Is bread fattening?

http://www.the-gi-diet.org/lowgifoods/

white bread is just bad, french bread is the devils food(but soo sooo nice :( ), brown bread is a lot better, but no carbs is better still.

THe problem is the insulin response, even if low, isn't conducive to losing fat basically. Insulin tells your body(amongst other things) to store fat, so the less your body tells itself to do that, the easier it is to lose the fat. decent brown breads can be as from that list, as low as 36, compared to 70+ for white breads, which all makes a huge difference.

Stick to carbs pre/post workout if you can, complex carbs before, and a small amount of easier carbs after just to give your muscles some energy.


I found it very difficult to give up bread as mostly my diet beforehand was heavily based around bread and its just so easy/quick to eat that it was convinient, tasty and I wasn't eating well so the sugar high kept me from feeling so tired all the time.

Its difficult to change your diet drastically, especially if you were eating a huge amount of carbs, feel 100times better for doing it after a short adjustment period though.
 
so what can i put my sandwich material in? seriously.. what alternative is there to bread for a sandwich? i assume tortila thingies are just as bad?
 
I have one whole grain sandwich a day and that seems fine to me. The main thing is to cut out white bread and any ridiculous amount of bread consumption a day.
 
White is, full of sugar and salt and the fact adding butter makes it worst, most of the time I eat my sandwiches butter/marg free.

Its sod law, brown is good for you but taste meh, but white is bad but is lush.

Narh, I think more grain in the bread the better ! :D
 
Think of the white stuff in bread as little more than sugar and you're not far from an actual representation. The less white, the better for a number of reasons.

White bread digests into a sort of starchy goo inside the eater's stomach that just lines the intestines and can stick there for a good, long while. This impedes regular digestion and can give rise to bloatedness (than stuff the ladies complain about). As well as giving you a low-grade sugar rush.

The more fibre in the bread (i.e. brown stuff), the more the stomach/gut have to play with and push out, for want of a better expression.

And cola? That stuff is just ming in a plastic bottle, besides not being particularly low in calories. And wine isn't far off, either. That's a bucketload of sugar, too, and the alcohol won't do you any favours, either.

Cut all that stuff out and you'll do even better. :)

Props for doing it, though - I couldn't.
 
alcohols issue is the estrogen(well beer mostly but alcohol in general), bread, even brown bread, gives you problems with insulin, both of which tell the body to store fat when you're trying to tell it to lose fat. Its not impossible to lose fat while eating carbs and drinking beer, its just easier to cut them out.

As for what to use instead of bread for your sandwich materials, the answer is, don't eat sandwich materials, eat different food. As said though, its damn difficult to change your diet, you become so used to eating one way eating other things just seems, weird.

But thats the other thing, its incredibly hard to eat a similar diet and just cut out bread, I ate loads of egg mayo(which is pretty good for you) in bread(which sucks) , and qourn, cheese, and loads of bread, every day. The thing for me wasn't finding an alternative to just the bread, but the whole sandwich. Its ruddy difficult to replace the bread in a sandwich and far easier to replace the sandwich, just a case of finding foods you like that are also healthy. Not terrible advise is, try a whole bunch of different foods until you find things you like.

Just remember its only till the weights gone, once you are at the weight you want, eating carbs isn't a bad thing, as long as you're burning about what you eat.
 
dont know if this is a coincidence or not, but today i cut down a lot of the bread to what im used to having.

today i walked 5 miles, biked 5 miles, and did 30mins light weights.

normally i struggle to do 2-4 miles. as a replacement to the bread ive been snacking on nuts, and drinking water instead of squash.

ive been full of energy, and not tired as much like someone said, bread makes you more tired.

im going to keep cutting down in hope that my own personal triumphs today, were not a fluke - but infact a result of my diet change today.

very interesting reading what a lot of you have said, i never imagined something so simple as bread stores as fat, its defo made me rethink a few things.

the problem is, like someone already mentioned is the bread is so quick and easy to make a meal with.

