- What Is
- What is starch?
- Foods With Resistant Starch
- Foods with resistant starch
- Starchy Vegetables
- What about starchy vegetables?
- Starchy Foods to Avoid
- Starchy foods to avoid
- Nutrition Facts Label
- The nutrition facts label: parsing the starch
- Choose Good Sources
- Stay starchy
- Comments
- **COMMENTSTAGLIST**
- More
- **OTHERTAGLIST**
What is starch?
Starch is a complex carbohydrate. Healthy examples of starch include whole grains, beans, legumes, bananas, and cooked and cooled starches.
Starchy foods may not always get respect, but they have a crucial role in your diet. They can be nutritious, versatile, and tasty, but choosing the right starchy foods can be overwhelming. It can be tempting to just order french fries or mashed potatoes with your meal.
However, what exactly is the nutritional value of starch, and how can you make the most of it?
Starch is a complex carbohydrate. Starch, sugar, and fiber are the three most common carbohydrates you will get from your food. Your body breaks down some carbs into blood sugar that provides energy to the cells in your body.
Starches have a bad reputation in certain circles, but the type of starch you eat is what plays a significant role in its nutritional value.
Starch vs. resistant starch
People once thought all starch quickly turned into glucose, became blood sugar, and was used up as energy. This conception changed in the 1980s when researchers discovered that some starches act like fiber. Your body doesn’t digest fiber. Instead, it passes through your digestive tract unscathed.
The slow movement of fiber through the digestive tract serves several functions. It helps you maintain your blood sugar levels, prevents constipation, makes you feel full longer, and more.
Resistant starches are similar. They pass through your digestive tract, unaffected until they reach your large intestine. Then, the resistant starch becomes food for bacteria in the large intestine. A robust population of friendly gut bacteria may then improve your digestive health.
Since resistant starch isn't digested like other starch, it also doesn't spike blood sugar levels. Foods high in resistant starch, then, are ideal if you’re looking for healthy starchy food.
Foods with resistant starch
Resistant starch isn’t a well-advertised feature of food. You won’t find it on many nutritional labels. It can be found in a number of foods, though, including:
Whole grains
You should already eat whole grains because of their fiber content, but whole grains also contain resistant starch. Refined grains have all the grain layers stripped away, but whole grains retain more nutrients.
Beans
Most beans, especially kidney and white beans, are high in resistant starch. Beans are also a great source of protein and fiber.
Legumes
Legumes are one of the most robust sources of resistant starch. Chickpeas, lentils, and peas are nutritious and versatile legumes.
Lentils, in particular, are a rich source of protein and resistant starch. They have at least four times more resistant starch than certain other starchy foods, like potatoes.
Bananas and plantains
If you need sweet but starchy food, unripened (green) bananas and plantains contain resistant starches. These starches turn to sugar, though, as the banana ripens and gets sweeter.
Cooked and cooled starches
Some starchy foods, like rice or potatoes, lose some of their starches when cooked. However, a specific type of starch crystalizes and becomes resistant when the food cools down.
Foods with resistant starches like those listed above often have more resistant starch when they are cooled after cooking. On top of that, reheating them later isn’t enough to destroy the resistant starches again, so they’re similarly healthy as leftovers.
What about starchy vegetables?
The most famous starchy vegetables are peas, corn, and potatoes. Starchy vegetables have more carbohydrates than nonstarchy vegetables, but that doesn’t mean they’re unhealthy: They’re just more calorically dense.
Starchy vegetables are rich in vitamins and minerals like other vegetables, so they still have many health benefits. You can enjoy potatoes and corn without worry (so long as they don't contain unhealthy additives like excess salt).
Of course, there are many starchy vegetables, so you don’t always need to grab the potatoes. Incorporate any of these starchy vegetables into your diet:
- Cassava
- Corn
- Jicama
- Lima beans
- Taro root
- Water chestnuts
- Yams
- Yucca
Starchy vegetables have more carbs on average than nonstarchy vegetables, though, so you may wish to opt for nonstarchy vegetables more often if you are specifically trying to reduce your calorie intake.
Starchy foods to avoid
You should omit processed or refined starches from your plate. Foods like white bread, white rice, enriched pasta, instant potatoes, and other processed foods are potentially unhealthy starches for a few reasons:
Refined starches lack significant nutrients
Processed foods are often stripped of their nutritional value, leaving only starch behind. They still give your body energy, but refined starches lack the nutrients they have when they’re whole.
Refined starches don’t fill you up
The lack of nutrients in refined foods often means you don’t feel as full from eating them. This lack of satiety can cause overeating, weight gain, and health problems.
Refined starches are digested too quickly
Refined starches travel more quickly through the body because of the simplicity of their nutritional makeup. Quick digestion lets them hit your bloodstream faster and spike your blood sugar.
The nutrition facts label: parsing the starch
You’ll have to do a little math to figure out how much starch is in your food. Food has three primary carbohydrates: starch, sugar, and fiber. To figure out how much starch is in your food, then, you’ll need to subtract the total sugars and dietary fiber from the total carbohydrates.
There’s no formula or recommended amount for resistant starch, so all you can do to up your intake of this nutrient is to eat foods with resistant starch.
Stay starchy
While those on certain diets may wish to moderate their intake, carbs and starches aren’t innately unhealthy for most people. In fact, they play an essential role in a diet that’s hard to replace. The important thing is obtaining them from sources that will also provide other nutrients while leaving out unhealthy additives.
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Medically Reviewed on 2/10/2023
References
SOURCES:
American Diabetes Association: "Get to Know Carbs."
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: "Food Labels."
Consumer Reports: "Resistant Starch May Speed Weight Loss and Improve Health."
Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health: "Ask the Expert: Legumes and Resistant Starch," "Fiber."
The Johns Hopkins Patient Guide to Diabetes: "THE TRUTH ABOUT STARCHY VEGETABLES," "WHAT IS RESISTANT STARCH?"
MedlinePlus: "Carbohydrates."
Nutrients: "Starchy Carbohydrates in a Healthy Diet: The Role of the Humble Potato."
U.S. Department of Agriculture and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services: "Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 2020-2025."
