“How Much Do You Know About Food Nutrition” Series | How Much Do You Know About Staple Foods?

In our daily diet, rice and noodles often appear on people's tables as staple foods. However, in recent years, there have been many sayings about "staple foods are not good", such as "If you want to lose weight, you must eat less staple foods!" "Eating too much staple foods is the culprit of getting fat and causing diabetes!" So, is it really good to eat less staple foods? How to eat staple foods more healthily? This article will show you how.

1. What is staple food?

Staple foods generally include cereals, beans and tubers, which are the main sources of protein, starch, oil, minerals and vitamins needed in people's daily diet.

2. Why do we need to eat staple foods?

In our daily diet, we can divide food into four categories: cereals and potatoes, vegetables and fruits, beans, fish, meat, eggs, milk and fats. Each type of food has its own nutritional characteristics. When eating, we should keep a certain proportion of each type of food to ensure balanced nutrition and perfect functioning of the body.

Carbohydrates provided by staple foods are an important source of energy for the body. 50%-65% of the energy a person needs in a day is provided by carbohydrates.

Carbohydrates not only have a filling effect, but also provide energy for the brain. If you do not consume enough carbohydrates, it may cause dizziness, fatigue, emotional instability, memory loss and other problems. Girls may also suffer from menstrual disorders.

Staple foods are also an important source of dietary fiber, B vitamins, etc. Without staple foods, it is difficult to meet the dietary fiber needs by relying solely on fruits and vegetables.

When losing weight, you can reduce the amount of staple food, but you cannot stop eating it. If you don't eat staple food regularly, it will easily affect your body. Not eating staple food for a long time may also lead to malnutrition, hypoglycemia, gastritis, gallstones and other diseases.

3. How to eat staple food?

We usually divide staple foods into two categories: coarse grains and fine grains (refined staple foods).

Common rice, noodles and other rice and flour products, such as dumplings, pancakes, steamed buns, and rice noodles are all refined grains; in addition, rice noodle rolls, wide noodles, vermicelli, etc. are also refined grains.

There are many types of coarse grains, which can be roughly divided into three categories: miscellaneous beans, whole grains and potatoes.

In your daily diet, it is recommended that you eat a combination of coarse and fine foods, and you can increase your intake of coarse grains on this basis.

Compared with refined grains, coarse grains have the following advantages:

1. High nutritional density. While providing carbohydrates, it can also provide more vitamins, minerals and other beneficial ingredients.

2. Rich in dietary fiber, strong sense of fullness.

3. Helps maintain a healthy intestinal ecology.

4. Small blood sugar response.

Author: Cheng Qiyuan and Lan Haobo from Luoyang Normal University

Review expert: He Jialiang, associate professor of the School of Food and Bioengineering, Henan University of Science and Technology