Carbohydrates now have a bad reputation. It is important to distinguish between good and bad carbohydrates. We explain which carbs are good and healthy and which are actually bad and therefore unhealthy.

Good and bad carbohydrates

The Nutrition Societies recommend that at least half of your energy needs be covered by carbohydrates. Others disagree. This is especially true of the low-carb diet’s supporters. They say that carbs are the main cause of obesity, diabetes, and many other health issues. So, they should be avoided or greatly reduced.

Both sides have good arguments. They mostly conclude that the truth depends on the individual. It depends on whether carbs are good or bad for him. Because there are actually people for whom a low carbohydrate consumption would be good, even if they choose the good carbs and avoid the bad ones. In the same way, however, there are people who only really blossom when they consume plenty of carbohydrates.

For the vast majority of people, however, it is not necessary to practice a low-carb diet. In our opinion, the question of the quality of the carbs you eat is much more important than the question of how many carbs you should eat.

Most people can eat good carbs without problems. But, the bad carbs can make you sick. This is especially true if you eat them with lots of fats.

Let’s look closer at carbohydrates and carbohydrate-rich foods. We’ll cover their different forms and qualities, and, of course, their health properties. By the end of the article, you’ll have a good basic knowledge of carbs, and you’ll be able to distinguish the good carbs from the bad.

What are carbohydrates?

From a purely chemical point of view, carbohydrates are molecules made up of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen atoms. In the field of nutrition, they are counted among the three macronutrients: carbohydrates, fats, and proteins.

In addition to the macronutrients, which give the body energy (calories) and building materials. There are also micronutrients. They do not provide energy in the form of calories, but they have numerous other vital functions. These include vitamins, minerals, trace elements, and secondary plant substances.

If you want to reduce your carbohydrate consumption, here are recipes from the vegan low-carb diet.

The Four Categories

Carbohydrates can be divided into four categories:

1. Sugar: short-chain carbohydrates

Most carbohydrates that taste sweet are called sugar. There are many different sugars. The sugars can be roughly divided into two main categories, namely single (simple) sugars and double (complex) sugars:

Simple sugars are called monosaccharides. They include glucose (glucose), fructose (fruit sugar), galactose (mucous sugar), or mannose. Many people now know mannose as an alternative remedy for urinary tract infections. Mucus sugar is almost unknown. It occurs quite frequently in nature and also directly in us humans, namely wherever we have mucous membranes – hence the name mucus sugar ( 7 ).

Disaccharides are double sugars. They include, for example, sucrose (what table sugar is made of), lactose (milk sugar in the milk of mammals), and maltose (malt sugar). The latter is made in the body during the digestion of starch. Digestive enzymes first break the starch into maltose. Then, in a further step, the maltose becomes glucose. The glucose enters the blood and raises blood sugar levels there (9).

2. Polysaccharides: long-chain carbohydrates

The most important representative of polysaccharides is starch. For example, it is found in cereal products, potatoes, nuts, and legumes. It consists of many glucose molecules that are firmly bound together.

Starch does not taste sweet compared to the monosaccharides and disaccharides. Only if you chew starchy foods such as bread or potatoes for a very long time and salivate them well, their taste becomes sweeter and sweeter. This is because the mouth starts digesting carbs if you eat slowly and chew well. But, people today are too busy for that.

Saliva contains ptyalin, a carbohydrate-digesting enzyme. The ptyaline converts the starch into shorter-chain carbohydrates. The shorter the carbohydrate chains become, the sweeter they taste. That’s why bread, for example, tastes sweeter the longer you chew it.

3. Fiber: indigestible fiber

Fiber is also a carbohydrate. People can hardly digest fiber because they lack the appropriate digestive enzymes. Only a few bacterial strains that live in the large intestine of humans can use the fiber and break it down into short-chain fatty acids.

Fiber can fuel gut cells. It aids in regrowing the gut lining. So, it is a key reason why fiber is so healthy for the intestines.

