Although carbohydrates serve as the main source of energy for the body, not all carbohydrates affect the body in the same way. Knowing how fast your body can break down specific carbohydrates, can help you monitor not only your blood sugar levels, but also your weight. The previous classifications of simple or complex carbs failed to take into account the variable blood sugar response to each carbohydrate. This prompted the creation of the glycemic index -- a classification system that ranks foods based on their ability to increase blood sugar levels. A variety of different books provide information on glycemic index diets aimed at helping diabetics maintain healthy blood sugar levels or as a way to lose weight.
"The New Glucose Revolution"
"The New Glucose Revolution" written by Jennie Brand-Miller, Thomas M.S. Wolever, Kaye Foster-Powell and Stephen Colaqiuri, stresses the importance of the glycemic index in maintaining good health. In this book the authors divide carbohydrates into two groups; low GI foods and high GI foods. High GI foods, those that you should limit, register at 70 or higher on the scale while low GI foods, the most desirable, measure at 55 or less. This book does not provide a specific diet to follow, but instead teaches you how nutritionists determine the GI of foods, how to apply the information to specific health applications and how to balance your overall GI load by choosing low GI foods. This same group of authors created several other books as supplements to "The New Glucose Revolution", such as the "Low GI Diet Cookbook" and "NGR Low GI Vegetarian Cookbook."
"The G.I. Diet"
"The G.I. Diet" by Rick Gallop provides a diet plan to help you lose weight in a healthy way without going hungry. This book categorizes the foods on the glycemic index using a traffic light symbol, with foods in the red category representing those you should avoid, the yellow category those you should consume only occasionally and those in the green section representing the foods you should eat regularly. "The G.I. Diet" strives to not only teach the reader about the glycemic index and how to eat a satisfying diet choosing low GI foods, but tries to make the system easy to follow saying "if you can follow a traffic light, you can follow this diet."
The Zone Diet
With the first book "Enter the Zone" written by Dr. Barry Sears and released in 1995, the Zone Diet flooded the diet industry. Sears created his series of books and founded The Zone Labs based on his research on the role your diet plays in hormone production, gene expression and the inflammatory response. The Zone diet books therefore not only explain the glycemic index but the role inflammation plays in your overall health and weight. The goal of this diet plan is to make lifelong changes to the way you eat to help control cellular inflammation and therefore live within "The Zone."
"The Glycemic Load Diet"
The "Glycemic Load Diet" written by Dr. Rob Thompson strives to enhance the effects of eating based on the glycemic index by adjusting for serving sizes, therefore concentrating on the overall glycemic load. In this book, Thompson explains that strictly following the glycemic index can fail you since the index is based on lab-controlled portions, not how you actually eat. "The Glycemic Load Diet" suggests limiting your glycemic load to less than 500 per day and provides the necessary information on how to do this. The difference between "The Glycemic Load Diet" and other low glycemic index diets is that this diet does not place as many restrictions on the type and how much carbohydrates you can consume, therefore making it easier to follow.
