Why You Should Eat With Chopsticks

A while back, we brought you news of a foolproof way to cut the calories of your beloved bowl of rice in half. And it didn’t involve throwing the majority of it in the bin, you were pleased to learn. You can read the full article over yonder in which?Dr Pushparajah Thavarajah, a professor at the University of Sri Lanka, found that if you cook your rice with a small amount of coconut oil and then stick it in the fridge for 12 hours, your rice will have ten times more resistant starch than regular rice, meaning less calorie digestion and a lower GI rating.

Now though, we’ve stumbled upon another way to chop your body’s reaction to rice. Apparently, if you’re a lover of take-aways and just can’t live without them, eating your rice with chopsticks can lower your GI response and be far healthier for your body than shovelling it in with a fork. Of course this makes total sense, given that eating with chopsticks almost always slows you down, and it’s just not possible to devour ladlefuls of food per bite. For those who hear a lot about ‘GI’ but are still unsure about what it’s all about, lowering your GI response to food, or eating foods that are naturally low GI means that you get a slower release of energy, allowing your body to metabolise far more efficiently and burn fat faster, all the while keeping you feeling fuller for longer and your blood sugar levels on an even keel.

According to a study jointly carried out by the Singapore Institute for Clinical Sciences, the National University of Singapore and the Clinical Nutrition Research Centre (CNRC),?those who use chopsticks to eat white rice experienced significantly lower glucose response – 16% to be exact – meaning that they had lower rates of increase in their blood sugar levels, compared to those who used spoons and hands. Good news all round, right?

The key to adopting a low GI lifestyle is to avoid overly processed foods and anything that ever says ‘easy cook’ or ‘instant’. For the most part, opt for brown and wholegrain carbohydrates, as opposed to white rice or white bread. Nutritionists also recommend swapping your cakes and biscuits for unsalted nuts but that’s just not a fair deal, if you’re asking us. Can’t we just eat our Dairy Milk with chopsticks?