4. Sugar alcohols such as xylitol, sorbitol and mannitol

Sugar alcohols are also classified as carbohydrates. They taste almost as sweet as sugar but lead to a significantly lower insulin secretion than sugar. Sugar alcohols include the popular sugar alternatives xylitol and erythritol. They also include sorbitol and mannitol. Those two are found in many beverages and ready-to-eat products.

“Normal” carbohydrates contain 4.1 kcal per gram. Sugar alcohols contain only 2.4 kcal per gram. That’s why they are often used in diets or by health-conscious people.

However, many people do not tolerate sugar alcohols well. They can cause digestive problems, such as flatulence, abdominal pain, and diarrhea from a single dose. For dogs, xylitol is even life-threatening, which is why it is better not to have xylitol-containing sweets/cakes/desserts in the house, if dogs are also part of the family, especially those that like to help themselves from time to time. Other sugar alcohols do not seem to pose this risk, but of course, they should not be given to dogs.

The great advantage of sugar alcohols for humans is that they do not promote caries, so they cannot be used as food by the caries bacteria. Xylitol and erythritol, in particular, are even considered to fight tooth decay. However, you don’t have to eat the sugar alcohol to do this. It makes much more sense to use it as a mouthwash.

The Roles of Carbohydrates

Their main task (sugar and starch) is to provide energy. Most carbohydrates come from fruit, bread, pasta, biscuits, or the sugar in coffee. They are first broken down into glucose. Then, the cell burns them (converts them to energy). When the body doesn’t need energy, it turns glucose into fat. It stores the fat in fat cells. This is why too much carb-rich food can add to weight gain.

Fiber is an exception to this, see above. They provide hardly any energy because they cannot be digested. However, depending on the intestinal flora, some people – often overweight people – may harbor a particularly large amount of certain intestinal bacteria (which can metabolize fiber), so that fiber also provides additional calories for these people.

In this case, building up the gut flora through intestinal cleansing could help to change the gut flora again. It would do so in a way that stops dietary fiber from being broken down too much. This would stop it from contributing to weight gain.

Whole and isolated carbohydrates

But nobody just eats pure sugar or pure starch. Carbohydrates are found in very different proportions in our food. Animal-based foods are low-carb. But, most carbs come from plants. Here, too, there are foods rich in carbohydrates, like potatoes and cereals. And, there are lower-carb foods, like leafy greens and berries.

But, these foods differ in 2 ways. They differ in their amount of carbohydrates. They also differ in their quality.

Carbohydrate-rich foods are often split into two groups. These are “simple carbohydrates” and “complex carbohydrates”. In our opinion, dividing them into “whole carbohydrates” (good carbs) and “isolated or refined carbohydrates” (bad carbs) makes more sense. And it is easier to understand.

Whole foods are good carbs

Wholesome carbs include all (relatively) unprocessed carbohydrate-rich foods that still have their original fiber content.

Examples of whole foods rich in carbohydrates include vegetables, fruits, legumes, potatoes, and whole grains. These foods are generally considered healthy. “In general” because there will always be isolated people who develop a food intolerance or food allergy to one or the other food. For these people, of course, the incompatible foods are not healthy, no matter how beneficial they may be for other people.

The good carbohydrates are also those that have a low glycemic load or glycemic index, which means that they do not upset blood sugar levels as much as the refined/bad carbohydrates ( 1 ) ( 2 ) ( 3 ) ( 4 ).

Isolated Carbs Are Bad Carbs

Refined/isolated carbohydrates, on the other hand, have been industrially processed in one way or another, with processing consisting in particular of removing the fiber content, which usually increases the shelf life of the food in question or simplifies its use in the food industry, but does not exactly make it healthier. Here are three examples:

Wholemeal flour becomes white flour (= extract flour) – the outer layers and the germ of the whole grain are removed and thus not only the fiber but also most of the vital substances are gone.

Whole grain rice becomes polished rice – here, too, the outer layers and important vital substances are removed.

