Are Olives Good for Prediabetes? Benefits & Servings
Prediabetes changes the way you look at every snack, and few foods cause as much confusion as the humble olive. Here is the short answer: yes, olives for prediabetes are generally a smart choice. They contain almost no digestible carbohydrate, sit low on the glycemic index, and deliver heart-friendly monounsaturated fats along with polyphenols such as oleuropein and hydroxytyrosol. The main caveat is sodium, not sugar. In this guide, you will learn exactly how olives affect blood sugar, how green, black, and Kalamata varieties compare, what a sensible serving looks like, which products to skip, and why your individual physiology—including your gut microbiome—shapes your personal glucose response.
Quick Answer: Are Olives Good for Prediabetes?
Yes—olives are one of the more blood-sugar-friendly snacks you can choose when you have prediabetes. A typical serving of five to ten olives contains only about one to two grams of carbohydrate, virtually no sugar, and an estimated glycemic index of roughly 15, which places them firmly among low glycemic foods. Their fat and fiber also slow digestion, which helps soften the glucose response of the meals they accompany.
That said, "good for prediabetes" comes with two honest caveats. First, brine-cured and canned olives can be surprisingly high in sodium, which matters because prediabetes frequently travels alongside elevated blood pressure and increased cardiovascular risk. Second, the most exciting research on olive compounds—including early findings on elenolic acid—comes from laboratory and animal studies using concentrated extracts, not from people simply eating olives with dinner. The sensible conclusion: olives are a genuinely helpful component of an overall prediabetes eating pattern, not a stand-alone fix. The rest of this article walks through the nutrition facts, the science, the serving math, and the practical label-reading skills that let you enjoy olives with confidence.
Olive Nutrition: Carbs, Calories, and Glycemic Index
Understanding what is actually inside an olive explains why it earns its blood-sugar-friendly reputation. Olives are essentially a fruit with a very unusual nutrition profile: high in fat, extremely low in carbohydrate, and almost free of sugar. That combination is precisely what most prediabetes eating patterns call for in a snack.
Carbohydrates and Net Carbs in Olives
A serving of about five large olives (roughly 20 grams, drained) contains around one gram of total carbohydrate, and much of that comes from fiber. That means net carbs in olives—the figure you get by subtracting fiber from total carbohydrate—are often at or below one gram per serving. Even a generous portion of ten olives usually delivers only two to three grams of carbohydrate. For perspective, one slice of bread contains about 15 grams and a small apple around 20 grams. Sugar, meanwhile, is essentially a rounding error in plain, cured olives.
The Glycemic Index of Olives
The glycemic index (GI) ranks carbohydrate-containing foods by how quickly they raise blood glucose, with values below 55 considered low. Olives are commonly listed with a glycemic index of around 15, although formal GI testing of olives is limited and values vary by reference source. In practice, the exact number barely matters: because olives contain so little digestible carbohydrate to begin with, their glycemic load per serving is close to zero. A food cannot produce a meaningful blood sugar spike if there is very little glucose-generating carbohydrate to absorb. This is why olives routinely appear on low glycemic food lists alongside eggs, cheese, nuts, and non-starchy vegetables.
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Fat, Fiber, Vitamins, and Minerals
Most of the calories in olives come from fat—about two to three grams per five-olive serving—and the majority of that fat is oleic acid, a monounsaturated fatty acid that makes up roughly 70 to 75 percent of the total. This is the same fat that dominates olive oil, which is one of the best-studied fats in nutrition science. Olives also contribute small amounts of vitamin E, copper, and iron, plus a modest half-gram or so of fiber per serving. The fiber contribution is helpful but not dramatic; olives are not a substitute for legumes, vegetables, or whole grains in that department. One practical note for label readers: many canned "black ripe" olives list ferrous gluconate as an ingredient. It is an iron compound used to fix the color uniformly and is considered safe—it does not change the carbohydrate content.
How Olives May Support Blood Sugar and Insulin Sensitivity
Nutrition facts tell you what is in an olive; mechanisms explain why those components might matter for glucose control. Several plausible pathways are worth understanding, along with an honest account of how strong the evidence is for each.
