The low GI diet
The low GI diet is a diet in which carbohydrates can account for up to 55% of calories but must have a low glycemic index (or GI). Kesako? The glycemic index represents the ability of carbohydrate to raise blood sugar levels, or blood sugar levels. A carbohydrate with a high glycemic index (over 70/100) raises blood sugar quickly, while a carbohydrate with a low glycemic index (below 55) causes it to rise more slowly. The aim is to limit the secretion of insulin induced and promote weight gain.

The concept of glycemic index refines the older notion of simple carbohydrates and complex carbohydrates: indeed, complex carbohydrates can actually have a high glycemic index.

More specifically, the glycemic load takes into consideration both the amount of carbohydrate and its glycemic index. Are you still following? For example, a very small portion of a very high GI food has a low glycemic load, a large amount of a low GI food has a high glycemic load. Theoretically, the lower the glycemic index of a food, the more you can eat.

The gluten-free diet
Gluten is a protein found in cereal products and in particular in wheat. The gluten-free diet therefore eliminates wheat from the plate but also other grains such as rye or oats.

But watch out for false friends! Gluten-free doesn’t mean carbohydrate-free: A gluten-free diet based on grains such as rice, potatoes, and fruit is gluten-free but high in carbohydrates.

The low-carb diet
Unlike the low GI diet, the low-carb diet (for low carbohydrates, or few carbohydrates in French) is not only concerned with the glycemic index of foods (even if of course you should favor ingredients with a low GI) but also the amount of carbohydrates consumed. He recommends consuming less than 100 grams of carbohydrates per day. Be careful, we are talking here about the amount of carbohydrates and not sugar: this is why we must look at the “carbohydrates” line of the nutritional value tables and not only the “including sugar” line.

Concretely, starches such as sugar are very largely reduced or even eliminated, and carbohydrates are mainly derived from fruits, legumes or vegetables.

The ketogenic diet (or keto diet)
The ketogenic diet is a form of the low-carb diet in which carbohydrates are further reduced to less than 25 grams per day. The goal of the ketogenic diet is to harness the body’s ability to use fat for energy instead of carbohydrates through ketones (hence the name the ketogenic diet).

Cereals and starches are removed, as well as legumes. The plates consist of green vegetables, meat, eggs, fish, and fats like butter and olive oil. To know everything about the ketogenic diet, I invite you to read my articles on this subject:

Everything you need to know to start the ketogenic diet!
The Banting diet
The Banting diet takes its name from William Banting (1797-1878), known for having been the first to testify to the benefits of a low-carbohydrate diet, notably through his book Letter on Corpulence published in 1863. After having tried many unsuccessful diets and having reached the weight of 92 kilograms for 1.65 meters, Banting followed the advice of Dr. Harvey before losing 20 kilograms in a year and feeling 20 years younger:

“Dinner: 2 o’clock in the evening with five or six ounces of any fish except salmon, herring or eel, or even weight of any meat except pork and veal, any vegetable except potatoes, parsnips, beets, turnips, carrots; an ounce of toast, fruit, unsweetened pudding, poultry and game, and two or three glasses of good red wine, sherry or Madeira (Champagne, Oporto and Beer are prohibited); in all ten to twelve ounces of solid food and ten ounces of liquid (…)

Supper: 9 o’clock in the evening with three or four ounces of meat or fish, as at dinner, a glass or two of red wine or sherry cut with water: in all four ounces of solid food and seven ounces of liquid “

The Atkins diet
The Atkins Diet, named after its creator, Dr. Robert Atkins, is the forerunner of the ketogenic diet. In the 1970s, he developed a program to lose weight based on the drastic reduction of carbohydrates. His program takes place in several phases: the first is the most reduced in carbohydrates and they are reintroduced over time until a point of equilibrium is found. The Atkins Diet was reviewed in 2011 by Dr Eric Westman, Stephen Phinney and Jeff Volek, to give the new

Atkins diet.

Although I am personally a fan of the ketogenic diet, the goal of this article is not to take sides with one diet over another but to make you understand the big differences between them, between the type of carbohydrate and their quality, as well as to address the notions of index and glycemic load. Hope it helped you see more clearly!