Prediabetes Diet: Meal Plan, What Foods to Eat & Avoid

Updated: December 5, 2020

What Is Prediabetes?

Prediabetes (also seen written as "pre diabetes" and "pre-diabetes") is a condition with higher-than-normal blood sugar (blood glucose) levels, but levels that are lower than in type 2 diabetes. 

As the National Institute for Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) explains, it results from a disruption in how your body regulates glucose (sugar) in your blood.

The Lark Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP) is an award-winning mobile health program that over 100,000 Americans have used to help prevent Diabetes. It's provided free of charge by many health plans. Your diet plays a huge part in preventing diabetes because the sugars your body breaks down can come from food, as your body digests and metabolizes the foods you eat, and that is why it is important to monitor prediabetes glucose levels.

Almost every choice you make day and night can affect blood sugar levels, and Lark Diabetes Prevention Program can guide you in healthy decisions. This personalized coaching program uses proven methods to lower risk for type 2 diabetes. See if you are eligible below.

Jump to the recipes here!

The "Right" Prediabetes Diet

What is the best, or "right" prediabetes diet? That may be a burning question on your mind if you have been recently diagnosed with prediabetes (also known as borderline diabetes), or if you have known about your prediabetes for a while now.

The good news about prediabetes is that it is reversible, meaning you can prevent the progression of type 2 diabetes. The Mayo Clinic states that by following a healthier diet by eating nutritious foods and adding daily activity to your routine, you can regulate your blood sugar.

Table Of Contents

• Should I Say "Prediabetes" or "Prediabetic"?
• Best Diet Plan to Reverse Prediabetes
• What You Should Look For In Your Best Pre-Diabetes Diet:
• Prediabetes Diet Plan and Eating Healthier
• Finding the Right Diet for Prediabetes
• Healthy Diets for Prediabetes
• Sample Diet Plans for Prediabetes
• Low-Carb Ketogenic Recipes For Prediabetes
• Balanced Prediabetes Recipes
• So What Is the Healthiest Diet for Prediabetes?

Why Diet Matters for Prediabetes

This carefully controlled system can go awry if you continually challenge your blood glucose regulation system by eating foods high in sugar, or just too much food. A common way this can happen is if you are gaining weight. With weight gain, you are consistently eating more than your body needs.

Your body will try to keep up with demands and can be successful for a long time. As your insulin resistance increases, your pancreas can produce increasing amounts of insulin to try to keep blood sugar levels in normal ranges.

Prediabetes and type 2 diabetes are conditions that develop when insulin does not work properly in your body anymore. They develop gradually, often over years or decades, and are usually related to lifestyle factors such as diet.

Insulin is released in response to an increase in blood sugar. When you are healthy, the system works well.

If this continues, though, the system will eventually break down. At some point, your pancreas will be unable to produce enough insulin to keep up with demand.

This point, when insulin is no longer sufficient, is the point when your blood sugar levels begin to rise. You can get a blood test, and your doctor can diagnose you with prediabetes or diabetes based on the result. 

You are at higher risk of prediabetes if you are:

• Over 45 years old
• Do not get much exercise or are sedentary
• Have a family history of diabetes
• Are African American, Native American, Hispanic/Latino, or Pacific Islander
• Are overweight or obese
• Have high "bad" LDL cholesterol or high triglycerides, or low "good" HDL cholesterol

What these have in common is that you can improve them with diet, either eating better or having a planned diet for your prediabetes.

Many people with prediabetes eventually get type 2 diabetes, but here's a secret: it doesn't always have to happen, prediabetes is reversible, which is why it is called borderline diabetes.

The American Diabetes Association shows that you can prevent or delay type 2 diabetes in large part by following a healthy diet for prediabetes – no gimmicks necessary.

Awareness of prediabetes could be the best thing that ever happened to you. It gives you the chance to find a good diet for prediabetes that works for your health and for your lifestyle. The Lark Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP) is an award-winning mobile health program that over 100,000 Americans have used to help prevent Diabetes. It's provided free of charge by many health plans.

Once you decide to make those healthy changes, you are more likely to succeed with a support system that works for you, and a health app could be what you need for information and accountability.

Jump to the recipes here!

Should I Say "Prediabetes" or "Prediabetic"?

For years, the prediabetes and diabetes communities have been grappling over the issue of how to refer to individuals with prediabetes and diabetes. While some members of the public and medical communities alike often use the terms "prediabetic" and "diabetic," many others prefer to use terms such as "living with prediabetes," "has prediabetes," or "person with diabetes," or "PWD."

Calling people "prediabetic" or "diabetic" may feel like it is an attempt to define them by their health conditions, and that they have no control over their health condition.

