Theresa Albert is a nutritionist, best-selling cookbook author, and Food Network personality, and we're thrilled to have her with us for the next few weeks to provide her unique brand of cooking and nutritional knowledge. Whole grains are the perfect packaging for fibre, nutrients, good fats and carbohydrates. Any grain in its natural state (rice, wheat, barley, millet, etc.) is ready for processing by your body.  The more processing that occurs outside of you, the more risk there is of losing some of those precious nutrients. But that’s only half of the story.  The other half is what is known as the glycemic response, which is a measurement of how quickly a food is turned into fuel by your body.  We want foods that burn slowly so that there is a consistent level of insulin required and energy produced. Think of it this way - your blood sugar is like a thermostat in your house.  If you are constantly turning the heat up and down and turning the air conditioning on and off, no one is going to be very comfortable inside. They are going to be alternately sluggish and shivering to compensate, and the furnace and air conditioner are both going to kick the bucket a lot sooner for all the extra effort. The way to protect this from happening is to keep the jackets on the grains and the temperature consistent. It is mostly fibre that helps regulate the glycemic response, but fibre also regulates the bowel.  There are two kinds of fibre: bulk and gel.  The bulking, insoluble kind helps “sweep out” while the gelling, soluble kind helps capture things like cholesterol and other wastes and move them through.  The bottom line is that you need both, and Canadians on the whole fall sadly short on how much we get. We average between 4 and 11 grams per day while the recommendation is at least 25 and up to 40. Fibre comes from fruits and vegetables as well as whole grains, and boosting both is the best way to get it. There are high-fibre cereals on the market that can help get you part of the way there, but the rest is going to come not only from whole grain breads but also naturally high fibre foods like: apples, figs, berries, plums, celery, spinach, broccoli, cauliflower, and beans. A good way to go is to combine lean sources of protein with high fibre foods. A breading for chicken that contains whole wheat flour, oats or flax seeds is a great start. Add a side dish of whole grain rice and a crunchy vegetable and you can’t go wrong. Making sure that each meal has some naturally-occurring fibre and protein will mean that you don’t need to count grams of anything. You will be able to cover off all your nutritional needs, keep an even blood sugar level and simply enjoy luscious food.