Sugar cane/sugar beets are processed into concentrated sweeteners (table sugar) by using only their juice, boiling it down, cleaning it, and crystallizing it – there are hardly any vital substances left, fiber is no longer available.

Of course, this category also includes all foods made from the above. Examples are pasta and baked goods made from sugar and white flour. This includes cakes, biscuits, snacks, croissants, rolls, bread, etc. It also includes sweetened beverages (soft drinks/energy drinks), sweets, ketchup, and other ready-to-eat meals with a high sugar content ( 13 ) ( 14 ).

Bad Carbs: The Health Effects

Many studies show that eating refined carbohydrates, or “bad” ones, is linked to health problems. These problems include obesity and type 2 diabetes. These bad carbs cause severe blood sugar swings. This leads to cravings for even more carb-rich and unhealthy foods, making obesity worse. Obesity, on the other hand, is the basis for metabolic syndrome and many chronic diseases.

Blood sugar fluctuations and chronic diseases

Big swings in blood sugar also cause chronic inflammation. Nearly every chronic disease is also accompanied by inflammation. Bad carbohydrates can promote and worsen these diseases and block their cure.

But being overweight is also pro-inflammatory. So, bad carbs also cause disease via this route. This is because abdominal fat in particular is a hormone-active tissue and forms, among other things, pro-inflammatory messenger substances. The fewer isolated carbohydrates you eat, the easier it is to lose weight and the less risk there is of developing a chronic disease.

Lack of vital substances

Foods that are high in refined carbohydrates are usually also low in essential nutrients. It is therefore often said that they are “empty calories”, meaning that these foods provide calories, but not vital substances. Therefore, those who like to eat poor carbohydrate sources run the risk of developing a nutrient deficiency in the long term.

No more control over sugar consumption

Often you don’t even recognize the bad carbohydrates at first glance. This is because many ready-made products have a lot of sugar added to them, and you wouldn’t even think of these foods, e.g. dips, desserts, fruit yogurts, juices, lemonades, snacks, ready-made sauces, etc. This is also called “hidden sugar”.

Consumers who don’t read the ingredient list of their foods can quickly lose track of their sugar intake because of the hidden sugar, and in this way consume much more sugar than they would actually like. In addition, the other ingredients of such products are usually not very healthy either.

Cause of the most common cause of death

No wonder hidden sugar is associated with all sorts of conditions, such as high blood pressure, high blood lipid levels, high uric acid levels, fatty liver, diabetes, obesity, etc. However, all these problems now increase the risk of further diseases, such as cardiovascular diseases, which are still the most common cause of death of our time ( 8 ).

So there are clearly bad carbs that are by no means recommended. However, it is not very wise to demonize the entire group of carbohydrates just because this group includes a few unhealthy foods in addition to healthy ones.

After all, a Mars bar can’t be compared to an apple, a piece of cake can’t be compared to a jacket potato, and a table bun can’t be compared to a slice of wholemeal spelt bread. The good carbohydrates, therefore, fit very well into a healthy diet.

Good Carbs: The Health Effects

The good carbohydrates or wholesome carbohydrate-rich foods not only contain carbs, but also numerous vital substances and fiber. They do not cause blood sugar spikes, consequently no cravings and therefore do not pose a risk of chronic inflammatory diseases.

Hundreds of studies on fiber-rich carbohydrates (vegetables, fruits, legumes, whole grains) show that consuming these foods leads to improved metabolic health and reduces the risk of disease.

You can find studies on any topic. It could be vegetables or individual grains. It could be pseudo-grains, nuts, beans, peas, or fruits. The results will be positive.

Fruits are often warned for diabetics. But, they are even recommended for diabetes. This is in contrast to isolated sugars, as we describe here: Fruits and diabetes.

One of the most popular and healthiest cereals is oats, which provide numerous vital substances and trace elements so that even small daily amounts of them are enough to meaningfully enhance the diet. The situation is similar with the pseudo-grain quinoa, millet or buckwheat.

