No matter what carbohydrate it is – whether it’s in a lollipop, bread, pasta, or an orange – all carbohydrates have 4 Calories/gram. That means that if you break down a gram of this food, it will create 4 Calories of energy/heat.
So if you are looking at a slice of bread with 40 calories and 10 grams of carbohydrates, you can be sure that all of the calories in that slice of bread come from carbohydrates, because 40 divided by 10 is 4. But here’s the kicker. All carbohydrates are not created equally. We have simple carbohydrates (monosaccharide’s and disaccharides: the sugars), complex carbohydrates (long chains of carbohydrate molecules), and fibers.
Examples of simple carbohydrates are glucose, fructose, and galactose. Your body’s favorite sugar is glucose. It knows how to use glucose, and glucose is the only carbohydrate your body breaks down for energy. You have to do cardio workouts aswell.
All the other carbohydrates your body must modify through chemical processes to make glucose so that it can use it for energy. In fact, your body must modify all nutrients into glucose before they can be used for energy. Use healthy food and be sure that you are doing the right thing.
Examples of disaccharides are sucrose, maltose, and lactose. Sucrose is table sugar, maltose is the sugar you find in many starches, and lactose is the sugar in milk. Disaccharides are just two monosaccharides hanging out with one another. The body can split them and get monosaccharides that it can then convert to glucose for energy.
