October 14, 2015

Chicken & Butternut Squash Tagine Diabetes Friendly

Last week we wrote about Sara, mom of Owen who was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes 4 years ago. To kick off this month’s series of diabetes friendly recipes Sara shared a chicken tagine with butternut squash which I served to my own family this weekend.

As I began to research recipes which claimed to be diabetic friendly, I quickly started to disappear into a carbohydrate black hole. How do I know what “number” means low carb? Is it nutrient dense? It is an education and understanding carbohydrates and the role of meal planning called out to me as a home cook. It’s important to remember however that type 1 diabetes requires ongoing medical intervention.

The American Diabetes Association considers recipes that indicate equal to or less than 30 grams of carbohydrates per serving are ideal and anything with less than 15 grams per serving is low carb. Of course, the type of carbohydrate matters too. See their “Understanding Carbohydrates” section for more information. As for fiber, an “excellent” source will contain 5 grams or more.

Meal planning helps me organise my week around work and kid schedules and using different tools such as online grocery ordering at Peapod makes it so easy. I love to shop specialty markets for meat and fish but I take 20 minutes on a weekend to sit down with a cup of coffee, cookbooks and my notepad and pencil to be inspired for the week head. If this seems onerous or “just one more thing to do” then the American Diabetes Association has a dedicated website offering free meal planning which includes nutritional content and a printable grocery shopping list.

This month we have our own series starting with chicken and butternut squash tagine with golden raisins. It is well spiced with a sweet edge from the soft squash and plump raisins. I asked Sara, Owen’s mom, to help decode the information behind the nutritional content. Here’s what she had to say about the chicken and butternut squash tagine.

“…being able to provide the nutrition information (carbs, primarily) is very nice.”

Nutritional Information for chicken tagine with butternut squash and golden raisins:

Protein 29.8 g – GOOD

Carbohydrate 29.7 g – IDEAL

Fiber 5.2 g” – IDEAL

“..squash is very friendly, it’s low carb and high in fiber, which delays carbohydrate absorbtion.” In other words, a slow carb.

“Everything in this recipe is very low carb with the exception of the raisins which are carbohydrate dense so use only the small measured amount”

“I recommend serving brown rice instead of white because it is much lower on the glycemic index so raises blood sugar more slowly and is high in fiber. (The glycemic index, or GI, measures how a -containing food raises . Foods are ranked based on how they compare to a reference food — either or white bread.

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Cooking Time: 6 hours on LOW or 3 hours on HIGH

Servings: 6

Ingredients

2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
3 cloves of garlic, minced
2 1/2 tbsp Garam Masala OR make your own see indented ingredients below in bold italics
- 4 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 1/2 tsp ground cumin
- 1 1/2 tsp ground cardamom
- 1/8 tsp cayenne pepper
- 1/2 tsp ground black pepper
1 tsp ground turmeric
1/2 tsp salt
3 lbs or 12 skinless chicken thighs
one butternut squash, (4 cups) peeled and diced into bite-sized pieces
1/2 cup golden raisins
1 cup reduced-sodium or salt-free chicken broth