Thanks everyone for opening my eyes! :D
 
yup, not a coincidence(probably :p ) , the problem especially if it was white bread you ate(wasn't clear i don't think) is that due to the fast burning you tend to get a sugar high very quickly and so the come down is far more extreme. THe worse the carbs and the more you have the worse the come down and the more tired you feel. Coming off carbs can be a pain, but you find pretty quickly the sustained energy from fat and ultra low gi carbs stops the sugar high, but stops the tiredness also.

But yeah the biggest problem for me wasn't just how easy bread was but how used to it I was. Because I ate more than half my meals as bread, i had simply run out of other idea's of what to eat almost instantly when I stopped eating it.

The very clear thing for me is when I do eat carbs now, I eat very different carbs, gone are the white bread rolls and frenchbread, in are the better carbs, the wholewheat pasta, brown pitta bread with hummous when I have it. So I'm not getting that old situation of eating, being shattered 2 hours later and feeling starving.


Nuts are insanely good for you though, especially if you don't eat more good fat, nuts are great for energy, water also helps everything work better.

Its also why people say low gi carbs preworkout, because something high gi, runs out quickly with that sugar high and mid run you get stupidly tired. Slower release carbs, wholewheat stuff in general, keeps you going longer, as will the fat.

I always felt completely unhealthy and tired the way I ate and having bad knee's so little exercise, when i did exercise I couldn't do much. WHen i start again when eating well i can do so much more which in turn helps motivate you more and feel better.

Forcing myself to go the ultra low carb route I lost loads of weight but also pretty much was like going to rehab. I was used to not eating carbs anymore so wasn't craving the bad things, and now when I do want some a small amount of wholewheat bread or pasta is fine where as before it wouldn't seem like enough food for me.

Summing it up I guess is low carb is great for losing weight and for general healthy eating maintaining, or gaining muscle eat carbs just make sure they are good carbs and you won't really have a problem.

my only vice now, is pizza, :( good for a treat now and then but might have to find a decent recipe for a wholewheat base and make them myself.
 
white bread i was eating, its a no no on my shopping list now ;)

pizza is a good treat, but come on they have almost up to 2000 calories on some of them, stay clear unless a one in a blue moon treat i say :D
 
white bread i was eating, its a no no on my shopping list now ;)

pizza is a good treat, but come on they have almost up to 2000 calories on some of them, stay clear unless a one in a blue moon treat i say :D

Cook your own; still not the most healthy thing due to the cheese and flour, but considerably better than any that you'd get from a take-out. Really easy to do as well :)
 
A good pizza from time to time is fine. I eat them - you have to treat yourself. I also have chocolate (well real stuff, 80%+) from time to time too, as I do cakes etc...

It's about balance. My diet on the whole is pretty low in fats and carbs , but I eat lots and lots of fruit and veg, but lots of lean meats too. I have a varied diet which is the key. It's important to do what you can to help your body such as low GI etc which I do in terms of pasta and rice where I can.

If you're trying to focus on weight loss however you do have to be more regimented. However once at a level where you're comfy, eating what you want as long as you're sensible is fine. However I never drink fizzy drinks, drink little alcohol, and tend to keep away from crisps and hydrogenated vegetable fats, white bread and other poor quality food stuffs. It's just a lifestyle decision and it's become part of what I like to do. :)
 
I really want a fresh bloomer straight from the oven now, paired with some smoked bacon, and nice butter spread over the bread. I'm sorry, far too weak :(:(

The bread one is hard, especially as I became renound at uni for being the guy who always had to have 2 slices of bread and butter with every meal. Have recently really cut it out of my meals, except with my packed lunch at work which has to be white sometimes. Have replaced it mainly with a mixed nut mix containing raisins, peanuts, brazils, walnuts, almonds cashews etc. I munch on these mid afternoon about 3pm, then on the choo choo train at 5pm have some grapes + an apple, then train at 630pm when I get home. Then a solid dinner at about 8pm after training, but unfortunately none of this chicken breast malarky. Meeeeat, potatoes/rice, salad + veg, full of homecooked NOM.

