I hear so much that "white" food is bad for you.

Can you supply me a list of bad white foods and what you sub in their place?

white potatoes?
white rice?
white bread - like wonder bread?
sugar?

what else?

Thanks!

Dana

I don't think white potatoes and white rice are bad for me, necessarily, I just think their counterparts are BETTER for me.

White potatoes - sweet potatoes
White rice - brown rice or wild rice
White bread - whole grain bread (when you look at the ingredients, make sure the first ingredient says "whole" grain)
Tortillas - whole wheat tortillas (La Tortilla factory makes a great 50 calorie tortilla that I love)
Pitas - whole wheat pitas (like bread, read the ingredients to ensure the first ingredient is "whole" grain)
Pasta - whole grain pasta (whole wheat pasta or some other whole grain like spelt)
Processed breakfast cereals - oatmeal (not the packaged kind). I also read the ingredients for breakfast cereals to make sure they are high fiber (3+ grams of fiber per serving)

Other whole grains - corn, bulgar, quinoa (pronounced keen-wa, great stuff, cooks up like rice and has a good nutty taste)

Here's an interesting guide (PDF)

thanks glory87... I tried brown rice once.. yuck! maybe I did it wrong or something. I do, however like wild rice. I eat Natural Ovens bread - that's good for me.

So what's so wrong with the white stuff? or should it be limited?

I've never tried a sweet potatoe.. I'm scared!!!

Try the Uncle Ben's long grain brown rice. Yum. Or even the Uncle Ben's boil in a bag brown rice. Or even the nuke in the microwave brown rice. Watch the sodium on the wild rice.

Natural Ovens rules!!

Sweet potatoes do, too. You can bake them, then sprinkle with cinnamon for a great treat. Or boil them, scoop out the insides, and whip them up with a tad of butter & cinnamon, nutmeg, or whatever else you like.

Be not afraid!

Sweet potatoes are good, like their name says, they are sweet. I like to bake mine for a little over an hour. They taste great. I also like to cut them like french fries and roast them until they are soft/crispy.

Natural Ovens bread does have a whole grain version, if you like that brand, try to eat the whole grain bread - it has 4 grams of fiber per serving which is great. Even their multi-grain bread is pretty good, whole wheat is the second ingredient.

If you hate brown rice, don't eat it. I hate lima beans and green peppers and I just don't bother with them. It is weird, I used to hate oatmeal and cottage cheese and I like them now, sometimes tastes can change.

I don't think there is anything "wrong" with white stuff, it's just not as nutritinally powerful as the whole grain options (which also tend to have more fiber). If I'm going to eat something, I want it to be good for me. Since I happen to like the whole grain versions of pasta, bread, tortillas, pita just makes sense to eat the more nutritious options instead of their more processed, less nutritonally powerful counterparts.

"white" products are very easily processed by your body. Therefore, they are a lot like sugar ( you will not feel full for very long). However, all of the "brown" products have more fiber and it will take you body longer to digest them. White more or less means "processed".

Good luck! white products are my favorite junk food. I am a bread lover!

Why are whole grains better?

Q: What's the difference between whole and refined grain?
A: Refined grains are milled and bleached. The outer bran, which has the fiber and nutrients, is removed. Then nutrients are reinserted. That's why "enriched" flour is on the label.

In this country we want baked goods that are light and fluffy. That's why we keep refining our flour until it's like talcum powder.

Q: Why is whole grain better?

A: Whole grains have more fiber, double the calcium, six times more magnesium and four times more potassium.

The refining process removes most of a grain's vitamins, minerals and fiber. Whole grains contain the kernel's outer shell (bran), seed (germ) and other beneficial substances that may reduce the risk of heart disease, stroke and colon cancer. Whole grains help prevent constipation and diverticulitis.They also help to stabilize blood sugar, which allows insulin to do its job and, thus, protect against diabetes. Oats, barley and rye are especially rich in soluble fiber.

Some people probably don't know that the antioxidants found in grains are not present in fruits and vegetables. Antioxidants are important for fighting cancer.

