…in the obesity “epidemic?” I’ve thought so for a while. Apparently there are more studies out indicating that HFCS really is not very good for us:
Food manufacturers love to use high fructose corn syrup because it’s cheap and sweet. In October 2003, researchers at the University of Michigan concluded that fructose in high levels elevates dangerous triglycerides by as much as 32 percent and makes the body’s fat burning and storage system sluggish, which causes weight gain.
Now the U.S. Department of Agriculture has found more evidence of a link between a rapid rise in obesity and a corn product used to sweeten soft drinks and food since the 1970s, reports The Associated Press. Specifically, the data showed an increase in the use of high fructose corn sweeteners in the late 1970s and 1980s that was “coincidental with the epidemic of obesity,” said one of the researchers, Dr. George A. Bray, a longtime obesity scientist with Louisiana State University System’s Pennington Biomedical Research Center. The research was published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
This stuff is everywhere — I was shocked when I found it in canned tomato soup!
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Even the “100% natural” granola bar I was eating when I read this has high fructose corn syrup — although “sugar” and “crisp rice” which contains sugar are higher on the igredient list. It also has brown sugar syrup! I wasn’t under the impression that this was an ideal snack though, so I’m not too upset.
I wasn’t very good at science in school, but I do sometimes think the “It’s about the calories eaten versus calories burned. Period!” insistence has got to be a little simplistic. It may be strictly true but could it be that the calories we read on the label do not accurately reflect how many calories the food acts like it has inside our bodies? Or that over the long term the properties of certain foods affect how many calories the body needs, not to mention the feeling of hunger a person has after eating the same number of calories in different foods? I just don’t think those calculators of how many calories an individual needs to maintain or lose weight based on their size and activity level can ever be a perfect indicator. So maybe that’s why it’s not helpful to tell everyone, “If you want to lose weight, eat fewer calories than you burn/than you need to maintain your weight,” because determining those numbers isn’t that simple.
I believe someone once advised me that the need for certain nutrients could be causing continued hunger when I should have been full. There’s often this, “You pig, just live with it if you ‘feel hungry’ when you’ve eaten enough” mentality but if one’s “healthy diet food” is some kind of “bar” for breakfast and Lean Cuisine for lunch, maybe the hunger is real for some quality nutrients.
Mostly lately I notice processed packaged foods leave an icky aftertaste, probably a salty one, even if they’re not obviously salty to the taste buds.
I have heard that HFCS was worse for you, and wondered why it was in so many places….and then I heard a program talking about trade, which said that sugar in this country has to sell at or above a certain threshold price–so sugar is decreed by someone or some group to be expensive, and therefore we are overrun by (cheaper) corn syrup. Which is why your soda in Britain will have sugar, while it has corn syrup here. (caveat–lazy non-journalist here; I haven’t checked up my recalled bit of trivia, and have no idea where I heard it)
I think one problem with simplifying everything to calories in/out is that different things break down differently in your body, and they and their byproducts affect your system differently, so that corn syrup could chemically slow down your fat burning while it was only giving you as many calories as sugar would have. Alcohol has a caloric number attached to it, but it certainly has other effects on the body as well!
This is the reason that the only bottled sauce that I use is Mario Batali’s: as it has only ingredients that go into my own sauce. I am not worried about the health benefits of HFCS any more than I am over the health benefits of gin, but I object to using sweeteners to mask the fact that one is using icky, tasteless ingredients. Also, the other sauces are just too sweet. If I were to use them, I would have to add so much stuff to make them taste moderately good that I might as well make it from scratch anyway. It is the same with modified food starch. Why buy yogurt or sour cream that is thickened with this stuff, when the only reason it needs thickening is that they did not use the proper culturing methods that make it so yummy to begin with?
We eliminated HFCS and all corn syrup (includes corn syrup solids). This has made a tremedous impact in some behavior issues we were having with a child. I’m convinced the effects of CS products goes well beyond obesity-related issues.
