The crazy consequence of removing cacao from my oatmeal
It's crazy what removing cacao from my oatmeal did to my blood glucose. Some evidence to show how fats cause insulin resistance.
I love oatmeal. I eat oatmeal every single day, without fail, all throughout the year. A hot, smoking bowl keeps me warm during the winter, a fresh, overnight one fills me up during the summer.
Oatmeals are a great source of energy and definitely a powerhouse of nutrition, especially for someone like me who exercises and run intensely every day.
Depending on the season, I rotate a couple of oatmeal “recipes”. The base ingredients are always:
200g of oats
2 large bananas
Flax or chia seeds
Spices (cinnamon, black pepper, turmeric)
Water (sometimes unsweetened soy milk).
During the summer, I top it off with frozen berries, because I love it fresh and colourful.
Then, in winter months I add either coffee or cacao powder, because I like it to taste like a chocolate cake/tiramisu. Since I introduced cacao this past months, I noticed something interesting: on most days when cacao was part of the recipe, I would experience a rise of blood glucose during the night, as you can see in the yellow area below, between 12 am and 7am.
So I removed it for a couple of days to see what would happen. This is the day after, when oats, bananas, flaxseeds and cinnamon were the only ingredients.
No delayed glucose spikes during the night: a perfect day, in range 100% of the time. With only two screenshots one could claim this is pure anecdotal, but I can swear that this pattern has been quite consistent, and looking at my Dexcom data I can draw a (close-to) 1 to 1 relationship between days where my oatmeal had cacao and my blood glucose skyrocketed at night (I wrote more in depth about this on my blog).
I should add that my dinners and snacks after the oatmeal are made of green light foods only, as a diligent disciple of the Mastering Diabetes guidelines.
Cacao → Fats → Insulin resistance → Delayed rise in blood glucose
And here comes the interesting bit: fruits, legumes and grains constitute 90% of my nutrition.
These whole plant-based and carbohydrates rich foods promote insulin sensitivity.
Fats (and excess protein), on the opposite, cause insulin resistance. And cacao powder is…a great source of processed fats!
(Note that I still eat a square of 100% pure chocolate, without sugars. Chocolate is a great source of antioxidants)!
A meal that contains a combination of carbohydrates and processed fats is a perfect candidate for a delayed rise in blood glucose, that can span from 3 to 15 hours after the meal (depending on the amount of fats).
Which is exactly what happened to me.
Conclusion: low fats, happy blood glucose
To me, this is just further evidence that fats, especially processed ones, have a true and direct detrimental impact on blood glucose regulation.
Oatmeal with cacao → delayed spikes.
Oatmeal without cacao (but still with flaxseeds of course!) → steady and smooth 100% time in range.
You can make whatever out of this experience of mine I have just shared. You can toss it, scream that it is a pure anecdote without any context, or that it is the dose that makes the poison. That is all true. What is also true is that high blood glucose has real life impact: in my case, I have an harder time sleeping, maintaining focus during the day and my energy levels are far more shaky.
Feel free to consider my post as a mere fact. But the science is clear about the role fats and proteins play when it comes to insulin resistance, the root cause of a nightmarish diabetes management.
If you want to dig further, I suggest you start here:
The Mastering Diabetes framework is what led me to conquer a 90% time in range on a consistent basis, a journey I have documented over the past few months.
So, no drama. I will continue do enjoy my big oatmeals, my runs, my life as a type 1 diabetic. Just with a little less cacao!