People love their bananas. Ask anyone to grab a snack, and 9 times out of 10 theyll pull out a banana from their backpack and pocketbook. In fact bananas are the most popular fruit in the US with the average person consuming 25 pounds a year. They dont need any washing or refrigeration. They are high in fiber and potassium, and low in calories. What could be wrong with them? Depending on the ripeness and size, a banana can have a huge impact on blood sugar. That can be a good thing if you are running a marathon, but a bad thing if you are watching your blood sugars or tryingto lose weight. Bananas are not alone in spiking blood sugars; there are other foods high on the glycemic index scale that do the same thing.
Glycemic index (GI) is a scale used to measure the impact of a specific food on blood sugar. GI ranks foodin comparison to a food reference point, either glucose or white bread, which are both ranked at 100. The GI of a food tells you how quickly the sugar from the food will enter the blood stream. Eating low GIfoods have helped with weight loss as well as maintaining steady blood sugars in those with prediabetes or diabetes. Eating foods that keep blood sugars from spiking requires less insulin. A lower blood insulin level lessens the workload for the pancreas, preserving its function, and also helps with weight loss. Here are some examples of low, medium and high GIfoods:
Glycemin index is only part of the picture. To completely understand how much a food will impact blood sugar you also need to know how much sugar it will deliver. This is called the glycemic load. Glycemic load takes into consideration portion size.A glycemic load of 10 or below is considered low, while a glycemic load of 20 or more is considered high.
ripe bananas are sweeter but also have a much higher GI
The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition maintains a list of glycemic index and glycemic load of over 750 commonfoods. The table below lists glycemic index, serving size based on grams, and glycemic loadof a ripe banana, a slightly under-ripe banana and an over-ripe banana with some brown spots. I could not find any information on a fully green banana, but you can safely assume it has an even lower GI than the slightly under ripe banana.
A study reported in Diabetic Medicine on the effect of banana ripeness on blood sugars in people with type 2 diabetes, revealed:
Green bananas contain more resistant starches. Resistant starches are starches that resist digestion in the small intestine. Resistant starches are fermented by our healthy gut microbes and help to produce vitamins and health-promoting compounds as well as destroy potential cancer causing toxins. Resistant starches also help to reduce blood sugars.
When fruits ripen the resistant starches convert to sugar which is why a ripe banana tastes sweeter and will raise blood sugars much more than a green banana.
This is where Glycemic Load comes into play. A small banana has 18.5 gms of carbs, while a 9 inch banana contains over 35 gms. When you consider serving size in addition to ripeness, you can easily see how blood sugars could really spike by eating a large ripe banana.
Diabetes.org discusses other factors that impact the GI of foods.
I remember my mother telling me that green bananas would give me a stomach ache. Part of that problem is from the fermentation process that occurs in the gut. People with a normal digestion and a healthy diet should not experience this problem. But people with irritable bowel syndrome or some other digestive problem, green bananas could cause gas and bloating.
For the rest of us, unless you are getting ready for a marathon, this is what you should do:
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Go bananas, but go green for a lower glycemic index - Bangor Daily News (blog)