Studies have shown that people who eat whole grains have a lower body mass index, lower total cholesterol and a lower waist-to-hip ratio.

Epidemiological studies on a variety of different populations noted that people who eat three daily servings of whole grains reduced their risk of heart disease, stroke, type-2 diabetes and digestive-system cancers.

http://www.lifestyle.msn.com/MindBod...cumentid=39934

My personal goal is to avoid refined/processed foods as much as possible when I start eating again.
It is probably a good rule of thumb to realize that anything made in a factory isn't good for us. However, most of us don't have time to make everything from scratch, grow our own veggies, etc etc. So, avoiding processed foods as much as possible is likely the best we can do.
Getting rid of the "white" stuff from your regular diet is one of the premises of the low glycemic index diet. White bread, white rice, cereals, etc etc, are absorbed very quickly by the body and spike our insulin levels very quickly (just as sugar would). And the extra glucose from those foods ends up being stored as FAT!
If you are going to try to cut down on "white" stuff, it is important to look at ingredient labels - for instance, enriched wheat bread is not whole wheat bread.
As long as you can find healthy versions of the "white" foods that you like, stick with them and make them part of your lifestyle, not a "diet."
As far as sugar - Splenda is good, I use sweet n low in my tea... Avoid labels with corn syrup or high fructose corn syrup as one of the top 4 ingredients.
I saw on Oprah a few months back that if you consume a beverage containing high fructose corn syrup (regular pop) with a meal, you will eat more at your meal than if you had nothing or anything else without that ingredient.

I'm a huge fan of whole-wheat couscous. It takes just five minutes to prepare, and has a great flavour.

couscous.. I don't think I want to know what that is! sounds weird.

I'm such a meat and potatoes kind of gal. - can you tell?

Amanda.. that is so interesting what you said about having a soda with dinner.. my dh does that every night. So is diet soda just as bad?

When you spoke about cereal - all cereal? I eat heart to heart

cous cous is a grain and it's fab, I'm making a lot of cous cous salads for my lunches at work at the moment, my favourite is cous cous with dried apricots and prunes, spring onions, chickpeas, garlic, a chopped chilli and a bit of lemon juice and olive oil.

Kashi Cereals are whole grain so they're a great alternative to refined flour cereals. I think heart to heart has some cane juice so you might want to watch out for that a little bit. Otherwise, it's a great choice! I definately reach for Kashi products when I'm shopping because I know they don't put any "junk" in their food.

Cous Cous is DELICIOUS!!! I would eat it everyday if I could lol... All it is is pasta in fine little pellets. The whole wheat variety is terrific for you! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Couscous it's really not that scary!

Quinoa is another favorite in our house as well... It's a complete protein too so that's a big plus.

When shopping it's important to look for the word "whole" as opposed to the word "enriched" enriched is a naughty word when it comes to nutrition because it means they're trying to make up for something they processed out of the product in the first place. It's best to eat things as close to nature as possible, in my opinion.

I, personally, have no problem with white potatoes on an occasional basis. They have a lot of vitamins and minerals and I don't think they hinder my weight loss if I eat them once every couple weeks. I know people have varying opinions on this... but I agree that eating them every single day might not be the best plan of action.

Good luck with your goals!! you can do it!

And in this thread we've just managed to prove the wikipedia assertion that

I call it a grain, you call it pasta!

That's interesting!!!

But couscous is made of grain! There is no "couscous" plant where the couscous is harvested. Grain is harvested, then it is made into couscous.

"The couscous grains are made from semolina (coarsely ground durum wheat) or, in some regions, from coarsely ground barley or millet. The semolina is sprinkled with water and rolled with the hands to form small pellets, sprinkled with dry semolina to keep the pellets separate, and then sieved. The pellets which are too small to be finished grains of couscous fall through the sieve to be again sprinkled with dry semolina and rolled into pellets. This process continues until all the semolina has been formed into tiny grains of couscous."

Wheat is a grain, barley is a grain, bulgar is a grain - couscous is made from grains!