Lark recognizes the entire person and the importance of managing health conditions within the context of the person's lifestyle. We hope that this distinction and our personalized coaching will allow Lark's respect, expertise, and good intentions to shine through.

Best Diet Plan to Reverse Prediabetes

A great thing about prediabetes is that it is often reversible. In most cases, you do not even need medications, all you may need are the right diet plan, additional healthy lifestyle choices such as exercising and avoiding smoking, and a lot of dedication and patience.

There is no single "best diet plan for prediabetes". If you ask 100 people, "What is the best diet for prediabetes?," you may get 100 different answers – and they may all be correct.

Your plan should help you control your weight, provide the nutrients and healthy foods you need to lower risk for diabetes and other chronic diseases, and fit into your lifestyle so that you can make it work for the long term.

There are guideline to healthy eating when you have prediabetes, which we'll go over below.

What You Should Look For In Your Prediabetes Diet:

1. Your "Right Weight"

Extra pounds are among the most significant modifiable risk factors for prediabetes and diabetes, and the prediabetes diet plan that you choose should help you achieve and maintain a healthy weight.

While a "healthy" BMI is considered to be under 25 kg/m2 (that is 155 lb. for a 5'6" woman and 179 lb. for a 5'11" man), it may not be necessary to get under that weight to lower your risk. Losing as little as 5% of your body weight – or 8 to 10 lb. if you weigh 160 to 200 lb. – can decrease diabetes risk.

2. Right Nutrition

Aside from weight, certain nutrients are linked to improved health and lower diabetes risk.

Increasing consumption of:

• Vegetables such as chard, kale, broccoli, and Brussel sprouts
• Fruits, such as low glycemic foods like apples, cherries, or blueberries
• Beans
• Eating more whole grains instead of refined grains
• Choosing olive oil instead of other oils such as vegetable oil

Improving your diet and increasing certain nutrient-rich foods can all lower diabetes risk.

Decreasing the consumption of:

• Sweets and candy
• Avoiding refined carbohydrates, such as white bread and pasta, and choosing low carbohydrate foods
• Unhealthy fats from fried foods
• Avoiding fatty meats

Need help finding a prediabetes low carb diet? We've made a comprehensive list to help you choose low carb food for your prediabetes!

3. Right Lifestyle

If you do not follow the diet plan, it will not work. Any diet, no matter how nutritionally perfect, needs to fit into your lifestyle. Your prediabetic diet needs to:

• Include foods you love to eat
• Allow for indulgences and special occasions, so you can satisfy the occasional craving and fit in a party or work event without going off your diet plan or feeling guilty
• Rely on "regular" foods and ingredients that your local supermarket carries
• Require you to spend only the amount of time in the kitchen that you want, rather than requiring gourmet recipes for all three meals

Prediabetes Diet Plan and Eating Healthier

Here are some diet recommendations for prediabetes, including a list of foods that are best for those looking for the best diet to lower blood sugar.

Below are some foods that can help you regulate your blood sugar and keep your weight in a healthy range.

‍

Want to Download This Prediabetes Diet Plan As A PDF?

GET MY COPY

Finding the Right Diet for Preventing Diabetes

A prediabetes diet plan can help your blood sugars get closer to or even within healthy ranges. In prediabetes, your blood sugar is higher than normal but still lower than in diabetes (this is known as insulin resistance). Your doctor may tell you that you have prediabetes if you have:

• Fasting blood sugar level of 100 to 125 mg/dl,
• An oral glucose tolerance test of 140 to 199 mg/dl, or
• Glycated hemoglobin (A1c range) of 5.7% to 6.4%.

Need more help with blood sugar levels? View our chart to help you keep your blood sugar in a healthy range!

While you have some insulin resistance, your body is still producing and responding to insulin – and that's great news. It means you can put together a nutritious plan that follows pre diabetic diet recommendations and expect better health.

A healthy diet for prediabetes does not necessarily need to be low in carbohydrates. According to U.S. News and World Report rankings, the two types of diet for prediabetes and high cholesterol in 2022, are moderate diet patterns. A Mediterranean diet pattern is ranked first, followed closely by the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension, or DASH, diet.

Types of Healthy Diets for Prediabetes

About Low-Carbohydrate and Ketogenic Diets for Prediabetes

Low-carbohydrate diets have gotten a lot of attention recently as strategies for reversing prediabetes. The carbohydrates in your diet that provide weight loss include sugars and starches. Starches are in grains and flour, beans, and starchy vegetables.

Added sugars include sugars in sweets, sweetened foods such as flavored oatmeal and ketchup, and sugar-sweetened beverages such as soda. There are also natural sugars, which are found in nutritious foods such as dairy products and fruit.

