Counting carbohydrates is a fact of life for people managing their diabetes.
Limiting the number of carbs eaten every day is one strategy for keeping blood sugar at healthy levels and to help lose weight. Your diabetes care team will help you figure out the maximum number of carbohydrates you should eat every day for best results. It’s up to you to accurately keep track of carbs, along with calories and fat, to make sure you’re sticking to a healthy diet.
Here are the three tips from the American Diabetes Association to make the count a little less complicated:
- Make familiar meals. People think they like variety, but the truth is, most of us fall into a routine of eating the same meals in a pretty regular rotation. This kind of routine makes it much easier to keep track of things like carbohydrates and calories. Learn the carb totals in your favorite dishes ““ homemade and those at restaurants. You can use food labels, the nutrition information many restaurants post about their menus or carb counters available in books or smartphone apps. Eat the familiar foods 80 percent of the time and you’ll only have to do the math for 20 percent of your meals.
- Make a food catalog. Write down the carb totals for the foods you eat regularly. Building a library of ingredients and prepared dishes (half a cup of cooked red kidney beans compared to a portion of prepared chili containing the beans, for example) helps you plan menus and keep track of your diet. Check out the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Nutrient Data Library for information on various foods.
- Make an educated guess. Your food catalog will help you make an accurate “guesstimate” when you run across unfamiliar dishes or visit a new restaurant that doesn’t post its nutrition information where it’s readily accessible. Knowing how many carbs are in a half-cup of pasta can help you figure out the number of carbs in pasta salad at the company picnic, for example, and while the new bistro might not post its data, a restaurant you’ve been to with a similar menu likely does, and that information can help you count and plan meals.
