When it comes to healthy tricks- knowing how to increase resistant starches in foods should definitely be in your health toolbox.
So, in case you don’t know already– Resistant starches are a type of carbohydrate that can resist digestion in the small intestine and reach the large intestine, where they can feed the good bacteria in your gut.
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Benefits of resistant starches
Now both of these two things are really important, especially for those with insulin resistance. This is because resistant starches, since they’re not digested in the small intestine, can help keep blood sugar from spiking.
Short-chain fatty acids
The second reason resistant starches are really important is that they help produce short-chain fatty acids in the large intestine by becoming food for the good gut bacteria through fermentation. They’re really good at this because they’re not absorbed in the small intestine and can reach the colon intact.
Short-chain fatty acids play a crucial role in maintaining gut health and have been linked to various health benefits, such as reducing inflammation, promoting satiety, and improving insulin sensitivity.
Short-chain fatty acids can reduce inflammation in the gut and the body, which can help prevent chronic diseases like inflammatory bowel disease and type 2 diabetes.
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Short-chain fatty acids can also improve insulin sensitivity, which can help regulate blood sugar levels and reduce the risk of developing diabetes.
Short-chain fatty acids are believed to support the immune system and protect against certain types of cancer.
And, as a bonus, Short chain fatty acids also play a role in regulating hunger and satiety, which can help with weight loss or maintenance.
Overall, Short chain fatty acids are an important component of a healthy gut and a healthy body.
Foods that Contain Resistant Starches
One way to increase your intake of resistant starches is to add foods that naturally contain them to your diet.
There are many foods that contain high amounts of resistant starches. Some examples include:
- Green bananas: Unripe bananas are a great source of resistant starch. Just remember that as the banana ripens, the starch is converted into simple sugars.
- Beans and legumes: Foods like lentils, chickpeas, black beans, and navy beans are all great sources of resistant starches.
- Oats: Oats are not only high in fiber, but they also contain resistant starches.
- Whole grains: Whole grains like barley, rye, and quinoa contain high amounts of resistant starches.
- Nuts and seeds: Some nuts and seeds, such as almonds and pumpkin seeds, contain resistant starches.
How to Increase Resistant Starches
One thing we’ve learned in the last couple of decades is that foods made with refined flour like pasta are really bad for blood sugar levels because they cause spikes. This is something even those without insulin resistance want to avoid for metabolic health but truly needs to be avoided for those with insulin resistance conditions like prediabetes, type 2 diabetes, and PCOS, among others.
A few years ago, some researchers from the University of Surrey were curious about what happens to pasta when you cook it and cool it in terms of resistant starches. What they found is that the starches actually increase when the pasta was cooked and then cooled, which helped blunt the blood sugar response.
Then they went a step further and cooked it, cooled it, then reheated it—and what they found is that this next step reduced blood sugar spikes by 50%!
The study was then repeated and confirmed by a peer-reviewed study in 2019.
This study cites that other reviews also showed the same results with rice, potatoes, and maize porridge.
This is important, not only because of the difference in blood sugar response but also because increasing the resistant starches decreases the number of calories absorbed. This matters for weight loss, gain, or maintenance.
Just know that this isn’t permission to go crazy with pasta and rice if you’re insulin resistant—you still need to manage the total amount of carbohydrates. But it does give a few more options in terms of better carbohydrates.
Guidelines for increasing resistant starches in foods:
- Cook the food,
- cool it at least 12 hours,
- then reheat it so it’s hot,
- and eat it while it’s hot.
The best carbs to use the cooking/cooling trick:
- Pasta
- Potatoes
- Sweet potatoes
- Beans/lentils
- Rice
- Oats
- Other Whole grains
How to know it’s helping your blood sugar:
One thing to note about anything with nutrition is that results from studies and trials give an average—meaning that things don’t react the exact same way for every single person. So just know that you could have a different response in some way than even someone you’re related to.
That being said, the only way to know is just to Test it!
You can do this using a manual blood glucose monitor or a continuous glucose monitor.
How to test your blood sugar levels to determine the effects of food:
- Check blood sugar immediately before eating;
- Check @ 1 hour and 2 hours after, which is called the postprandial blood glucose level;
- Test it against the food when you didn’t cook and then cool to truly see the difference.
Now when you’re doing this—think of it as a science experiment- (make sure to use as few variables and same conditions—same recipe, same time of day, same meal, same order of macros, etc) to get as accurate a result as possible.
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