Proponents of low-carbohydrate weight loss diets, such as Atkins, claim that the diet can help you lose weight because instead of burning dietary carbohydrates for fuel, you burn body fat because you are eating so few dietary carbohydrates. The diet can help you cut calories by:

• Eliminating or severely restricting high-calorie foods such as sweets and refined carbohydrates.
• Promoting satiety by increasing protein and fat, which are filling nutrients.
• Reducing appetite by reducing the food choices available to you.

Types of Diets for Prediabetes

• 1. Low-Carb Diets and Prediabetes
• 2. Ketogenic Diet for Prediabetes
• 3. Mediterranean Diet Pattern for Prediabetes
• 4. DASH Diet for Prediabetes
• 5. The DPP Diet and Coaching for Prediabetes

1. Low-Carb Diets and Prediabetes

Sugars and starches that you get from your diet enter your bloodstream as a type of sugar called glucose. In prediabetes, your body has trouble managing the glucose in your blood due to resistance to a hormone called insulin. Normally, insulin is able to help your body keep blood glucose levels in check, but the effect is weaker if you have prediabetes, so blood glucose rises.

There is research supporting reduced-carbohydrate diets in the treatment of prediabetes. Reducing your sugar and starch intake may lower blood sugar levels by preventing as much sugar from going into your blood. It can also help reverse insulin resistance.

Reduced-carbohydrate diets range from moderate to very low-carb. The rest of your calories come from protein and fat, so you might depend more heavily on high-protein and high-fat foods than the average person.

2. Ketogenic Diet for Prediabetes

A ketogenic diet is a type of low-carbohydrate diet that is on the extreme end. The goal is to limit carbohydrates so much that the body does not have enough glucose – a type of carbohydrate – to fuel the brain normally. Instead, the body shifts to a metabolic state called ketosis, and produces ketone bodies to fuel the brain's activities.

The theory behind a ketogenic diet for prediabetes is that when your body is in ketosis, you can be sure that you do not have excess carbohydrates in your diet. Since carbohydrates in your diet are broken down into glucose that goes into your bloodstream, being in ketosis assures that you are not inundating your bloodstream with excessive amounts of glucose due to the foods you eat.

A ketogenic diet for prediabetes might include about 20 to 50 grams per day of non-fiber carbohydrates, or about 5 to 10% of total calories from carbohydrates. The rest of your calories come from fat and protein. The food choices on this diet are similar to those on other low-carb diets, but you may need to further restrict some of the moderate-carbohydrate options that might be easier to fit in on a more moderate low-carb diet. Examples include fruit (an apple has 24 grams of non-fiber carbohydrates) and starchy vegetables (a half-cup of corn has 15 grams of non-fiber carbs).

3. Mediterranean Diet Pattern for Prediabetes

A Mediterranean-style diet is based on traditional eating patterns of Mediterranean countries, especially Greece, southern Italy, and Spain. This way of eating is known for its heart-healthy benefits, but research also shows that it can also help in weight loss and assist in blood sugar control.

Compared to the average American diet, a Mediterranean diet pattern generally includes more:

• Olive oil
• Vegetables
• Legumes (beans, peas, lentils, and soy)
• Whole grains
• Fruits
• Nuts

It includes moderate consumption of poultry and fish, and less:

• Full fat dairy products
• Red meat
• Sweets

4. DASH Diet for Prediabetes

The DASH diet may have been developed for reducing high blood pressure, but don't let that fool you. The DASH may also be good for weight loss, bone health, mental health, heart health, and prediabetes prevention. To get from an average American diet to a DASH-style pattern, you can:

• Boost your intake of vegetables and fresh fruit
• Eat more low-fat dairy products and beans
• Choose whole grains more often
• Choose fish, poultry, and lean meat instead of fatty red meat or processed meat
• Reduce the amount of sweets you have

5. The DPP Diet and Coaching for Prediabetes

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, have developed a program with diet and lifestyle changes that has been shown among prediabetes patients to reduce the risk of developing diabetes by over 50%. This program is the Diabetes Prevention Program, or DPP.

The Lark Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP) is an award-winning mobile health program that over 100,000 Americans have used to help prevent Diabetes. It's provided free of charge by many health plans.

Lark helps with tracking weight, food, and exercise, and customizes the program according to preferences such as low-carb, gluten-free, or vegan.

Lark's prediabetes diet recommendations are consistent with the DPP and include recommendations based off evidence from diets such as the DASH diet and Mediterranean patterns. Your Lark coach, for example, might suggest:

• Choosing fruit instead of dessert.
• Steaming, baking, or grilling instead of frying.
• Using olive oil instead of butter or shortening.
• Trying plant-based proteins or fish sometimes instead of red meat.
• Enjoying your meals and having them in a pleasant environment.

