Why should diabetics eat only Basmati rice? – by Dr Harold Gunatillake
Basmati polished or wholegrain rice is recommended for diabetics to eat if you are a determined rice eater. Basmati is a low energy food, and the daily serving is about 150g provides about 200 calories. Whole grain Basmati has the lowest glycaemic index (GI), which means that when it is digested it releases the energy slowly keeping blood sugar levels more stable and not giving rise to glucose spikes.
Basmati rice being long grain has more amylose than other rice. Amylose makes the digestion slower and do not gelatinize and the particle size remain long in the gut during digestion.
Steaming the rice rather than boiling in water has a lower Glycaemic Index
Whole grain basmati has more fibre than most other varieties. High fibre assists in good digestion, prevents colon cancer, less cholesterol absorption and so on. Fibre in the rice makes it more resistant for absorption and also acts as prebiotics to the friendly gut microbes. Fibre also makes you full and delay hunger.
Basmati rice has more vitamin B, and minerals like copper and magnesium which helps to control blood sugar levels.
AS mentioned earlier 150g of cooked rice produce approximately 200 calories. This could be manipulated to decrease the calorie content of the basmati rice and make it healthier for those striving to reduce their weights.
This was discovered by an undergraduate student at the College of Chemical Sciences in Sri Lanka by ingeniously reducing the calorie content as much a 50 per cent, by manipulating the chemistry of the starch.
The process is simple. When the water is boiling and before adding the raw well washed rice, a few teaspoons of coconut oil is added into the boiling water. Sudhair James presented this paper as his preliminary research at National Meeting & Expositions of the American Chemical Society. He further said that the boiled rice is kept in the fridge overnight which gives a dense coating, resulting in slow digestion and less calorie intake.
The concept is that oiling the surface of the white rice through the modified way of cooking converts the starch to resistant starch. Further chilling in the fridge overnight reduces the calorie content by 50 percent.
So it is a good idea to add a teaspoon of coconut oil into your steamed or cooked rice. Shake it well and keep it in the fridge overnight. Next day you warm the rice and a sensible way to reduce weight though freshly cooked rice makes you put on weight.
You could ‘Pilaf’ the rice and make it more pleasurable to your taste buds and much healthier eating, too.
Without inserting the rice to boiling water following the adding of coconut oil, one could jazz it by adding the uncooked rice and lightly stir frying after heating the oil in a saucepan and sautéing the diced fine onions until soft, for about 2-3 minutes. Then to spike the flavour one could add cumin, saffron, cinnamon, thyme, mint and parsley. Instead of water, now stock and red or white wine is added.
By this process of cooking you tend to form a dense oily coating on the surface of the grain, which helps in much slower digestion and absorption in the small gut.
There is no chance of spiking blood sugar levels as when ‘uncoated’ boiled white rice is eaten.
Good advice from Dr harold