Monounsaturated Fat and Slower Digestion
Fat slows gastric emptying—the rate at which food leaves your stomach. When olives are eaten as part of a meal, their fat can modestly slow the digestion and absorption of the carbohydrate in the rest of the plate, which may help blunt post-meal glucose excursions. Beyond meal mechanics, dietary patterns that replace refined carbohydrates and some saturated fats with monounsaturated fat-rich foods have been associated with improved insulin sensitivity and better blood lipid profiles in clinical research. Swapping a refined-cracker snack for a small bowl of olives and nuts fits that pattern.
Polyphenols: Oleuropein, Hydroxytyrosol, and Elenolic Acid
Olives are rich in polyphenols, a diverse family of plant compounds with antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activity. The most studied include:
- Oleuropein: the bitter phenolic compound concentrated in raw olives; much of it is broken down during curing, though fermented olives retain meaningful amounts along with its byproducts.
- Hydroxytyrosol and tyrosol: smaller phenolic molecules that remain stable through curing and fermentation and are among the best-characterized olive phenolics.
- Elenolic acid: an olive compound that has recently drawn attention for its effects on glucose regulation in laboratory research.
In cell and animal studies, olive polyphenols have been shown to influence several processes relevant to glucose metabolism, including glucose uptake into muscle cells, insulin signaling pathways, and oxidative stress. Human evidence is more limited but emerging: one small clinical trial found that middle-aged overweight men who took a concentrated olive leaf extract, which is rich in oleuropein, for twelve weeks showed improvements in insulin sensitivity compared with placebo.
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Elenolic acid deserves special mention because it has generated headlines. Recent laboratory and animal research reported that this compound stimulated secretion of both GLP-1—a gut hormone targeted by popular diabetes medications—and insulin, and lowered blood sugar in obese, diabetic mice. These findings are scientifically intriguing, but they involved concentrated extracts delivered at doses no one obtains from eating olives, and equivalent human trials have not yet been completed. Mouse results are a starting point for research, not proof of dietary benefit. Until human studies exist, it is best to view elenolic acid as a promising research story rather than a reason to expect olives to act like medicine.
What Population and Clinical Studies Show
At the level of whole diets, the evidence is more mature. In a substudy of the well-known PREDIMED trial, adults at high cardiovascular risk who followed a Mediterranean diet supplemented with extra-virgin olive oil developed type 2 diabetes at roughly 40 percent lower rates over about four years compared with a control group advised to follow a lower-fat diet. Observational studies have also linked higher olive and olive oil consumption with better metabolic markers. Two caveats keep this honest: those trials tested full dietary patterns, not olives in isolation, and association within complex diets cannot isolate the effect of any single food. Olives fit a pattern that appears protective; they are not proven, on their own, to prevent diabetes.
The Gut Microbiome: Why Your Glucose Response Is Personal
One underappreciated reason people respond differently to the same food is the collection of microbes living in the gut. The gut microbiome—the trillions of bacteria, archaea, and other microorganisms in the digestive tract—participates directly in how the body handles food, and it is especially relevant to olives for an interesting reason.
Most olive polyphenols are not absorbed intact. Instead, gut bacteria break them down into smaller metabolites, some of which are thought to carry much of the biological activity associated with these compounds. The specific metabolites produced depend heavily on which microbes a person hosts, which helps explain why two people eating the identical diet can show different levels of circulating polyphenol byproducts. Research also suggests that fiber-fermenting gut bacteria produce short-chain fatty acids—compounds such as butyrate and propionate that have been studied for roles in insulin sensitivity, inflammation, and glucose homeostasis. Olives contribute only modest fiber themselves, but they complement the fiber-rich plant foods that feed those microbes, and fermented olive varieties carry phenolic profiles shaped by the fermentation process itself.
The relevance to prediabetes is growing. Studies have associated lower gut microbial diversity and certain microbial patterns with insulin resistance and greater glycemic variability, and large personalized-nutrition experiments have shown that individual glucose responses to the same meal can differ substantially from person to person. In other words, "are olives good for blood sugar?" has a general answer—yes—but the size of the benefit is not identical for everyone.
