Jacket Potato

Ok, I did the counting only last week and still armed with the books...all good on paper. BUT every time I have a jacket tattie for lunch, I can guarantee a hypo...even by under valuing the CP's slightly on it. Anything else, pretty much isn't an issue, but a jacket potato never seems to come out on the same 1:1 ratio I'm on using the carb values from the books.

This got me thinking, does a jacket tattie take quiet a while to break down? and thus it's over a longer period of time and as such the QA has already lowered the BG far to fast for the potato to balance? Otherwise it makes no sense at all that I would need a 1:1 ratio for all food, except a jacket potato which would have it's own 1:0.3 ratio.

A jacket potatoe would generally take longer to digest, also the digestion depends on what topping you have, a cheese and beans one would take even longer...........

When is your hypo...........?

I would expect to see your insulin drop you low maybe 1.5-2.5 hours post meal............its really a case of trying to match up your insulin action to the digestive action..........

At lunch time I inject 30 -40 minutes before eating, this is because the digestion is faster than my insulin, so I need the insulin in and working long before I start eating, with your situation and for others where the food is either starchy, high in fat, or both its sometimes worth splitting your meal time injection, say 50% before you eat and 50% after you eat..............

This 50:50 split can be experimented with, maybe changing to 60:40 and so on, and also the time of the after meal dose can be moved to 30, 60, 90, 120 minutes, its all about experimenting and testing to see how it effects you personally.........

Good luck with it................

I tend to be boring with the tatties actually, just cheese. And yes am talking about a lunch at 12 or 12.30 and having BG's in the 7's and it being in the low 3's by 3pm (so 3 to 3.5hr's later)...but again only on the Jacket Potato's so it does seem to be digestion causing it.

Think I'll probably just carry on using an exception to my ratio for it. Least that way I avoid the hypo and any raises can be picked up at dinner any how or simply burnt off during the day due to how long it's taking.

Thanks for the advice.

No problem mate, only do what you are comfortable with...........as long as you know you dont need to be low 3 hours later, or high for dinner time......it just takes some experimenting and recording, you might not even need to split, might be a case of jagging up after you have finised eating............

the cheese for sure will slow digestion even more, you should experiment with different toppings if you do find yourself eating them all the time.......

Hi guys,

Interesting discussion and strangely enough (contrary to what health professionals previously believed / understood / advised), jacket potatoes have a relatively fast absorption rate, so the CPs get into your blood stream pretty quickly.

We know from experience that different cooking methods (eg oven baked; microwaved; cooked in foil) appear to make a difference to the CP value of a potato once it's cooked, most likely due to how much water is lost in the cooking process, however the 'validated' nutritional text books give the 3CPs per 100g value which is what's stated in the DAFNE CP List.

Many DAFNE Educators suggest, where possible, to weigh the potato while it's raw, to get a more accurate value (based on 1.5 CPs per 100g) then it doesn't matter how it's cooked.

The other thing to consider is whether or not you eat the skin..... you may lose up to 1CP if you leave the skin

Hope this helps the discussion?

Carolin

So a jacket potato behaves like pasta and rice? How weird!

I do remember my DAFNE team saying about how it's cooked effects it's out come... didn't click in my head that it was like pasta and rice though (probably because most potato doesn't change due to water, but in a way, for a jacket to behave differently to say chips, does make some sense when you think about it).

It seems a baked potato actually absorbs faster than pasta, but about the same as rice.................and white bread, so starchy, but still high medium to high GI, which means higher spikes as opposed to a slow gradual impact on BG................

try it without cheese and see what happens.......the impace may be less severe, then you can start thinking about other toppings.............

Also you're eating it with fat which slows absorption doesn't it?

For all types of cooked potatoes I use different amounts and ratios. For fries and mash I need a lot more than I do for baked. I used to have the hypo problem with jackets when going by the book. I had to figure out my own levels on potatoes.

Fat does slow the absorption of the carbs............

I think the main point I would highlight with different types of starchy carbs and high fat content meals is that its the digestion that is effected, so in theory your insulin/carb ratio should never change, as you will always need the same amount of insulin per 10 grams for that time of day...............its the timing of the dose that is critical when trying to combat slowed or quickly absorbed foods......

Have either of you actually looked at weighing the spud raw and going on that like Carolin was saying?
I have and it works out great for me. No problem (even eating the jacket to make sure). Why are you over complicating it?