Peas, chickpeas and other legumes provide trace elements, minerals and antioxidants as well as naturally high-quality protein and fiber. Not to mention nuts, which protect the heart and pancreas and also have a cancer-fighting effect.

Good carbohydrates: primeval food

Carbohydrates have also been consumed for many thousands of years – whether in the form of roots, tubers, nuts, grass seeds, unripe legumes or even fruits. The obesity epidemic, on the other hand, did not begin until the late 20th century, and the type 2 diabetes epidemic followed shortly after. It doesn’t make sense, therefore, to suddenly blame foods we’ve been eating for millennia for new health problems that have only developed because we’re moving less and letting the food industry prepare our food (11).

It should also be remembered that there are many peoples who are in excellent health on a high-carbohydrate diet or who were in excellent health before the influence of the food industry, such as the inhabitants of Okinawa (Japan) or those from Kitava (Pacific). They all eat or ate extremely carbohydrate rich, but at the same time only real food, i.e. foods that are as natural as possible, unprocessed and industrially hardly modified and rich in vital substances and fiber.

However, once a natural eater switches to processed and refined carbohydrates, their fitness declines and chronic conditions set in.

You can live without carbs, but you don’t have to

You can live without carbs, as low-carb followers explain again and again. That’s true, but why would you do that to yourself when so many carbohydrate-rich foods not only taste very good, but are also incredibly healthy?

There are many foods that are not exactly essential, but enormously healthy if you do choose them. For example, you can live well without walnuts, without dandelions, without endive salad, without parsley, without freshly harvested apples, etc. But why would you do that? They are delicious foods that provide the organism with extremely helpful and healing substances. The same is true of many other foods that happen to belong to the category of carbohydrates.

Table: Good and bad carbohydrates

To make it easy for you to decide between good and bad carbohydrates once and for all, you will find a corresponding overview below:

Good carbohydrates

Good sources include:

• All vegetables and salads
• All fruits: apples, berries, grapes, bananas, etc. – all in unprocessed form (not canned, not as jam, not as syrup) – of course, fruits can be processed raw, e.g. in a blender.
• Legumes: lentils, peas, beans, chickpeas, peanuts, etc.
• Nuts: walnuts, hazelnuts, macadamia nuts, etc. and almonds
• Seeds: pumpkin seeds, linseed, sunflower seeds, etc.
• Whole grains (incl. pseudo-grains): oats, spelt, rice, quinoa, buckwheat, millet, etc.
• Potatoes and sweet potatoes

Bad carbohydrates

Bad sources:

• Sugar, sugar syrup
• White flour (extract flour)/starch flour
• White bread or bread containing white flour – Rye breads only looks darker because rye flour is darker than wheat flour, but rye flour is usually just as much processed as a light wheat flour. Unless the bread is made from 100 percent whole meal flour, which then has to be written on it.
• White/Polished Rice
• Fruit juices
• Sweetened beverages: cola and other soft drinks, energy drinks
• Sweets, chocolate and candies
• Ice cream
• Cakes, sweet pastries, biscuits and other pastries – these foods usually consist largely of white flour and sugar in combination with fat and eggs.
• Highly processed potato products: French fries and potato pancakes from the snack bar or fast food restaurant, potato chips, mashed potatoes, etc.

With this table, you already have a helpful guide for your next purchase.

Opt for a conscious diet

Surely you now know one or the other acquaintance, colleague or relative who eats a lot of bad carbohydrates and is still completely healthy. Of course, there are these people. Just as there are chain smokers and sports grouches who are still in top shape at the age of 80.

For us, however, it is not a matter of finding those exceptions that have become ancient with unhealthy diets and lifestyles. Rather, it is about finding out how to behave in order to increase the chances of a happy, healthy and, above all, more conscious life – and this automatically includes a consciously selected healthy diet, which should contain good, but preferably not bad carbs ( 15 ).

Try it out, which type of diet suits you best! If you make sure that vegetables, salads and good carbohydrates become your staple foods, plus of course, high-quality protein sources are served as side dishes, then you are already on the best possible path.