This is where measuring beats guessing. Standard lab work such as an A1C, where results between 5.7 and 6.4 percent indicate the prediabetes range, tells you your average blood sugar but not why it behaves the way it does. A gut microbiome test adds a different layer of information: it describes your microbial diversity, the relative abundance of key bacterial groups, and the functional potential of your gut ecosystem. That context may help you and your healthcare team understand why you respond to foods the way you do and where dietary changes might matter most for you specifically. Just as important is knowing what such a test cannot do: it cannot diagnose prediabetes or insulin resistance, it cannot replace glucose or A1C testing, and its findings describe associations that require professional interpretation. Because microbiome composition shifts with diet over weeks to months, a personalized microbiome analysis is best understood as a dynamic snapshot that can be re-examined as your eating pattern evolves—not a one-time verdict on your health.
Green vs. Black Olives: Which Is Better for Prediabetes?
Walk down any olive aisle and you will face a choice between green, black, and everything in between. The differences start at harvest. Green olives are picked before full ripeness; black olives are either tree-ripened or, in the case of most canned California-style "black ripe" olives, processed to a uniform dark color. All raw olives are intensely bitter because of oleuropein and must be cured—typically through brine fermentation, lye treatment, or dry curing—before they become edible.
For blood sugar purposes, the differences between colors are minor. Carbohydrate content is nearly identical, and none of the varieties contains meaningful sugar when plainly cured. The real distinctions are sodium, fat, and polyphenol profile:
- Green olives are usually fermented, slightly higher in fat, and often among the saltier options on the shelf.
- Black ripe (canned) olives lose some polyphenols during lye processing but are frequently the lowest in sodium and have the softest flavor.
- Kalamata olives, the deep-purple Greek variety, are naturally brine-fermented, which preserves a rich phenolic profile, with sodium usually between the other two.
| Approximate values per 5 large olives (~20 g, drained) | Green, brine-cured | Black ripe, canned | Kalamata, brine-cured | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Calories | ~30 | ~20–25 | ~25–35 | |
| Total carbohydrate | ~1 g | ~1 g | ~1–1.5 g | |
| Fiber | ~0.5–1 g | ~0.5–1 g | ~0.5–1 g | |
| Total fat | ~3 g | ~2 g | ~2.5–3 g | |
| Sodium | ~250–600 mg | ~100–160 mg | ~200–350 mg |
Values vary considerably by brand, cure, and drained weight, so treat the table as a guide rather than gospel and always check the specific label. The practical takeaway: when people ask whether green or black olives are better for blood sugar, the honest answer is that both work, and the decision should come down to sodium per serving and personal taste. If sodium is a concern, canned black ripe olives usually win; if you value fermented-food polyphenols and robust flavor, Kalamata and other brine-cured Greek-style olives are excellent.
How Many Olives Can You Eat with Prediabetes?
Unlike most foods in a prediabetes diet, olives are rarely limited by their carbohydrate. A standard serving is about five olives (roughly 15 to 20 grams), and most people can comfortably enjoy five to ten without pushing glucose upward in any meaningful way. Traditional diabetes exchange systems counted about 8 to 10 medium olives as one fat serving, which is a useful mental anchor if you follow a structured meal plan.
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A few practical habits make portion control effortless:
- Pre-portion olives into a small bowl instead of eating from the jar.
- Think of a serving as five olives and treat ten as a generous but reasonable upper end for most days.
- If you use a glucose meter and are curious about your personal response, check your post-meal values after a typical olive-containing meal; most people see minimal movement from the olives themselves.
Individual variability is real. Some people show small glucose responses to foods that leave others completely flat, which is one more reason personal data—whether from routine glucose monitoring or broader tools like microbiome testing—can be more informative than general rules.
Olives, Sodium, and Heart Health: What to Watch
If olives have a downside, this is it. Curing is essentially a salt process, and salt is where olive nutrition goes from excellent to complicated.
Why Sodium Matters More with Prediabetes
Prediabetes and high blood pressure frequently occur together, partly because insulin resistance affects how the kidneys and blood vessels handle sodium. Cardiovascular risk is also quietly elevated during the prediabetes stage, years before diabetes develops. That makes the sodium in olives more relevant than it might be for the average healthy snacker. USDA nutrition data lists pickled green olives at more than 3,000 milligrams of sodium per 100 grams—among the saltiest plant foods on the shelf. Most health organizations recommend keeping total daily sodium under 2,300 milligrams, with about 1,500 milligrams often suggested for people with hypertension or elevated cardiovascular risk.
