How to embrace healthy eating for diabetes

If you've been diagnosed with diabetes, you certainly won't have to give up taste or satisfaction, because eating right for diabetes means enjoying a wide range of delicious foods from all of the food groups. Here are some helpful tips on healthy eating when you have diabetes.

Lean proteins, a rainbow of fruits and vegetables, low-fat dairy products and wholesome whole grains are yours to savour, in appropriate portion sizes.You'll be concentrating on foods like these and eliminating less healthy fast foods and processed foods from your meal plan. Part of the process is learning substitutions.

• If you love ice cream, you'll likely need to shift to frozen yogurt.
• If you love fried chicken, you'll learn that breaded and baked chicken is just as yummy and far healthier.

There's a delicious, healthy version of almost every indulgent food, even cake.

It's a long list. First of all is the high fibre content. Fibre is terrific for people striving to lower blood-sugar levels. And vegetables and fruits contain lots of fibre. They also contain healthy forms of carbs, so fresh produce is a great energy source.

• Vegetables and fruits are made up mostly of water; a peach, for example, is 88 percent water; a cucumber, 96 percent water; a tomato, 94 percent. What does that mean? Fewer calories! You can eat three or more whole cucumbers and still be well below the calories in a chocolate bar.
• For people who want to limit calories and processed foods but like a robust meal, it's great to know you can eat almost endless amounts of veggies without hurting your health.
• Vegetables and fruits are chock full of phytochemicals, natural plant chemicals that help the body defend itself against disease and the ravages of aging.
• Broccoli, cabbage and other cruciferous vegetables fight cancer; tomatoes, carrots and red peppers are packed with antioxidants and chemicals that help protect the eyes; and many vegetables contain other chemicals that stimulate the body's immune cells and infection-fighting enzymes.

Put simply, fresh produce is the primary food in a healthy diet. That's why one half of your plate should be filled with produce.

Fibre, put simply, is the part of any plant-based food that your body can't digest. It passes right through you, staying more or less in its natural form. It may not be sexy as far as nutrients go — in fact, technically, it's not even considered a nutrient, since your body can't process it — but it's important for several reasons:

• It slows digestion and keeps blood sugar from rising quickly after a meal. This effect is so powerful that it can lower your overall blood-sugar levels. And because it slows digestion, fibre also keeps you feeling full longer.
• It adds bulk to food, so it makes you feel full without adding calories. One study found that over the course of 10 years, people who ate a lot of high-fibre foods weighed an average of 4.5 kilograms (10 pounds) less than people who ate little fibre.
• Soluble fibre — the type of fibre that dissolves in liquid and forms a gummy substance in your digestive tract — can cut your cholesterol and lower your risk of heart disease. Beans, barley and oatmeal are all rich with this form of fibre.

A high-fibre diet keeps you "regular," making problems such as constipation, spastic colon and hemorrhoids (common in people with type 2 diabetes) less likely. It may also cut your risk of colon cancer.