If there’s one thing that almost every woman has heard about by now, the low carb diet is it. Low carb diets are becoming incredibly popular by anyone who wants to shed those last ten pounds because they often promise very good results in a short period of time.
While low carb diets can definitely work, you must keep in mind that it’s never healthy to cut all carbohydrates from your diet for an extended period of time. Instead, you should focus on eating the right sources of carbohydrates at the right time.
Let’s have a look at the best forms of carbohydrates that you can consume so you can get this straight in your mind once and for all.
Oatmeal
Hands down one of the single best sources of carbohydrates for your diet will be oatmeal. Oatmeal contains no sugar, is a high source of dietary fibre, and can be prepared any number of ways. It’s great added into other foods, eaten cold like regular cereal, or cooked warm on a cold winter’s day.
Oatmeal is also very slow to digest by the body so you won’t get that rapid blood sugar spike followed by a crash like you might with some other choices.
Buckwheat
Second on our list of carbohydrates that you’ll definitely want to consider adding to your day is buckwheat. Buckwheat is great with any type of casserole dish or alongside your main protein source. It can be eaten as a replacement for oatmeal if you’re bored with that or it can also be used in flour form when you make your morning serving of pancakes.
Buckwheat’s nutritional highlight is its dietary fibre content as it comes in at 4.5 grams per cup serving – higher than most other types of grains.
Barley
Third on our list is barley. When most people think of barley they think about beef barley soup but you should realise that there are plenty of other uses for this healthy food. Barley also can work great in casseroles or in any bean-filled dishes. In addition to that, barley can also be mixed into a salad and served cold further increasing the possibilities you can use it for.
Quinoa
One grain food that is especially common among vegetarians is quinoa. This is another slower digesting source of carbohydrates so great for those who are watching their weight, but what’s more is that this form of carb contains a complete source of protein.
So if you’re someone who is aiming to improve your overall protein intake, quinoa may just be the food that you’ll want to turn to.
Brown Rice
Finally, you can’t go wrong with brown rice. Brown rice is simple to prepare, cheap to purchase, and works well in so many dishes that you’ll hardly ever grow bored with it.
Brown rice contains more fiber than white rice so is better from a blood-sugar standpoint and will easily help provide you the energy you need to perform your workouts without increasing your total calorie intake too high.
So there you have the main, wholesome sources of carbohydrates that you can add to your daily diet. Just do watch that you get the serving sizes correct for these as if there’s one thing that may cause them to contribute to weight gain that will be it.