‍

Sample Diet Plans for Prediabetes

The prediabetes diet plans below and prediabetes meal plans are designed to help you lose weight, improve your blood sugar control and overall health, and be easy to follow. Each plan has about 1,200 to 1,400 calories per day. If you need more, you can add in one or more of the healthy snack options listed below the menus.

There is are one-week menus for a low-carb ketogenic diet and for a balanced, DPP-based prediabetes diet, and snacks listed for both types of diets.

Be sure to:

• Drink plenty of water
• Check with your doctor before starting the plan
• Modify the plan to meet your dietary needs and preferences

‍

Low-Carb Ketogenic Prediabetes Menu

Low-Carb Ketogenic Recipes For Prediabetes

Spinach Cheddar Frittata

(Serves 4)

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon of olive oil
• 10 oz. frozen cooked or fresh spinach
• 8 oz. sliced zucchini
• 4 eggs plus 8 egg whites
• 4 oz. cheddar cheese

Directions:

1. Cook the vegetables in a hot pan with oil
2. Mix with the eggs and cheese
3. Pour into a greased pan
4. Bake at 400 degrees until the eggs are set, or about 25 minutes.

Cauliflower Turkey Hash

(Serves 4)

Ingredients

• 1 lb. cooked fresh or frozen cauliflower, chopped
• 1 lb. lean ground turkey
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper
• 4 eggs

Directions

• Heat the oil in a pan
• Add the onion and ground turkey; stir until the turkey is browned
• Add the spices and cauliflower
• Add the eggs and stir until the eggs are cooked

Chicken Chili

(Serves 4)

Ingredients

• 1 lb. chicken breast, cubed or shredded
• 1 tbs olive oil
• 1 onion, diced
• 1 clove garlic, chopped
• 1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and chopped
• 1 cup low-sodium chicken broth
• 1 cup low-sodium canned white beans
• 1/2 teaspoon cumin
• 1/2 cup fresh cilantro
• 2 oz. shredded cheese
• 1 avocado, sliced

Directions

1. Heat the oil in a pan and add the chicken, garlic, onion, and jalapeno
2. Cook until chicken is cooked and no longer raw
3. Add the broth, beans, and cumin, bring to a boil, then simmer for 15 minutes
4. Stir in the cilantro
5. Serve, topped with cheese and avocado

Low-Carb Ketogenic Snacks

• 1/4 cup cantaloupe and 1 string cheese stick
• 1 cup cucumber sticks and 1/2 cup plain Greek yogurt
• 1 oz. almonds
• 1 cup bell pepper strips and 2 tablespoons hummus
• 1 string cheese stick or 1 oz. other cheese
• 1 hard-boiled egg
• 1 cup cooked broccoli florets with 1 oz. cheese melted on top
• 1 oz. unsweetened 100% dark chocolate
• Caprese salad with 1 oz. mozzarella cheese in small cubes, plus 1/2 cup cherry tomatoes, fresh basil, and 1 teaspoon of olive oil
• 1/2 can tuna mixed with 2 tablespoons of yogurt and 1 tablespoon of diced celery, spread on hollowed-out cucumber halves or hard-boiled egg white halves.
• 1 small avocado
• Mini skewers with 2 oz. of skinless cooked chicken breast and 1 oz. of mozzarella cheese, both cubed, and button mushrooms.

Balanced DPP Prediabetes Menu

Almost every choice you make day and night can affect blood sugar levels, and Lark Diabetes Prevention Program can guide you in healthy decisions. This personalized coaching program uses proven methods to lower risk for type 2 diabetes. See if you are eligible below.

Balanced Prediabetes Recipes

Oatmeal Pancakes

(Serves 2)

Ingredients

• 1 cup of rolled or quick-cooking oats
• ¾ cup warm milk
• 2 tablespoons ground flaxseed
• 1 egg
• ¼ cup whole-wheat flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder

1. Let the oats soak in the milk for 20 minutes
2. Blend in the remaining ingredients
3. Pour in spoonfuls onto a heated griddle with cooking spray, and turn over when edges bubble.
4. Serve warm. and enjoy!

Quinoa Salad

(Serves 4)

Ingredients

• 2 cups quinoa cooked in low-sodium broth
• ½ onion, diced
• 2 large tomatoes, diced
• 1 cup low-sodium canned black or kidney beans
• 1 tablespoon of lime juice
• 4 ounces of cheddar or jack cheese
• ½ teaspoon cumin
• 1 cup of mango or kiwi in pieces

Directions

Combine all ingredients and let sit together until time to serve.

So What Is the Healthiest Diet for Prediabetes?

The best diet for prediabetes is one that lowers blood sugar and helps lose extra pounds, but also is delicious and fits into your lifestyle according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Lark Diabetes Prevention Program can help you do just that by offering tips and personalized coaching through the guided program.