To be fair to the olive: its fat profile is genuinely heart-friendly, dominated by the same monounsaturated oleic acid found in olive oil. The olive itself is not the problem; the brine is.
Practical Ways to Keep the Salt in Check
- Look for products labeled "low sodium" (140 milligrams or less per serving) or "no salt added," which are increasingly available in most supermarkets.
- Rinse drained olives under cold water before eating; this washes away some of the surface sodium, and a longer soak in fresh water removes a bit more if you have time.
- Reserve the saltiest brine-cured varieties for occasional use and make a lower-sodium option your everyday olive.
- Track olives as part of your whole-day sodium picture. Bread, cheese, deli meats, and sauces usually contribute far more sodium than olives, so trimming those first may matter more.
None of this means olives are off the table if you have blood pressure concerns. It means olives are a food where the serving size and the specific product choice carry real consequences—and where a little label literacy pays off.
Choosing Olives: Labels, Additives, and Products to Avoid
Plain cured olives are almost universally prediabetes-friendly. The complications come from what gets added around them: sugars slipped into brines and marinades, sweetened stuffings, and snack products that turn a simple fruit into a dessert-adjacent item. Learning to read an olive label takes about a minute and covers you for years.
A Quick Label-Reading Checklist
- Check the ingredient list for sugar by any name. Glucose, dextrose, corn syrup, honey, and "evaporated cane juice" sometimes appear in brines, marinades, and salad-olive dressings.
- Look at sodium per serving—and at the serving size itself. Some brands list three olives as a serving, which makes the sodium figure look friendlier than reality.
- Know the sodium terminology. "Low sodium" has a legal definition (140 milligrams or fewer per serving); "reduced sodium" only means less than the regular version, which can still be quite salty.
- Confirm olives are the first ingredient. In quality products they will be, followed simply by water, salt, and perhaps vinegar or herbs.
- Accept harmless additives. Ferrous gluconate in canned black olives is a color stabilizer, not a red flag.
- For tapenade, check for added sugar and note the sodium. Olives, capers, and anchovies are already salty on their own.
Olive Products to Approach with Caution
- Sweetened or cocktail-style olives packed in sugary marinades or honey glazes—the added sugar in brine defeats the purpose of a low-carb snack.
- "Salad olives" in sweetened dressing, a category worth checking carefully even though the word "salad" sounds virtuous.
- Breaded or fried olives, the popular restaurant appetizer, which wraps a low-GI food in refined carbohydrates and frying oil.
- Olive snack packs paired with pretzels or sweet dippers, where the accompanying components drive the glucose response.
- Marinated olives with dessert-like flavorings such as candied citrus or chocolate coatings.
Stuffed olives deserve a nuance of their own. Pimento-stuffed, garlic-stuffed, and jalapeño-stuffed olives remain very low in carbohydrate and are perfectly suitable for prediabetes. Cheese-stuffed varieties are also low in carbs but add calories and some saturated fat, so they fit better as an occasional item if weight and heart health are part of your goals. The stuffings to skip are the sweet ones—anything glazed, candied, or alcohol-soaked in syrup.
How to Add Olives to a Prediabetes-Friendly Diet
Olives are at their best when they upgrade other healthy foods rather than standing alone. That is also when they do the most metabolic work.
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Pair Olives with Protein and Fiber
Combining olives with protein and fiber slows overall digestion and flattens the glucose curve of the whole meal. This pairing strategy—fat plus protein plus fiber—is one of the simplest and most reliable ways to reduce post-meal blood sugar spikes without giving up flavor. Olives contribute the fat and a little fiber; cheese, eggs, fish, poultry, legumes, and vegetables supply the rest.
Meal and Snack Ideas
- Greek salad with tomato, cucumber, red onion, feta, and Kalamata olives. >A small Mediterranean plate: olives, a few almonds, a cube or two of cheese, and raw vegetable sticks.
- Hummus topped with chopped olives and olive oil, served with cucumber and pepper strips.
- Chickpea or lentil salad with olives, parsley, lemon, and olive oil.
- Baked salmon or grilled chicken finished with an olive-tomato relish.
- White bean and olive dip spread on whole-grain crackers or used as a vegetable dip.
