DietaryFibre-1

The following foods are all good sources of dietary fibre…

Wholemeal, granary and softgrain varieties of bread
Jacket potatoes, new potatoes in their skins and baked potato skins
Wholegrain breakfast cereals, eg. Weetabix, branflakes, unsweetened muesli, Shreddies and porridge oats
Wholemeal pasta and brown rice
Beans, lentils and peas
Fresh and dried fruits – particularly if the skins are eaten
Vegetables – particularly if the skins are eaten
Nuts and seeds
Wholemeal flour

How about adding bran to my breakfast cereal?
Bran is a rich source of fibre, but there are far more pleasurable and healthy ways to boost fibre intakes! Not only is raw bran quite unpalatable but it doesn’t provide the other nutrients found in fibre-rich foods such as wholemeal bread and wholegrain cereals. Plus it can reduce the absorption of certain nutrients such as iron, calcium and zinc. For this reason, it’s no longer recommended that you sprinkle raw bran onto breakfast cereal.

Is there a simple way to tell if a food is a good source of fibre?
Looking at food labels is one of the easiest ways to identify whether or not a food contains a little or a lot of fibre. The Food Standards Agency recommends that any product claiming to be a ‘source’ of fibre should contain 3g fibre per 100g or at least 3g of fibre in the amount that could reasonably be expected to be eaten in one day. To claim that a food is high in fibre, the product must contain at least 6g per 100g or at least 6g in the amount that could be expected to be eaten each day. Otherwise, use the table below to see the fibre content of some common foods.


What Are Low Carb Diets?
Low carb diets are based on the premise that a diet very low in carbohydrate leads to a reduction in the body's insulin production, resulting in fat and protein (muscle) stores being used as its main energy source.

The aim of low carbohydrate diets is to force the body to use fat as its main energy source, when this happens a person produces 'ketone bodies' to fuel parts of the body that can not use fat as an energy source - the brain, and red blood cells, in particular. When this happens a person is said to be in a state of ketosis - characterised by smelly breath (an acetone smell like nail varnish) and side effects such as nausea and fatigue.

to be continued......