Living with prediabetes or diabetes does not mean you have to break up with pasta. Here are 5 tips to help stop the blood sugar spike at your next pasta dinner.
Cook pasta to an al dente texture
Follow the instructions on the package of your pasta to make sure you are cooking your pasta to an al dente texture (firm to the bite). Compared to overcooked, super soft noodles, al dente pasta is lower in glycemic index (a.k.a. More blood sugar friendly) because it is slower to digest.
Slower digestion results in slower absorption of sugar, thus a more gradual rise in blood sugar.
Keep pasta portions to 1 - 1.5 cups of cooked pasta
Regardless of the type of pasta, it is important to be mindful of portion size. Typically, I’d recommend limiting portion size at a meal to 1 - 1.5 cups of cooked pasta. This is equal to about 30 - 45 g of net carbs, which is very reasonable for a meal.
If this has you thinking “that's definitely not enough to keep me full”, be sure to follow tips 3 and 4 for a more balanced meal.
Be sure to pair with protein
You can expect a faster rise in blood sugar if eating pasta by itself. Just as with any other carbohydrate food, when carbs are eaten alone, it is digested fairly fast, resulting in faster absorption of glucose (sugar).
As always, we are looking to pair it with some protein to help slow down that absorption of carbs. This could be any protein choices you enjoy. Examples include ground meat or meatballs with spaghetti, chicken in a chicken pesto, cheese, lentils in place of ground meat, or beans (take inspiration from pasta e fagioli).
Include half a plate of vegetables
Part of the reason pasta is often a challenging meal for blood sugar, is that rather than a balanced plate, pasta often becomes the whole meal. To keep our pasta meals more balanced, be sure to include your 1/2 a plate of non-starchy vegetables.
This could be any vegetables you enjoy. Salads (yes, including store-bought salad kits) are a great quick to prepare option that works well in terms of flavour combination with pasta. Cooked vegetables work great if you are not a fan of raw vegetables. You could also make zoodles (zucchini noodles) as your half a plate of vegetables - mix it together with your pasta noodles for a more satiating amount of volume.
If using store-bought pasta sauce, choose one without added sugar
Store-bought pasta sauces often contain added sugar. This can unintentionally add to the blood sugar spike you are seeing after enjoying a pasta meal.
When grocery shopping, be sure to read the ingredient list to look for options without added sugar. A good example would be Mutti brand pasta sauces - no added sugar but super flavourful! This is an easy way to reduce carbohydrate content of your pasta sauce by about half.
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