Avocado

Hi there,

anybody know if you need insulin for an avocado? My gut instinct tells me no but I checked it online and it has 12 g CHO for 150g of avocado. Anyone any experience of this to share?

Can I presume if a fruit is not in the DAFNE carb counter book, then it is a 0 CP food?

thanks,

Hi Bill,
I think you are right as I believe Avacado has a very low GI and so will be absorbed very slowly so therefore you don't count it.
However your comment touches on a wider issue that if something isn't included in the DAFNE carb counter can you automatically assume you don't count it. This is the one weakness with the carb counter as it doesn't cover everything. I raised this at a recent DAFNE follow up meeting with our dietician and there doesn't seem to be an answer other than it is recognised that this a weakness of the system.
Regards
John

Guys,

It's true that the Carb book we get on the DAFNE Course doesn't have everything in - this is unfortunate but understandable as the people who make it can't possibly sample every type/brand of food out there, in much the same way that a dictionary doesn't have every word in the English language. If something is missing and you go on to find out the CP value of a portion, you can add your findings to the online carb counter we have here on the site. You never know - it may feed into the paper based diary in the future.

Simon

Simon,
As I understand it some things aren't included because although they contain carbohydrate they have a low GI and are so slowly absorbed that they aren't counted. So this then leads to confusion between things not included because they don't contain CHO, things that are CHO containing and low GI and therefore should not be counted and things that just haven't been iincluded yet. In some ways it would be good if the low GI, CHO containing items were added with a note saying you don't need to count them. Sorry if I have confused things but I have been caught out with this in the past.
Cheers
John

Hi John,

That's a really good point about the low GI foods being included - maybe a separate list could be added to the Carb Counting book. I'll feed this back to DAFNE Central.

Thanks,

Simon