Diabetes is a malfunction of the pancreas that produces extremely high blood sugar levels. Glucose produced by processing carbohydrates normally enters the body's cells to produce energy. With diabetes, the glucose stays in the blood stream longer. Foods that are fried are common triggers to overeating. Too much food eaten all at once makes it difficult to achieve normal blood sugar levels. Also, fried foods are higher in fat and calories. It is healthier to prepare your foods by baking, roasting, broiling, poaching, steaming, grilling or stir-frying.
Healthy Diet
Eating a healthy diet is one key lifestyle change that helps manage your diabetes. This improves overall blood sugar and cholesterol levels. It reduces blood pressure and keeps your weight down to a normal range. Even if you are on medication for diabetes, you must watch your diet since it directly impacts this disease. Controlling diabetes helps prevent a wide host of fatal complications.
Fry Cooking
Frying your food increases calories, carbohydrates, fat and sodium counts. One roasted chicken leg has 264 calories, no carbohydrates, 15 grams fat and 99 mg sodium. A fried chicken leg has 431 calories, 14 grams carbohydrates, 26 grams fat and 441 mg sodium. A baked potato has 163 calories, 36 grams carbohydrates, a trace of fat and 12 mg sodium. French fries have 458 calories, 53 grams carbohydrates, 25 grams fat and 265 mg of sodium. Fry cooking takes a healthy food and makes it less healthy.
Unhealthy Fats
Fry cooking adds a lot of fat to your food. One type of unhealthy fat is saturated fat, which is found in animal-based foods and high-fat plant foods. This fat is found in palm oil and animal shortening. Saturated fat raises your cholesterol level and increases your risk of heart disease. Another unhealthy fat is trans fat, which was developed in a laboratory in order to increase shelf life of processed foods. Look for hydrogenated oil or partially hydrogenated oil on the food label. There is no safe amount of trans fat. French fries normally contain trans fat since this is the type of fat most fast food restaurants use.
Healthy Fats
One way to improve fry cooking is to fry in healthy fats. This includes monounsaturated fat that reduces your blood pressure and blood glucose levels. Monounsaturated fats are olive oils and canola oils. Polyunsaturated fat is a healthy fat as well. This fat is found in corn, safflower and soybean oils. When dining out, ask to see what type of oil the restaurant uses when frying foods.
Carbohydrates and Sodium
Carbohydrates are essential for body function since they provide the body with a supply of energy. Carbohydrates feed the brain and central nervous system. An overabundance of carbohydrates in a diabetic diet causes uncontrollable high blood sugar levels. Most of the carbohydrate content is fried food is found in the bread coating. Sodium is also needed for body functions, but an overabundance of sodium causes high blood pressure and water retention. Most fried food is salted to improve the taste.
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