Highest Carb Staple Foods

The carb-loading shelf, weighed as you buy it: corn flakes open at 84g per 100g, matzo and fat-free saltines hold 83.7–82.3g, glutinous rice reaches 81.7g, and the white-rice family fills the 80–79.2g band alongside cornmeal. The popcorn rows close at 77.9g — with 15.1g of fiber that the polished rices left behind.

How this ranking works

Staple carbohydrates ranked by carbs per 100g, descending, at DRY weight — the weight on the package you buy. The sweets class is out by rule (sugars, candies, sweeteners, syrups, honey, jams, cookies), as are pure starch ingredients, pure fats and drinks, and dehydrated or dried-fruit forms whose concentration fakes the podium. Cooked weights differ — rice roughly triples — so compare at the bag, not the plate.

The table: top 20

#	Food	Carbs (g / 100g)	Calories (kcal/100g)
1	Cereal (Corn Flakes)	84	357
2	Crackers, matzo, plain	83.7	395
3	Crackers, saltines, fat-free, low-sodium	82.3	393
4	Rice, white, glutinous, unenriched, uncooked	81.7	370
5	Rice Cakes	81	386
6	Crackers, rye, wafers, plain	80.4	334
7	Snacks, popcorn, cakes	80.1	384
8	Rice, white, long-grain, regular, raw, enriched	80	365
9	Rice, white, long-grain, regular, raw, unenriched	80	365
10	Cornmeal, degermed, enriched, white	79.5	370
11	Cornmeal, degermed, enriched, yellow	79.5	370
12	Cornmeal, degermed, unenriched, white	79.5	370
13	Cornmeal, degermed, unenriched, yellow	79.5	370
14	Rice, white, medium-grain, raw, enriched	79.3	360
15	Rice, white, medium-grain, raw, unenriched	79.3	360
16	Rice, white, short-grain, enriched, uncooked	79.2	358
17	Rice, white, short-grain, raw, unenriched	79.2	358
18	Crackers, matzo, whole-wheat	78.9	351
19	Popcorn (Plain)	78	387
20	Snacks, popcorn, air-popped (Unsalted)	77.9	382

Source: the Alkemos food database — the same rows each food’s page shows (per-100g values; every name links to that food’s full page).

Reading the table

Rice is the honest bulk king

Six white-rice rows crowd the top twenty at 80–79.2g, and they cost the least per kilo of anything here. For a hard gainer filling a 400g-carb day, that is the arithmetic that works: cheap, neutral, and exactly countable at the dry cup.

Breakfast cereals earn row one

Corn flakes at 84g beat every rice row — concentration again, this time from the cereal extruder. The serving is the catch: 30g in the bowl, about 25g of carbs, versus 60g in a 75g dry rice portion. The column ranks; the portion decides.

Popcorn keeps its fiber

Air-popped popcorn carries 77.9g of carbs together with 15.1g of fiber — the whole grain's skin survived the pop. Among these refined-heavy rows it is the one intact grain, and the rye wafer's 22.9g fiber says the same for its own row.

Common questions

Why does the list use dry weight?

Because the bag is where the number is honest and identical every time: 100g of dry rice is 100g of rice. Cooked weight depends on your pot, water and time — the same rice lands anywhere from doubled to tripled. The dry column is the only version you can plan a macro day around.

Where are fruits and dates?

Fresh fruit carries its water — a banana sits near 23g per 100g, a fraction of these rows. Dates and raisins would score high, but drying them is exactly the concentration trick this family's rules exclude; their pages carry their own honest numbers instead.

Is a high-carb list against low-carb diets?

It answers the opposite goal, stated openly: carb loading, gaining weight, and endurance fueling all need these exact foods. The library keeps both doors — a low-carb, high-protein ranking exists for the keto side — and neither table judges the other's diet.

Turn these tables into a plan: the Calorie Calculator splits your daily budget into grams — free, no account needed.

New to this topic? Start from the curated Foods for Bulking collection — the hand-picked staples — then come back for the full ranking.