How to Eat Well: Is Gwyneth Paltrow right to deny her kids carbs?

I see that Gwyneth Paltrow is about to publish her third book about food. This time it’s a recipe book and, needless to say, there’s a huge amount of publicity surrounding the launch.
It is reported that Ms Paltrow limits the amount of carbohydrates that her children eat, which may seem rather drastic, especially as she goes on to say that her family is often hungry.
She also claims that everyone in the family has multiple food intolerances suggesting, in my view, spurious testing methods as well as rather bad luck.

The reviews for the book have been cynical, with one US critic branding it, “the Bible of laughable Hollywood neuroticism”. Celebrity shines a light on everything the star does, magnifying what is already there and Ms Paltrow’s anxiety about food is no exception.

It’s this point that interests me, as our behaviour around food is inevitably something we pass on to our children. Mothers are always right (I know this is true because my own mother told me so) and so Ms Paltrow’s children will be affected by their mother’s beliefs about food and diet.

This truth applies to most of us, but has the actress got a point when it comes to limiting carbohydrates? Remember that carbs consumed on their own create glucose (the sugar the body uses as a primary source of fuel) more rapidly than when they are consumed with protein or fat. When glucose levels in the blood rise too sharply, the excess is stored away first as glycogen (short-term stores) and then as fat.