Diabetes Direction

I originally wrote much of the content of this post as a guest post for FYCNYC (Find Your Center) and then posted a version on Cooking Made Simple. I thought however, considering how appropriate this is for diabetics, it would be worth sharing here as well.

The lowly sweet potato seems to be often over-looked, and sometimes despised, in kitchens all across this country with the exception, perhaps, of the south where the more popular vegetable, in the form of sweet potato pie and other great dishes, has earned it’s rightful place. Sweet potatoes are, it should be noted, available and affordable almost everywhere.

Sweet potatoes, are often confused with yams but they are not yams at all. Sweet potatoes, much like yams, are elongated yellow or orange tubers with ends that taper to a point, though typically the larger of the two. They are of two dominant types of sweet potatoes:

- the paler-skinned sweet potato has a thin, light yellow skin with pale yellow flesh which is not sweet and has a dry, crumbly texture similar to a white baking potato.

- the darker-skinned variety (which is most often called “yam” in error) has a thicker, dark orange to reddish skin with a vivid orange, sweet flesh and a moist texture.

For those who like all that technical stuff, the actual yam (right) is the tuber of
a tropical vine (Dioscorea batatas) which is not even remotely related to the sweet potato (center).

The sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas) is a dicotyledonous plant that belongs to the family Convolvulaceae, and is not actually a potato (left) either.

The sweet potato plant is a herbaceous perennial vine, which bears alternate heart-shaped, or palmately lobed, leaves and medium-sized sympetalous flowers, and is related to the flower known as morning glory.

The expert nutritionists at the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), have suggested the single most important change in diet any of us, including children, could make would be to replace the high fat content foods we regularly consume with those foods rich in complex carbohydrates. It seems the best available choice for that just happens to be sweet potatoes.

After considerable research, comparing all common vegetables, the CSPI has labeled the sweet potato as number one in nutrition, giving it a score of 184 for its rich content of dietary fiber, naturally occurring sugars and complex carbohydrates, protein, vitamins A and C, iron, and calcium. In their published ranking the sweet potato out-performed the next highest vegetable on the list by greater than 100 points. As well as points being added for the positive elements, points were deducted for fat content (especially saturated fat), sodium, cholesterol, added refined sugars and caffeine. Stated most simply, the higher the score received, the more nutritious, and the less bad for you, the food.

Here’s the CSPI’s own list of their top scoring vegetables:

With their great scores for dietary fiber, naturally occurring sugars, complex carbohydrates, protein, vitamins A and C, iron, and calcium, sweet potatoes secured first spot on the CSPI list. A surprise to me, the standard baking potato ranked second but was more than 100 points back. I expected it to be much lower and the result has caused me to take a new look at the potato which I had all but eliminated from my diet. I’ll write about those findings another time. Spinach, broccoli, and squash, which I would have expected to be leaders, weren’t so far down the list (3, 6, and 7, respectively) but lagged lagged much farther behind in points, which underscores the outstanding success of the sweet potato.

Of course, the nutritional facts speak for themselves. Remarkably, sweet potatoes have almost twice the recommended daily (RDA) allowance of vitamin A, some 42% of the recommendation for vitamin C, and nearly four times the RDA for beta carotene. These are impressive numbers for any meal, let alone a single vegetable. Although less commonly prepared with the skin, when the skin is included, sweet potatoes actually have more fiber than oatmeal. And all of this goodness comes in a package with only 130 to 160 calories. Not too shabby at all for an orange tater!

According to the US Department of Agriculture one medium size sweet potato provides the following:

Of interest to diabetics, sweet potatoes have the lowest glycemic index rating of any vegetable. The sweet potato digests slowly, causing only a gradual rise in blood sugar thus making them suitable for most diabetic diets (check with your doctor or dietitian, of course!). An additional, positive, result of the slow digestion process is you feel satisfied longer which leads to less snacking — where most of us get into trouble.

It seems clear to me that sweet potatoes should be added to everyone’s “good” carb list — they are found on many of the most popular diets now — and it shouldn’t take a rocket scientist to understand why.

It also came as a pleasant surprise to me that there are so many wonderful ways to serve sweet potatoes. There is no need to get stuck with plain old mashed with butter — though they’re not so bad that way either. Just add a little pumkin spice mix for a real treat. Sweeten with sucralose (Splenda, Apriva) or stevia and add some real whipped cream on top and you’ve got an amazing desert! The Sweet Potato Lover’s Cookbook by Lyniece North Talmadge, offers more than 100 ways to enjoy one of the world’s healthiest foods.

Not already a part of your diet? Perhaps you should give the lowly sweet potato a (another?) try.

[Rev. Stephen B. Henry, PhD. is an entrepreneur, web administrator, business coach, and diabetic, interested in personal motivation, quantum physics, and time travel. He writes on a variety of topics for numerous blogs, including his own Wizard's Place.]