Feedback—Your FAQs Answered

I am a 40-year old American woman with a history of slow and steady weight gain. My doctor says I have insulin resistance and should adopt a low GI diet. I have looked at your books on Amazon but can’t decide which one would be best for me.
Low GI eating means adopting a ‘this for that’ approach to changing what you eat – swapping high GI foods for low GI foods within the same food groups that you are already eating. Any of the following books would be helpful and all contain GI tables.

• If you want to keep it simple, we would recommend Low GI Eating Made Easy. It includes a week of suggestions for low GI eating plus the top 100 low GI foods and ideas and simple recipes for including them in your diet. Many people find it’s all they need to make the switch.
• If you would like a specific weight loss plan to motivate and guide you, then The Low GI Diet Revolution with its detailed 12-week menu and exercise program would be a better choice.
• If you want to read about the science behind the GI and get the answers to the 50 most common questions we have been asked over the years, you should take a look at The New Glucose Revolution. The 3rd US edition has just been published. It also has 50 recipes.
• The Shopper’s Guide is an annual publication that helps people stay up to date with all the latest GI values.
• The Diabetes and Pre-diabetes Handbook by Jennie and her co-authors has just been published in Australia and New Zealand. The US edition is expected out in July 2007.

My friend states categorically that sugar is sugar whether it’s in drinks or fruit. She says it’s the total amount of sugar that counts, not the type.
We are often asked if there’s a difference between naturally occurring sugars and refined sugars that you add to food. Here’s what Prof Jennie Brand Miller says in The New Glucose Revolution (3rd US edition). ‘Naturally occurring sugars are those found in milk and other dairy products and fruits and vegetables, including their juices. Refined sugar means added sugar, table sugar, honey, maple syrup, or corn syrup. Both sources include varying amounts of sucrose, glucose, fructose, and lactose. Some nutritionists make a distinction between them, because natural sugars are usually accompanied by micronutrients such as vitamin C. The rate of digestion and absorption of naturally occurring sugars is no different, on average, from that of refined sugars. There is, however, wide variation within food groups, depending on the food. The GI of fruits varies, from 25 for grapefruit to 76 for watermelon. Similarly, among the foods containing refined sugar, some are low GI and some are high. The GI of sweetened, low-fat yoghurt is only 26 to 28, while a Milky Way bar (a Mars bar in Canada) has a GI of 62.