Dieting on a Budget

I thought I was being very health conscious because I did not eat french fries. Instead, I would order baked or mashed potatoes. I was very surprised to learn that neither option is a good one.

According to Harvard University professor, Meir Stampfer, "Potatoes raise blood sugar as fast as sugar does. A potato may be a complex carbohydrate, but your body treats it like sugar...Eating mashed potatoes is not that from from getting an intravenous load of glucose."

In a research study that tracked more than 84,000 women for 20 years, the Harvard researchers discovered that women who ate one serving of potatoes a day (mashed or baked) had an 18% higher risk of diabetes than those who ate potatoes once every two weeks or so.

This does not meet we should never eat potatoes, but we need to consider alternative vegetables.

Consider the following recipe for roasted vegetables:

Ingredients

4 cups of any cut-up vegetables (broccoli, cauliflower, onion, squash, asparagus, etc)
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp soy sauce
5-6 garlic cloves, chopped
Black pepper

Procedure

• Preheat oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit.
• Coat the vegetables with the remaining ingredients.
• Spread in a single layer on a baking sheet.
• Roast for 10-15 minutes or until lightly browned.