- Tapenade as a savory topper for whole-grain toast or roasted vegetables.
Where Olives Fit in the Mediterranean Diet and the Diabetes Plate Method
Olives are a signature fat source in the Mediterranean diet, the eating pattern with the strongest evidence base for cardiometabolic health and, per the PREDIMED findings, reduced incidence of type 2 diabetes. A Mediterranean-style pattern emphasizes vegetables, legumes, nuts, whole grains, fish, and olive-derived fats—the context in which olives shine. If you follow the Diabetes Plate Method, olives slot in as a fat or flavor accent rather than a vegetable: fill half the plate with non-starchy vegetables, one quarter with lean protein, one quarter with fiber-rich carbohydrate, and add olives for satiety and taste. Because they are energy-dense, people working on weight loss may prefer to count olives deliberately rather than eating them by the handful, but as flavor accents they make vegetables and legumes dramatically more appealing—which is its own quiet benefit for glucose control.
What Else to Eat (and Avoid) with Prediabetes
Olives make the most sense as one element of a broader pattern. The foundations of a prediabetes diet are consistent across major health organizations: plenty of non-starchy vegetables; legumes such as beans, lentils, and chickpeas; intact whole grains like oats, barley, and quinoa; fish, poultry, and plant proteins; nuts and seeds; and whole-food sources of healthy fats including olive oil, avocados, and olives themselves.
On the other side of the ledger, the foods most strongly linked with worsening insulin resistance are sugar-sweetened beverages, fruit juice in large amounts, refined grains and sweets, heavily processed snack foods, and processed meats. You do not need perfection—glycemic patterns respond to averages over time, not single meals—but the balance should tilt clearly toward whole, fiber-rich foods. The encouraging news about prediabetes is that it is often reversible: in the landmark Diabetes Prevention Program, a lifestyle intervention achieving modest weight loss of 5 to 7 percent of body weight and around 150 minutes of weekly activity reduced progression to type 2 diabetes by 58 percent. Dietary choices like olives matter because they make that kind of pattern sustainable and enjoyable.
Key Takeaways
- Olives are a low glycemic food: about one gram of carbohydrate per five olives, an estimated glycemic index of around 15, and net carbs typically below one gram per serving.
- Their monounsaturated fat and fiber slow digestion, which may help blunt post-meal blood sugar spikes when olives accompany a meal.
- Polyphenols such as oleuropein and hydroxytyrosol show promise for insulin sensitivity in early research, but elenolic acid findings from mouse studies do not prove dietary benefit in humans.
- Green, black, and Kalamata olives are all suitable for prediabetes; the meaningful differences are sodium, flavor, and curing method, not carbohydrate.
- Sodium is the main caution: a five-olive serving can range from about 100 to over 500 milligrams, so rinsing, low-sodium products, and portion awareness matter.
- Read labels for added sugars in brines, marinades, stuffings, and tapenades; plain cured olives and savory stuffings like pimento are safe choices.
- A reasonable serving is about five olives, with up to ten being fine for most people—counted within your daily sodium budget rather than your carb budget.
- Olives work best inside a Mediterranean-style pattern alongside protein and fiber, and individual glucose responses vary, so personal monitoring provides the most reliable feedback.
Bottom Line: Should You Eat Olives with Prediabetes?
Yes—plain, cured olives are a legitimately good snack and flavor-booster for people with prediabetes. They bring almost no digestible carbohydrate, a glycemic load near zero, heart-friendly monounsaturated fat, and polyphenols under active scientific study. Their benefits are best understood as part of a Mediterranean-style eating pattern rather than as a stand-alone intervention, and the compounds generating the biggest headlines, like elenolic acid, remain in the early stages of human research. Sodium is the one genuine watch-point: choose your product carefully, rinse when sensible, and count olives within your daily sodium allowance.
Finally, remember that nutrition advice lands on individual physiology. Two people can eat the same olives and show different glucose and metabolic responses, influenced by genetics, activity, medications, and the gut microbiome that processes olive polyphenols into their active metabolites. If you want to move beyond generic guidance, pairing standard medical monitoring with deeper context about your own biology—such as understanding your gut microbiome—can turn broad dietary advice into a genuinely personalized strategy. And whatever you eat, keep your healthcare provider or a registered dietitian in the loop for targets and treatment decisions specific to you.
