It’s quite interesting to know that the order in which you eat the classes of food in your meal plays a vital role on how much your blood glucose will rise which affects your entire metabolic system on the long run.
Eating the components of your meals in proper order helps stabilize your blood sugar after the meal, and thus, generally improves your metabolic health.
The fact that what and when we eat play a vital role in our metabolic health is indisputable. However, not ordering what we eat properly can destroy the benefits of our fast, and the healthy foods we eat.
How Would Wrong Sequencing of a Meal Destroy the Benefits of Your Fast and a Healthy Meal?
Let’s assume that you embarked on a one-meal-a-day (OMAD) water-only fast and want to break your fast with a healthy meal that contain steamed or fermented vegetables, nuts/seeds, fish/meat barbecue or pepper soup, avocado, a small portion of white rice/potato/ yam, and fresh fruits. You can agree with me that this is a combo of nutrient-dense diet, with all classes of food.
However, if you misplace the order in which you eat these foods, you will not get the full health benefits of the fast and these healthy foods.
For instance, if you choose to break your fast with fresh fruits or any of the starchy foods (rice, potato, or yam), your metabolism will be negatively impacted due to a huge spike in your glucose and insulin levels caused by these starchy/sweet foods.
When you take starchy/sweet foods in an empty stomach, the sugar in them moves very quickly into your blood stream without restriction and increases the level of your blood glucose and insulin, which is the beginning of metabolic syndrome.
The large increase/spike in the blood glucose is the cause of numerous metabolic disorders such as insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, weight gain, brain fog, poor mental clarity, and cardiovascular diseases.
To achieve a good metabolic health, there’s one thing you must avoid. Never allow your blood glucose level to have a very steep/sharp increase after every meal you eat.
It’s advisable to continuously monitor your blood sugar level using the continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) device, to know the foods and the order of eating that spike or stable your blood glucose level so that you can maintain a good metabolic health.
What’s the Proper Sequence to Eat the Components of the Meal Listed Above?
When you are served with those foods listed above after an OMAD, eat the vegetables first, preferably, fermented vegetables which are rich in probiotics needed for a healthy gut.
After eating the vegies, take the proteins (nuts/seeds/meat/fish) and/or healthy fats (avocado). These sets of food are rich in fiber and fats and will help pad your gut to prevent the quick absorption of sugar and large spike in your blood glucose level when you finally take the carbs and fruits.
If you can maintain a stable blood glucose level, your metabolic health will greatly improve. Your insulin level will be stable, you will not store glucose as fat, you will experience weight loss with ease, and other metabolic conditions will dramatically improve.
Your metabolic health will be enhanced tremendously when you combine fasting and proper meal sequencing in your diet routine.
The right order of eating your meals remains – vegetables/fibers first, proteins/fats second, and finally carbohydrates/fruits.
Give this a trial and enjoy the health benefits thereof.
Thank you for dropping by. See you in our next post.
