Glucose Revolution: The Life-Changing Power of Balancing Your Blood Sugar

by Jessie Inchauspé

Here’s what happened in all these participants’ bodies: when they drank vinegar before eating a meal rich in carbohydrates, the glucose spike from that meal was reduced by 8 to 30 percent. To understand how this happens, we have an important clue: the amount of insulin also decreases when vinegar is consumed before eating (by about 20 percent in one study). This tells us that drinking vinegar does not flatten glucose curves by increasing the amount of insulin in the body. And this is a very good thing. Indeed, you could flatten a glucose curve by injecting someone with insulin or giving them a medication or a drink that would release more insulin into their system. This is because the more insulin there is in the body, the more your liver, muscles, and fat cells work to remove any excess glucose from the bloodstream and quickly store it away. However, although insulin brings glucose levels down, it also increases inflammation and weight gain. What we really want to do is flatten our glucose curves without increasing the amount of insulin in the body. Which is what vinegar does. So how does it work? Scientists believe that several things could be at play.