It was 2004 and the ‘No Carb Craze’ still had momentum (more in the US than in Canada), when I was invited to a conference about Glycemic Index (GI) with experts from around the world. We were discussing topics such as the recognized scientific method to determine the GI of foods and how the Canadian Diabetes Association educates their patients on GI. The conference was held in Toronto, the perfect venue, where twenty-three years earlier in 1981 at University of Toronto, Dr. David Jenkins and his colleagues developed a standardized system of ranking foods based on their effect on blood glucose levels known as the GI. What is GI? The GI is ranked from 0 to 100 and the unit … Continue reading
As a dietitian, I’m fairly active with all the knowledge and expertise to have reasonable, healthy eating habits, however, I too sometimes get caught up in ‘mindless eating’. What is mindless eating? It is a term Brian Wansink, Ph.D. made famous from the title of his book, Mindless Eating and his research at the Food and Brand Lab at Cornell University. What does it mean to mindlessly eat? Most of us don’t overeat because we’re hungry. We overeat because of boredom, of family and friends, packages and plates, names and numbers, labels and lights, colors and candles, shapes and smells, distractions and distances, cupboards and containers. Wansink’s studies show that the average person makes around 250 decisions about food every … Continue reading