Does Deep Frying Add Carbohydrates?

Does Deep Frying Add Carbohydrates?

Due to the increasing popularity of low-carb diet plans meant to suppress the high levels of diabetes among Americans, reasons abound as to why carbohydrates content in our diet is important.

Suppose you are particularly concerned with the quantities of carbs that you take at any given time.

In that case, you might be concerned that your method of preparing foods might predispose you to additional carbohydrates in your diet.

As a result, you might be asking, does deep frying add carbohydrates?

However, this does not nullify the possibility of deep-frying affecting other aspects of carbohydrates during the cooking process.

No! When you cook food using the deep frying method, you use hot oil immersion to bring the food to an edible state. During this process, it’s unlikely that any carbohydrates may be added to the food. However,fats are added to the food cooked this way.

Additionally, all cooking methods affect the digestibility of carbohydrates present in the particular food.

This does not exempt deep frying.Therefore, it’s essential to have a clear understanding of how deep-frying affects blood sugar.

Can I Eat Deep-Fried Foods If I Am On A Low-Carb Diet?

Yes! But you do not want to make it regular.The high prevalence of diabetes has placed most people on red tape as far as carbohydrate intake is concerned.

Any slight sign of high sugar will have your doctor recommending a low-carb diet without any hesitation.

Although some physicians are overstepping their mandate, most medical practitioners want to protect the populace from serious health complications.

Consequently, it’s easy for a health practitioner to bar you from eating high-carb diets.

If you happen to be one of these, a widespread concern will be; can I treat myself to a deep-fried snack?

Although an occasional treat to deep-fried goodies is not the end of your world, it would be a far-fetched statement to say that deep-fried foods are “healthy” for you.

It’s needful that you know the effect of deep frying on your food. Read on.

What Does Deep Frying Does to Food?

It’s impossible to overemphasize the need to know what deep-frying does to your meals. This information will come in handy when it comes to making good nutritional choices.

When starchy foods are deep-fried, the starches are broken down by the heating process. The result of this is the availability of easy-to-digest carbohydrates.

Therefore, the main issue with deep frying is making more carbohydrates in the food to be available to the body.

Consequently, the body can absorb more carbohydrates in the end.

However, if the deep-fried food does not contain carbohydrates, there is no effect on the food in relation to carbohydrates. A good example is deep-frying proteins.

Deep frying makes foods absorb more calories. Astonishingly, the foods that absorb very little oil during deep-frying are dense, gaining over 50% additional calories.

For instance, taking a deep-fried chicken gives you 64% more calories.

If you feel that you cannot do without deep-fried chicken but you are concerned with the high calories, batter the chicken before frying it.

Although this increases the calories to 128%, do not worry. Pick the batter off the fried chicken, and you will eventually have 33% more calories than pre-battering and frying.

Picking off the batter removes most of the added calories during cooking.

When it comes to more porous foods, more calories are absorbed from deep frying.

For instance, calories in corn tortillas have been shown to increase by 124% when being transformed into corn chips.

There is a similar occurrence with potatoes. But when turning a raw potato into a McDonalds’ fries’ packet, we are talking of a caloric increase of 368%!

Because this potato story may seem false, let’s break it down; to turn a potato into a packet of fries, it must undergo two processes.

During each process, the calories are more than doubled.

In the first process, calories are increased by 113%. In the process, USDA refers to as “Potatoes, french fried, all types, salt added in processing, frozen, unprepared.”

The removal of the skin is responsible for this calorie increase to a small extend.

However, the rest of the increase is from “processing,” which is not only unexplainable but impressively caloric.

The second process is getting golden brown French fries from frozen processed potatoes. On its part, this process increases the calories by another 120%.

Why Would You Need A Low Carbohydrate Diet?

Two main reasons are worth your consideration as you watch your carb intake.

First, you will want to watch your carb intake to stay aligned to a low-carb diet, or you want to manage diabetes or pre-diabetic conditions.

Currently, the internet is flooded with low-carb deep-fried recipes that are friendly to people on Atkins, Keto, or any other low-carb diet plan.

However, for those who have diabetes, you need to know that there are more things to be addressed than carbohydrates.

By default, most fried foods have carbohydrates.On the other hand, when foods are deep-fried, there is the additional fat content in the food.

Fat is known to slow down digestion. When your body is slower to digest the food, your glucose levels will also rise slowly.

Digestion of simple carbohydrates happens quickly. For instance, sugar being a simple carbohydrate will occasion rapid spikes in blood sugar levels.

If glucose rises rapidly, too much insulin will be procured by the body.

This results in crashes and spikes in the blood sugar and will cause insulin resistance eventually. This insulin resistance precedes type 2 diabetes.

On the other hand, high fiber and other similar carbohydrates are referred to as complex carbohydrates.

