The cold is not far away – it was supposed to arrive a while ago, we can count ourselves lucky to experience an Indian summer! – nor the hearty dishes typical of the season (the purists, including the one who writes these lines, have already organized raclettes, even with 18 degrees at 8 p.m., don’t overdo it). But who says autumn dishes often says calorie dishes, like the traditional beef bourguignon accompanied by its rice in sauce. If you are an aficionado of preparation but you count your calories come winter, we have the ultimate trick to considerably reduce the calorie content of rice (it's already that, right?). A cup of rice contains an average of 240 calories, but one key element helps lighten the portion:coconut oil. It was at the 249th National Meeting and Exposition of the American Chemical Society (CAS) that the American scientists presented their discovery. They concluded that converting the digestible starch in rice into less digestible starch, called "resistant starch", would reduce the calorie intake of the cereal. To arrive at these results, the team studied 38 varieties from Sri Lanka.
Unlike digestible starch, resistant starch is not broken down in the small intestine where carbohydrates normally break down into glucose or simple carbohydrates and then are absorbed into the blood. Here is the procedure:add the coconut oil to the boiling water, pour the rice and let it cook for 40 minutes, before placing it in the refrigerator for 12 hours. For half a cup of rice, they found the result contained up to 10 times more resistant starch. “Because obesity is a growing problem, especially in developing countries, we wanted to find solutions that include other foods says Sudhair A. James, who conducted the study. And to continue:“Once the body converts carbohydrates into glucose, the remaining fuel source turns into a polysaccharide called glycogen. The liver and muscles store glycogen for energy and turn it into glucose when needed. Excess glucose that is not converted into glycogen becomes fat, which can lead to overweight or obesity ". Pretty easy to understand, isn't it? Experts point out that cooling in the refrigerator is the key step in the process, the one that largely leads to resistant starch. Lesson well understood... What are we waiting for to try?
