Attention to weight loss! Do you eat real vegetables or "starchy vegetables"?

Everyone knows that if you want to be healthy or lose weight, you must eat more vegetables! Because vegetables have the lowest calories and are very filling. However, many people do not know that some plants that look like vegetables are not the low-calorie, burden-free vegetables as people think. Instead, they contain a lot of starch, which is sugar, the nutrient that weight loss people fear the most.

Everyone knows that people who want to be healthy or lose weight must eat more vegetables! Because vegetables have the lowest calories and are very filling.

So we call this type of vegetables rich in starch (sugar) "starchy vegetables". If you don't pay attention, you may mistakenly think you are eating a lot of vegetables, but in fact you are eating a lot of starch (sugar). How can you not get fat?

The Ministry of Health and Welfare divides food into six major categories, including staple foods (ex: rice, noodles, toast, buns, glutinous rice balls, flour, etc.) and vegetables (ex: cabbage, water spinach, loofah, onion, etc.). Staple foods mainly provide energy for the body, so they are higher in sugar and calories, while vegetables mainly provide dietary fiber, so they are lower in calories. Each serving of staple food has 70 calories, mainly because each serving of staple food contains 15g of sugar; while each serving of vegetables has 25 calories and only 5g of sugar, so eating staple food will contain about 3 times more calories and sugar than vegetables (see table)!

So which vegetables are actually starch? Instead of vegetables? I have sorted out the types of "starchy vegetables" for you (see table). Corn, burdock, pumpkin, water chestnut, lotus root, yam, taro, sweet potato, and potato are actually "starchy vegetables". The sugar and calories are about 3 to 5 times that of ordinary vegetables, and are also higher than ordinary staple foods. In fact, it is not an exaggeration to call them "staple foods."

Corn, burdock, pumpkin, water chestnut, lotus root, yam, taro, sweet potato, and potato are actually "starchy vegetables", with about 3 to 5 times the sugar and calories of ordinary vegetables.

These "starchy vegetables" mentioned above are actually hidden in the food we eat, but we don't even know it! Some people think that eating yam, burdock and lotus root is very healthy and eat a lot of yam or burdock; some people don’t like to eat rice and noodles, but like to eat corn, pumpkin, sweet potato, potato and taro as main meals; some people like to eat water chestnuts as snacks; but in fact, eating too many "starchy vegetables" will have higher calories, which will cause us to be obese and even affect blood sugar.

In particular, diabetic patients, because of their high blood sugar levels, need to be more careful about whether they eat "starchy vegetables". The sugar content of "starchy vegetables" is higher than that of ordinary vegetables, so it will affect blood sugar! Therefore, we should control the total amount of "starchy vegetables" and not consume too much of them, but mix them in appropriate amounts.

Nutritionist's advice:

You should eat at least 3 servings of vegetables a day, which is 3 small plates of vegetables. "Starchy vegetables" are more like staple foods, so you need to pay special attention. If you eat starchy vegetables, you need to reduce the amount of staple foods (ex: halve the amount of rice or noodles, etc.). Everyone's nutritional needs vary from person to person, and the above is just a reference suggestion.