I was wondering if there are any advantages/disadvantages to eating one type of carbohydrate over the other ?

Hi yes there are many benifits to eating fructose in fruit compared to startches.

1) Fructose is far more more efficient for the body to process and use

2) Fructose does not require a strong insulin response because it can pass the cell wall by way of diffusion and does not require active transport from insulin (ironicly this is why fruit is actually good for diabetics, however the problem is more complicated than this)

3) The breakdown of starches creates acid by-products that will require buffering from calcium and other minerals therefore reducing your alkalinity.

4) Fructose promotes fast nerve response

WorkoutMan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Hi yes there are many benifits to eating fructose
> in fruit compared to startches.
>
> 1) Fructose is far more more efficient for the
> body to process and use
>
> 2) Fructose does not require a strong insulin
> response because it can pass the cell wall by way
> of diffusion and does not require active transport
> from insulin (ironicly this is why fruit is
> actually good for diabetics, however the problem
> is more complicated than this)
>
> 3) The breakdown of starches creates acid
> by-products that will require buffering from
> calcium and other minerals therefore reducing your
> alkalinity.
>
> 4) Fructose promotes fast nerve response

I'm sorry but I don't know where you got these off-the-wall ideas from. This post flies directly in the face of all current nutritional advice and know-how about "carbs". Fructose has been implicated in all sorts of diseases from Advanced Glycation Endproducts (AGEs) to diabetes mellitus. No conventional, upstanding doctor would ever tell you a high fructose diet was good for you and even at the paleo message boards they advise against high fructose even though paleo man would have had lots of it.

If you look at ALL of the governmental advice and from all the educated people, scientists, biologists, dieticians... even the pop press they will ALWAYS tell you to cut down on the fructose and keep to the complex carbs because the complex carbs break down gradually and have a slow release of energy.

I completely agree. Excellent post WorkoutMan and I look forward to seeing more of you.

Maybe WorkoutMan was referring to the fructose we get naturally when we eat fruit.

In that case, everyone's right.

I'm not sure what you meant EZ, but if you're asking about simple carbs vs complex carbs, here's a passage from The China Study that I think explains a lot:

"At least 99% of the carbohydrates that we consume are derived from fruits, vegetables and grains. When these food are consumed in the unprocessed, unrefined and natural state, a large proportion of the carbohydrates are in the so-called "complex" form. This means that they are broken down in a controlled, regulated manner during digestion. This category of carbohydrates includes the many forms of dietary fiber, almost all of which remain undigested - but still provide substantial health benefits. In addition, these complex carbohydrates from whole foods are packaged with generous amounts of vitamins, minerals and accessible energy...

"On the opposite side of the spectrum, there are highly processed, highly refined carbohydrates that have been stripped of their fiber, vitamins and minerals. Typical "simple" carbohydrates are found in foods like white bread, processed snack items including crackers and chips made with wite flour, sweets including pastries and candy bars and sugar-laden soft drinks...."

suncloud, I still feel that even in rubbishy foods, fructose is still not worse than complex carbs. If only for the reason that bread, pasta, pizza used to be more likely to put on pounds for me than coke, chocolate, candy.

When I had the simple sugars I was happy for a while. The complex ones raise your blood sugar less fast true.... but then they raise it for a very long time. Your body gets USED TO the high sugar. Then when it drops, your body craves it to go back higher again. That's just my hypothetical theory though, we're in agreement though about that it doesn't concern us with what we eat now and hopefully never will.

For eating raw foods, simple sugars, which are found in fruit, are easier for the body to digest than complex carbohydrates.

Also fruit taste great all by itself. Raw starchy foods, say like a raw potato or raw wheat, has very little taste.

For me, given a choice between a plate of mangoes and a plate of raw potatoes, I'll take the mangoes.

Always eat your fruit whole, so that it has the soluble fibre to keep the sugars from spiking.

Dr. Graham suggests blending fruit with celery, to increase the fibre, if you would like.

Most 'complex carbs' that people think of are actually irritants, like grains - they irritate the intestines, and many people are allergic to them.

Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much
We are all in this together!
Namasté

I, of course was talking about the naturally occuring sugars in fruit. The problem being that the general public thinks sugar is sugar. But that is not the case. Raw fruit is the best human energy source.

Ha ha SuperInfinity, your post made me frown at first and than I smiled !

Okay WorkoutMan. Maybe I got carried away and overdid the sarcasm a little.

Of course everything the government, FDA, USDA tells you about nutrition is bogus. If we listened to the government we'd all still be eating five portions of bread and cereals a day and four portions of meat/dairy!!! To think I used to believe that when I was younger...

People have so much trust and faith in what "scientists say". If scientists said working long hard hours was good for your heart based on a long-term study I'm sure many people would believe it because the scientists told them. As if the scientists and doctors and government would NEVER tell them anything that was bad for them no matter how much money they could make out of it.

The Massai tribe have a thing about saying the word "lion" in their language. They're afraid to ever even say the word "lion" because they're afraid the lion will come and eat them if they do. Even the modern "educated" people get very uncomfortable if you say the word, deep down they believe maybe the lion will come and eat them for it.

It's the same way with westerners and the word "scientist" or especially the word "doctor". Doctors ARE generally very intelligent people in terms of neural capacity, that and the practice that they have dealing with people is why they're so great at manipulating people and so charismatic. The drug companies analyze everything and do whatever it takes to push as many drugs as possible, including directly paying doctors to prescribe their drugs!!! That's as barefaced as it gets.