These will take longer when it comes to digestion. This will result in more gradual decreases and increases in insulin production and blood glucose.

Just as complex carbohydrates slow down digestion, It is in this same way that proteins will slow digestion.

Consequently, deep-fried proteins should be consistent with a low-carb diet’s goals.

Although deep-fried foods may assist in cutting carbs for a diet, there are still other issues with deep-frying.

Indeed, deep-frying is a potential problem for those with medical conditions and who need a special diet.

How Does Deep-Frying Affect Trans Fat?

As already implied, deep-frying makes foods add fat. However, particular fat additions require some additional discussion.

Elevated cholesterol and a higher risk of cardiovascular disease have their roots in Tran’s fats.

However, there are general risks that resonate well with all fats. When you consider more fat in the diet, it’s factual that it can lead to more weight gain.

Your body’s insulin regulation ability can be complicated by excess body fat. Chronic high blood sugar is often related to your body having problems with insulin levels.

When you substitute your unsaturated fats with trans fats, the result will be a reduced risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

This reduction can be as high as 40%, not to mention the higher risk reduction of heart disease by 53 percent.

Therefore, although deep-frying can never add carbohydrates to the foods, you have many other issues to consider before deciding to take that favorite deep-fried meal.

Additionally, the presence of any underlying health conditions complicates the situation further.

It makes it more critical to consider your decision more carefully when taking or not to take deep-fried foods.

What Happens When I Use Air Frying?

Air frying is becoming the newly preferred method of cooking.This is a popular new trend whose momentum is increasing with the days.

This method is handy for those who have concerns emanating from deep-frying.

Peradventure you want to treat yourself but is constrained by your low-carb diet plan, you will find this cooking method to be rather realistic and rewarding.

Indeed, you can still enjoy tasty foods even though you are vaunting calories. Certainly, air frying helps you and your family to have both worlds.

Many downsides are associated with deep-frying, and air frying can come to your rescue, though not as your primary cooking method.

You should use it to treat yourself occasionally.

Fortunately, with air frying, you can still enjoy some parts of deep frying but with fewer long-term effects.This is possible thanks to new technologies in cooking.

How Does Frying Differ From Deep-Frying?

Fundamentally, there is not much difference between the two methods of cooking.

The kind of oil you resolve to use will go a long way in determining the nutritional value of your food. It also depends on how much oil you use.

Ideally speaking, the number of calories that your food will gain during deep-frying depends on several factors.

However, a significant percentage (75%) of the calories will come from the oil you use.

It’s, therefore, needful to choose your frying method keenly. Perhaps, you have asked yourself why fried foods have a crispy exterior.

When foods are deep-fried, they lose much moisture and replace it with fat. As a result, the food gets a crisp texture, but more importantly, plenty of calories are added.

Since most of the calories come from the fat taken during the frying process, using alternative frying techniques should reduce the fat.

You may consider using pan-frying instead of deep-frying.

There is even a better alternative than the American Heart Association recommends. The sautéing method is considered safer as it uses very little oil.

Alternatively, with this technique, you can use low-calorie liquid to do the frying. For instance, vegetable broth has been used with a lot of success.

Do Frying Oils Affect My Food?

Yes! The oil you choose will always get into the food you are frying. Consider the fact that deep frying is different from pan-frying. The fundamental difference is in oils used.

Ultimately, what brings a difference is the number of calories added to the final product.

Consistent with the exact food that is deep-fried and the quantity of the same food that you take, in a single sitting, you might add several hundred calories to your body in a day.

Sunflower oil and vegetable oils have been used by some people with great nutritional results.

When you opt to use pan-frying, using too much oil may have the same results as deep-frying.

Are There Any Other Health Considerations?

Yes. Let’s take a look at deep-fried chicken. With deep-fried chicken, there is more to consider than just the calories.

Many people will agree that they have ever experienced discomfort and indigestion after taking a meal.

 Peradventure, the meal in question, happens to be some fried food, indigestion will be worsened. Unfortunately, there are more serious repercussions that may follow.

According to a 2019 study, 100 000 women were studied to establish what effect fried food consumption had on them.

The study’s findings indicate that more fried foods intake was correlated to an elevated risk of cancer–related deaths and heart disease.

Additionally, some oils are healthier while others present more health risks. The oils that consist of less saturation of fat are better.

Conclusion

It’s indisputable that deep-fried foods are a tasty delicacy when taken with appropriate moderation.

Unfortunately, some people have been denied the delicacies that come with occasional treats of deep-fried foods.

However, you need to know that you can enjoy most aspects of deep-fried foods when using air frying.

Although deep-fried foods should be taken with necessary moderation and carefulness, it’s scarcely a good idea to avoid them altogether.

It’s a wise thing to ensure that you avoid large amounts of deep-fried food, no matter your health condition.

Failure to keep an eye on the number of such foods we take daily will have lasting effects on health.