Want Better Blood Sugar? Eat More Fat.

3 min read

If you’ve ever felt a burst of energy followed by a crash after a meal, you’ve likely experienced a glucose spike. This happens when the carbohydrates in your food quickly break down into sugar, flooding your bloodstream with glucose. In response, your pancreas releases insulin to shuttle that sugar into your cells. Ideally, your glucose should return to baseline—somewhere in the 80 mg/dL range for a glucose-tolerant individual—within about two hours after eating. But for many people, that’s not what happens.

Instead, glucose levels remain elevated, or swing rapidly, leading to symptoms like fatigue, irritability, sugar cravings, and energy dips. While these may seem mild or temporary, they’re often early indicators of deeper imbalance and an over-sensitivity to glucose.

Chronically mismanaged glucose doesn’t just affect your energy levels, it plays a key role in the development of metabolic diseases including obesity, hypertension, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), and cardiovascular disease. It also contributes to low-grade inflammation and hormone imbalance, and underlies many chronic conditions ranging from PCOS to acne.

In previous articles we’ve explored that waiting for a diagnosis of mismanaged blood sugar common in mid-life and beyond puts you well behind in terms of optimal health outcomes. This is why blood sugar balance is one of our non-negotiables when it comes to building a foundation of health. We aren’t just looking at diabetes prevention. We’re talking about long-term energy, mood, focus, fertility, inflammation, disease prevention and even how well your brain and sensory organs age.

Reduce Glucose Spikes by Rethinking Your Plate

One of the biggest drivers of glucose imbalance is the type and amount of carbohydrates we eat, especially those stripped of fiber and nutrients, like white flour, sugary snacks, and sweetened beverages. Reducing simple carbs and focusing on whole, complex carbohydrates can help, but there’s more to the story.

An everyday strategy that works well in real life: pair your carbs with healthy fats, quality protein, and plenty of fiber. This combination slows digestion, promotes satiety, and helps your body regulate insulin more efficiently. You don’t have to eliminate carbs altogether, but the order you eat them, quantity, quality, and even when you eat them matter.

To make this point more tangible, I’m sharing a few real-time examples from my continuous glucose monitor (CGM). After one meal rich in fat, fiber, and protein: eggs, coconut milk, avocado, and a handful of blackberries (also high in fiber), my blood sugar barely budged. At lunch, I had a kale and chicken salad with goat cheese, walnuts, and a generous drizzle of olive oil, plus a touch of balsamic vinegar. Again, just a gentle rise in blood sugar that stayed well within my personal target range. Even a later snack of nuts and dark chocolate didn’t cause much disruption.

Curious how your own blood sugar responds? Take our free Blood Sugar Balance Assessment.