Quote:
Originally Posted by
Eason 
Popcorn is a bad snack, even plain. It's a carbohydrate with little nutritional value except to make you hungrier and raise your blood sugar levels.
Although it does have little nutritional value, I find popcorn pretty filling.
From
http://www.drmirkin.com/nutrition/9566.html
Quote:
Many popular books such as Sugar Busters and The Zone give you a list of foods based on Glycemic index, and they recommend avoiding all foods that have a high glycemic index.
When you eat a food, your blood sugar level rises. The food that raises blood sugar the highest is pure table sugar. So glycemic index is a ratio of how high that food raises blood sugar in comparison to how high table sugar raises blood sugar levels. Foods whose carbohydrates break down slowly release glucose into the bloodstream slowly, so blood sugar levels do not rise high and therefore these foods have low glycemic index scores. Those that break down quickly cause a high rise in blood sugar and have a high glycemic index.
Most beans, whole grains and non-starchy vegetables have low glycemic index; while sugars, refined grains made from flour, fruits and root vegetables have a high glycemic index.
If you look at tables of glycemic index, you will see things that should bother an intelligent person. A carrot has almost the same glycemic index as sugar does. That is ridiculous. You know that a carrot is far safer for diabetics than table sugar. So scientists developed a new measure to rank foods called glycemic load. It tells you how much sugar is in the food, rather than just how high it raises blood sugar levels. To calculate glycemic load, you multiply the grams of carbohydrate in a serving of food by that food's glycemic index.
Carrots and potatoes both have a high glycemic index, but using the new glycemic load (GL), carrots dropped from high GI of 131 to a GL of 10. Potatoes fall from a GI of 121 to a GL of 45. Air-popped popcorn, with a glycemic index of 79, has a GL of 4.
Foods that are mostly water or air will not cause a steep rise in your blood sugar even if their glycemic index is high. That's why the new measure, Glycemic Load, is more useful. However, all of these tools should be used for research and not for your daily selection of foods. Use your own common sense and eat plenty of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, beans and other seeds. If you are diabetic, you can eat root vegetables and fruits with other foods to slow the rise in blood sugar they may cause.
Eat, Drink, and Be Healthy: The Harvard Medical School Guide to Healthy Eating (Simon & Schuster, June 2001), by Harvard School of Public Health professor and researcher Walter Willett, M.D.
