In the olden days, desserts, the course enjoyed post mealtime used to be a simple serving of fruit or bread sweetened with honey. With the invention of sugar, the refined crystalline sweetener from sugar beet or sugar cane, pretty much all foods could be sweetened to make it more palatable and/or preserve it in the absence of refrigeration. With this came the countless applications of sugar in food and dessert preparation. There wasn’t much concern about diabetes during the olden times.
Some gourmets liken doing away with dessert to watching a movie but not the ending or skipping the last chapter of a book. Not only is there something missing, but there is a recognized benefit to ending a meal with a palate cleanser that can help digest the meal.
With everything in life becoming automated and convenient people are more and more sedentary, living with less physical activity and exercise. Coupled with “advancements” in the food industry like the invention of fast food, canned goods, heavily-processed junk food the incidence of obesity, heart disease and diabetes has become alarming high. These rank among the top causes of death in many developed countries.
Desserts have the tendency to be the culprit in diabetes because of the excessive amount of sugar they normally contain. Beverages are an aggravating factor as well. Diet drinks and sodas though low in calories (some diet sodas are even zero calorie) are made with artificial sweeteners, chemical substances made in laboratories that do not have any nutritional benefit.
With the global trend of going back to nature, there have been a lot of sugar substitutes that sweeten foods but have a low-glycemic index. This pertains to how a food affects blood sugar levels upon its consumption. A rapid rise in blood sugar levels is harmful for people suffering from diabetes, a disorder affecting the way a person’s body uses food for energy. Sugar is normally digested and broken down to glucose which then circulates in the blood where cells eventually use it as fuel. Diabetes affects the process of the pancreas’ production of the hormone insulin which helps glucose absorption.
People with diabetes are recommended by their doctors to refrain from consuming too much sugary and starchy food. However, they are seldom told to completely eliminate these from the diet.
Use natural low-glycemic sweeteners in preparing desserts and diabetics can have their sweet ending without fear. As for other ingredients, low-glycemic food lists can be researched online or requested from doctors. These can serve as a guide in preparing and consuming foods. Everything in moderation though as even low-glycemic food still contains calories from other ingredients like flour, butter and eggs. If artificially sweetened, they can also cause laxative effects.