Keep going OP, bread isn't that hard to cut out, and this is coming from an addict who can't live without it. The odd bacon butty can be a nice treat :D
 
I've cut out bread for pitta bread. They are an absolute nightmare to make the night before though without destroying them, I normally have tuna in the pitta but it's getting a bit boring. Can anyone recommend something similar to tuna that I can have in pita that aims at losing weight?

Thanks
 
Generally pitta bread isn't much better, in terms of calories and how filling they are any bread is simply bad. Sure wholemeal pitta is better again less of a sugar high/crash, but you're still looking at 150-200calories per pitta, for something that isn't really that filling.

Fats/proteins tell your body its full and supress appetite, aswell as doing your body a whole hell of a lot of good, carbs generally increase appetite and don't do a whole hell of a lot, basically fat/protein are essential, can't live without either, carbs, you can cut out without a problem(very very limited situations some people have to have carbs, certain diabetes groups need sugar to bind to overproduction of insulin and some people can't metabolise fat properly so need carbs, but both are rare).


THeres also nowt really wrong with pigging out now and then, if you do eat a 2-3k calorie pizza, thats only one pound of energy, not like you'll put on a half stone for one pizza, assuming thats replacing a meal (or two) then its even less. If I have a pizza I'll tend to time a pizza with a run/row/weights/exercise of some sort not long after anyway. The worst thing about a carb binge is the excess weight from water retention as your carb intake increases, 500grams of carbs will retain 2lbs of water, but that will go straight off, you didn't really put 2lbs on due to eating a pizza, just bloat like a mofo from water :p


Egg mayo is very healthy, largely good fats that will help you lose weight, good quality protein too, cheese, no idea why people think cheese is bad for you, its not, low carbs(the right cheese's), some bad fat, some good, a little protein.

Nuts are also a great snack, might just be me though but open a 100gram bag of cashews and it can be damn hard not to eat the whole thing, addictive little *******.

When losing weight, the best thing I can do is a protein meal followed by a fattier meal rotated all day. for me, 2-3 protein shakes with a little fat, and 2-3 small scrambled egg's with veg, spices etc inbetween. When busy though i'll just try to have egg's in the morning, stick with protein shakes when out and about and you can't really cook, like at work, with a few nuts here and there for a bit of fat, then egg's when back at home again. protein shakes, nuts, lots of water, some low gi carbs and you'll be surprised how much energy you have and how not hungry you are.
 
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Nuts are also a great snack, might just be me though but open a 100gram bag of cashews and it can be damn hard not to eat the whole thing, addictive little *******.
Agree. My mid afternoon snack is currently 30g of protein in water and 25g Brazil nuts. Just enough to keep my body ticking over but could quite easily scoff the lot.
 
Wow.. Didn't realise bread was so bad for you! Might have to start having brown bread sandwichs for dinner at least..
 
Wow.. Didn't realise bread was so bad for you! Might have to start having brown bread sandwichs for dinner at least..

So 2 slices of bread with bread in the middle.

Nice !

Just had a load of my mixed nuts, nwo I feel sick after gobbling for 10 mins :D
 
well you are all right again, i ad no bread for dinner at all, went out 15 minutes later and did a 5 mile bike ride (lots of hills), something i havnt been able to do until yesterday and today because if lowered the bread intake, ive also walked 4 mile today, and played football for 1 hour and i still feel energized, normally i feel lazy and lacking in motivation.

i could do the 5 mile bike ride again tonight the way im feeling, i would suggest what others have suggested to me and cut the bread out for a substitute bread or alternative snack.

I dont feel as drained, lethargic, not motivated any more - ive done 18 miles walking/cycling combined in 2 days, i normally only do about 2-3 miles cycling a day :)
 
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