This article is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for personalized medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. If you have prediabetes or any health condition, consult a qualified healthcare professional before making significant dietary changes.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many olives can a diabetic eat a day?
Most people with diabetes or prediabetes can include about 5 to 10 olives per day without concern for blood sugar, since even ten olives contain only two to three grams of carbohydrate. The practical limit is sodium: count your olives within a daily target of roughly 2,300 milligrams, or 1,500 if you have high blood pressure. A registered dietitian can help you fit olives into your specific meal plan.
Do olives raise blood sugar?
Plain olives have a negligible effect on blood glucose because they contain almost no digestible carbohydrate, and their fat and fiber slow absorption further. Their glycemic index is commonly estimated around 15, firmly in the low range. The exceptions are products with added sugar in the brine, marinade, or stuffing, which is why label reading matters.
Which olives are healthier for blood sugar: green or black?
For blood sugar specifically, green and black olives are essentially equivalent—their carbohydrate content is nearly identical. Green olives are usually higher in fat and often higher in sodium, while canned black ripe olives tend to be lowest in sodium but lose some polyphenols during lye processing. Choose based on the sodium per serving on the label and your taste preference.
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Olives stuffed with pimento, garlic, or jalapeño remain very low in carbohydrate and are fine for prediabetes. Cheese-stuffed varieties add calories and saturated fat but few carbs, so they fit better occasionally. Avoid sweet-stuffed or glazed products, and check that the stuffing ingredients do not include added sugars.
Can eating olives help reverse prediabetes?
No single food reverses prediabetes, but olives can support the eating pattern that does. Research such as the Diabetes Prevention Program shows that modest weight loss and regular activity can dramatically reduce progression to type 2 diabetes, and Mediterranean-style diets rich in olive-derived fats are associated with lower diabetes incidence. Olives make that pattern more satisfying and sustainable.
Are olives good for high blood pressure?
It is a mixed picture. The monounsaturated fat in olives is heart-friendly, but the brine makes them one of the saltier plant foods, which is a concern if you have hypertension. Choose low-sodium or no-salt-added versions, rinse regular olives before eating, and keep portions to around five at a time. Your total daily sodium intake matters more than olives alone.
Are canned olives as healthy as jarred or brine-cured olives?
Canned black ripe olives are lower in sodium than most jarred brine-cured varieties and remain very low in carbohydrate, making them a perfectly good choice. They do lose some polyphenols during lye curing compared with naturally fermented olives such as Kalamata. Both formats fit a prediabetes diet; the differences are in polyphenol content and sodium, not glucose impact.
Is tapenade a good option for prediabetes?
Tapenade made from olives, capers, olive oil, and herbs is low in carbohydrate and fine in moderation, though it is high in sodium like the olives it comes from. Check labels for added sugar, which some commercial versions include, and stick to one or two tablespoons per serving. It works well as a dip for vegetables rather than refined crackers.
Can I eat olives on a low-carb diet for prediabetes?
Yes—olives are among the best low-carb snacks available, with net carbs typically below one gram per five-olive serving. Their fat also makes them more satiating than many low-carb alternatives. Keep the usual sodium precautions in mind, since low-carb diets do not change how much salt olives carry.
Do olives count as a vegetable or a fat in meal planning?
In most meal-planning systems, including traditional diabetes exchange lists, olives count as a fat serving—roughly 8 to 10 medium olives per serving—because most of their calories come from fat. In the Diabetes Plate Method, treat them as a flavor accent or fat source rather than part of the non-starchy vegetable half of your plate.
Does olive oil offer the same benefits as whole olives?
Olive oil, especially extra-virgin, provides the same monounsaturated fat and a more concentrated dose of certain polyphenols, with none of the sodium. Whole olives add fiber, chew, and satiety, which makes them useful as a snack. The two complement each other, and much of the strongest clinical research, including PREDIMED, involved olive oil as part of a full Mediterranean diet.
Should I check my glucose after eating olives?
If you already self-monitor, an occasional post-meal check after a typical olive-containing meal can show you your personal response, which is usually minimal from the olives themselves. Remember that the other foods on the plate influence the reading more than the olives do. Discuss your monitoring targets and frequency with your healthcare provider.
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