, there has been an urgent need to update and improve the accuracy and accessibility of the glycemic index of Malaysian foods.
Over the last two years, Dr Sangeetha was one of five scientists from IMU-CTNH and A-Star Singapore that collaborated to put together a GI compendium of non-Western foods.
Together, the team managed to put together a list of 940 foods from 16 Asian and Middle Eastern countries including Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan, Hong Kong, India, Sri Lanka, UAE and Saudi Arabia.
WHAT IS GI?
Carbohydrates are broken down to sugar during digestion and are absorbed into the blood. This then affects our blood sugar levels. GI is a number that indicates the quality of carbohydrates in foods. The higher the GI of a food, the higher and more rapidly it raises blood sugar when consumed.
Food is categorised as having a high GI if its GI value is 70 and above. Foods with a GI of 56 to 69 are placed in the medium GI category. A low GI food has a GI of 55 or lower.
For example, roti jala with chicken curry has a GI of 81, chiffon cake has 60 while yellow-fleshed watermelon has a GI of 47.
"Knowing these numbers is important for consumers to make an informed choice especially for those who want to watch their weight or control their diabetes," says Dr Sangeetha.
She adds that GI values have become even more important in light of today's Covid-19 pandemic.
It has made us acutely aware of the health implications of unhealthy diets, obesity and diabetes.
Both diabetes and obesity are associated with raised blood sugar levels that increase inflammation. High levels of inflammation can compromise immunity and make people more susceptible to infections.
QUALITY OVER QUANTITY
Controlling carbohydrates has long been the focus with low-carb, high-protein diets still very popular. While it seems logical that reducing our intake of carbs will help us reduce blood sugar levels, mainstream scientific evidence does not support low-carbohydrate diets.
According to Dr Sangeetha, it is unnecessary and even dangerous to completely cut out carbohydrates as the current evidence and mainstream consensus is that both high and low-carbohydrate diets increase mortality.
"Very low carbohydrate or keto diets are considered experimental and lacking in evidence in terms of long-term safety," she says.
According to her, a good balance is when carbohydrates provide about half of our energy needs.
In Asia, our diets are particularly high in carbohydrates. In a typical Asian diet, 50 to 80 per cent of energy comes from carbs, way higher than Western diets which tend to be heavier on proteins.
Dr Sangeetha says drastically reducing or completely cutting out carbohydrates from an Asian diet would mean that our plates would have little or no staples and would probably cost a lot more.
"It's not sustainable–and most times not affordable–to have a low-carbohydrate diet. What is more important, and what we should focus on, is the kind of carbohydrates we ingest."
This is where GI plays an important role. The GI of a food enables us to choose the type of carbohydrates we consume by basing our diet on quality—that is, low GI foods—rather than focusing only on quantity.
While we are able to choose better quality carbs, there are other factors that affect our blood sugar levels which we cannot change, and that's our phenotypes.
Phenotypes categorise people under observable characteristics including behaviour, colour, shape and size. The Asian phenotype has been categorised as TOFI–thin on the outside, fat on the inside.
"This means that at the same BMI, an Asian has higher body fat than a Caucasian," says IMU-CTNH nutrition and dietetics professor, Winnie Chee Siew Swee.
One of the consequences of this is that we get chronic diseases such as diabetes at much lower BMIs, she explains.
Our phenotype also affects the way our bodies break down sugar.
When compared to Caucasians, Asians produce a high blood glucose response to the same amount of carbohydrates.
All of these factors build up the case of why lower GI foods are so important to Malaysians.
Our lifestyles are also more sedentary compared to those in the West. We have longer working hours, a hot and humid climate and a cultural reluctance for exercise. These add on to high rates of obesity and diabetes in the community.
It almost seems like the cards are stacked up against us, but there are simple things that you can do to take the first steps to a healthier life especially for people with diabetes, pre-diabetes or a family history of diabetes.
TIPS TO GET STARTED
*Choose lower GI versions of your staple, for example swap white bread for wholemeal or eat a different type of rice grain (Basmati rice has a lower GI at 50 as compared to Jasmine rice at 78.7).
*You can choose to combine foods more effectively. For example, when we combine rice with veggies and meat (or egg and dhal) the high GI of the rice will be lowered by the lower GI of vegetables and meat.
*Avoid over-cooking. Any process, including cooking, that makes carbs more digestible increases their GI. For instance, if you cook low GI pasta longer, its GI may increase a few points.
*Traditional Asian cuisine provides us with lots of spices and condiments such as fenugreek, cinnamon, ginger, garlic, vinegar and other herbs. These are known to lower your blood sugar response.
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