Do doctors really believe in it? I don't know. Doctors, especially GPs, have the highest suicide rate of all trades. It would be telling though to know what percentage of doctors eat a raw or nearly raw diet. Especially those doctors that make up the farce known as the food pyramid....

Workout Man,
How do you know that Fructose is far more more efficient for the
> body to process and use ?
I'm trying to find something to read about this but everything I read tells me that few cells can direct use fructose and have to change it to glucose first or the liver processes it into fat. I just want to understand fructose metabolism better.

ilikerawfood,

Gonna field this one for WorkoutMan: fructose from fruit digest faster than the carbs from a serving of pasta, say. You know how the dieticians are always telling us to eat whole grains because they "digest slowly and don't flood the bloodstream with sugar"? Because fruits digest more quickly than starchy carbs do, raw fructose therefore converts to glucose more quickly and efficiently, in turn. Hope that helps : )

Hm I see what you're saying. Sp the cells can't use the fructose directly then. This conversion to glucose happens in the liver if I'm not mistaken. Would this burden the liver haveing to constantly convert large amounts of the fructose to glucose and doesn't alot just get converted to fat?

For a little more clarity,

Whole raw fruit is a source of both complex carbs and simple carbs (simple sugars).

Complex carbohydrates are found in cellulose, a component of dietary fiber found in whole fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds, whole grains, and legumes. The structure of fruits, vegetables, etc. is made of cellulose. As most of us already know, dietary fiber is important for enabling the proper digestion of all food.

Complex carbs are good for us when we obtain them from whole fruits, and other raw vegan foods.

Simple carbohydrates are sugars found naturally in the form of fructose in fruit, but also unnaturally in the form of refined sugar, white flour, white rice, white noodles, white pastries, etc. These unnatural sources of carbohydrates are not complex carbs.

Simple carbohydrates (simple sugars) are good for us when we obtain them from whole fruit, which is a natural source of simple carb combined with complex carb.

But simple carbs are not good for us when we get them from unnatural, refined sources, like table sugar, white flour, etc.

If we wanted to eat only the simple carbs found in fruits and not the complex carbs found in fruits, we would go to the store and buy bags of fructose instead of buying (or growing) fruits.

Obviously, the combination of simple and complex carbs found in whole fruits is better for us than just eating only the simple carbs we'd be eating if we ate a heap of fructose!

So it's not that simple carbs (simple sugars) are good and complex carbs are bad, or vice versa. Both are necessary for a healthy diet, but it's what we eat to get them that counts!

And a fruit is much more than a combination of simple carb with complex carb.
It's a living thing, capable of sustaining the life of a new tree in the seed that it carries, and capable of passing along its life force to the lucky ones who eat it.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/18/2009 07:03PM by suncloud.

I should have added this to what I just posted:

Most whole fruits have a relatively low glycemic index and will not result in a sugar spike for diabetics. This is because fruits contain the complex carbs that aid in proper digestion.

White bread will result in a sugar spike for diabetics because it is a source of simple sugars devoid of the natural complex carbs that were processed out.

Personally I feel much better avoiding all cooked grains, whole or otherwise.

I also feel much better when I eat whole fruits, obtaining both the simple and complex carbs together in their natural form.

ilikerawfood,

Your primate liver has evolved to not find large amounts of fructose burdensome to convert to glucose. So fear not : )

ilikerawfood Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Workout Man,
> How do you know that Fructose is far more more
> efficient for the
> > body to process and use ?
> I'm trying to find something to read about this
> but everything I read tells me that few cells can
> direct use fructose and have to change it to
> glucose first or the liver processes it into fat.
> I just want to understand fructose metabolism
> better.

I think fructose is more efficient than starch for the body to use because it require less breakdown before the body can use it. Calorie for calorie the net gain is higher. I have not read that fructose needs to be converted to glucose. It may be converted in some cases. But not always. My understanding is that fructose is the most optimal sugar molecule because it can enter the cell via diffusion, however glucose requires insulin. This is one reason why eating normal portions of fruit does not cause an insulin spike. Many fruits sugars are made of both glucose and fructose.

Just eat lots of fruits and vegetables and you wont have to worry about fat loss or lack there of. The key to fat loss is eating a very clean diet (least toxic as possible). If you eat 90% fruits and vegetables on a regular basis, it would be very hard for you to carry extra fat!

So basically you're all saying that the problem with starch is that is harder to break down.

So what would you say about sprouted grains? Or even, for that matter, bread leavened by natural yeasts and bacteria? Both of which are getting partially digested before we consume them..

I wouldn't say that they are as easily digested as fruit, but they are far more easily digested than untreated grains. And "sourdough" bread (leavened by natural yeasts and bacteria) tastes amazing!

eran,

Baked bread is not partially digested by yeast; just the ADDED sugars are. The starter in sourdough bread feeds on the sugars intrinsic to the flour. The protein and much of the starch is unaffected by this process, so it does not make the bread easier to digest. Sprouted grains as human food are a matter of debate. Grains were sprouted in ancient Mesopotamia probably because it was deduced that inert grains right off the stalk were indigestible to all but birds, so revivifying them as sprouts was employed for digestability. I am thankful that, not living a subsistence existence in the desert, I can just opt out of eating grain foods. And I say that as a former avid baker who thinks bread is delicious tasting : )