Diabetic Food - Cooking & Recipes
A diabetic need not have special foodstuffs in day-to-day life. He/she should be able to pick up a suitable portion, from the foodstuffs prepared for rest of the family. The housewife need not cook different meals for a diabetic.
Weighing Food
Foodstuffs of a low caloric value and low carbohydrate content can be treated as "free foods". These need not be weighed and can be consumed without any restriction.
The caloric value of rice, wheat, bajra or jowar flour, sago, cheese, oil, and butter is considerable; hence these foods should be consumed in measured quantities only.
Diabetics can assess with some practice the approximate nutritive value of food portion, though this is difficult in the beginning. One way is to have a small scale, that can weigh up to 100 gms, and is accurate within 10 gms. The other way is to have a set of standard household measures.
Standard household measures
| Measure | Capacity (in ml) |
| 1 teaspoon | 5 |
| 1 tablespoon | 15 |
| 1 wati | 150 |
| 1 cup | 150 |
A housewife should measure one wati each of rice (raw), wheat flour and weigh it. She should then see how much cooked rice or how many chapatis can be prepared out of this ration. She can thus translate the amount of wheat flour into the number of chapatis or raw rice into cooked rice. Weighing food stuffs from time to time is a good educational exercise for a diabetic and his spouse. Appendix 2 tabulates the preparations in terms of household measures.
Cookery
Sugar, jaggery and honey should be restricted. Flour, cheese, groundnut powder and coconut have considerable food value and should not be added as "free foods".
In order to preserve the fibre, vegetables should be cut into large pieces. The skin, seeds and stalk of the vegetables should not be discarded. Whole wheat flour should be used instead of maida.
Butter, ghee and oil should not be poured while cooking but its exact quantity should be measured in terms of teaspoons. The quantity of cooking fat can be cut down by using non-stick pans. Frying should be avoided. Cooking, baking or grilling are preferred.
Saccharin is available in the form of drops or tables. The tablet should be crushed and mixed with a little warm water before adding to a foodstuff. Saccharin is decomposed by heat, imparting a bitter taste. It is added after a foodstuff is prepared and not during boiling or cooking. Not more than two tablets should be added to one serving. A syrup of sorbitol is prepared by mixing 3 parts of water and 7 parts of sorbitol. A cake made with fructose does not rise like the one made with sugar. Cakes made with sorbitol or fructose may appear paler than those made with sugar. If this appearance is not to one's liking, a little yellow food colour may be added. It is little difficult to beat air into, sorbitol or fructose mixture hence the usual beating or whisking time should be doubled. Fructose browns more easily than sugar, hence foods containing fructose should be cooked in the oven at a slightly lower setting than usual. Aspartame is decomposed at high temperature, so it should not be used in baking cakes. Jams made with sugar substitutes should be stored in small jars because once opened, do not last as long as ordinary jams. Fruits or dates can be used to sweeten a dish. A housewife need not prepare separate foodstuffs for a diabetic. The initial stages of cookery are the same for non-diabetic and diabetic persons. Before the last stage that is addition of sugar, jaggery, groundnut powder or grated dry coconut, the housewife should set aside the serving for the diabetic person and then add these food stuffs for the rest of family members.
A day's meals should be planned in the morning.
Salt |
Cardamom |
Vanilla |