I think you are right. (IMHO I think it has also made all of our food so @*#&! sweet that our pallettes no longer appreciate naturally sweet food or nice desserts made with cane or beet sugar. Did I ever mention how much better some foreign Coke tastes? Coke that is kosher for Passover (HFC can’t pass the criteria for Passover) is ‘divine.’ ) 🙂
Here, here to Ellyn!
When PapaC was diagnosed with diabetes (which we are controlling with diet at the moment), I had to go back and reread EVERY bottle label. I was horrified. And it was way, way too hard!
HFCS (and other sugars) were in everything, even things that I don’t think of as “sweet.” But I’m sure that they are, compared to the equivalent things of my grandparents’ day.
We were lucky to find a spicy, yummy spaghetti sauce in a house brand (boy, were we surprised!) that had no added sugar. But it was hard.
I do think all of this is why I crave sweets so desperately when I’m on WW, trying to eat healthily. My system thinks I’ve given up 3 candy bars a day!
Ellyn,
Hush up now, or I’ll have to fight crowds at the Kosher Supermart next Lent!!!
To everyone else, Ellyn is lying! LYING! Coca-Cola never offers a cane-sugar version here in the US. Never!!! Its a lie, so don’t waste your time showing up at the Kosher markets, especially in Atlanta. They’ll be out anyway. Trust me.
Sorry, Ellyn, for calumniating you, but you’re giving away the most closely gaurded secret of Coca-Cola fans everywhere. Are we going to have pull your membership in the Coke Fan Club?
And yes, the root cause is American Protectionism in the Sugar Industry. The cost of cane sugar went through the roof when I was a small child, making Coke prohibitively expensive to produce. So Coke released that “new” Coke (rebottled Pepsi) and when people demanded the old formula, they got “Coke Classic” instead. It was a move to divert the attention of Coke-drinkers away from the fact that the Original Formula ™ was retired with the Advent of New Coke, replaced with this HFCS abomination called “Classic”.
Can you tell I am still bitter nearly two decades later?
I have bought cane sweetened cola at Trader Joe’s. pricey but flavorful.
I think that the glycemic index of HF corn syrup has got to be astronomical.
In case anyone took me seriously, I was engaging in a jocose lie when I called Ellyn a liar, just trying to be funny.
But since she let the cat out, I may as well admit, yes, the Real Thing can be had at Passover from any Kosher foods distributor. Just look for the KP symbol meaning “Kashrut for Passover”. If you’re not sure, ask one of the employees. They can show you what the KP symbol looks like.
read this
article for more info.
When did Coke stop using real sugar? I wonder if I drank so much of the HFCS stuff (there was a time I might have drunk six cans a day!) that I wouldn’t appreciate this Kosher for Passover if I tried it. I’m pregnant and avoiding soda right now so I’m glad for this reminder of its badness.
When I’m shopping for “budget mainstream ‘healthy'” I can’t really rule out the HCFS; I don’t make my own spaghetti sauce or my own much of anything that would have sweeteners in packaged form, except the occasional baked good 🙁
Coke dropped cane sugar for HFCS when the “brought back” Coke Classic. New Coke was never inteneded to be a real product offering, just a distraction to make us thankful to have somethingt hat tasted like Coke again, even if it wasn’t.
This new C2 stuff actually tastes MORE like Coke than Coke Classic, because they do use cane suagr (processed with ammonia, but still cane sugar.)
I do remember original Coke, but since I was only about six or seven when New Coke came out (and was replaced by Coca-Cola Classic,) it was not the stuff of my terrible habit.
Ammonia aside, I’ll be avoiding the C2 stuff because of artificial sweetener(s). I accidentally had MinuteMaid Light Lemonade, which is the same sort of thing isn’t it — some sugar, and one or two artificial sweeteners — and I must admit it was pretty tasty and had me completely fooled, as someone who dislikes the flavor of calorie-free diet soda, possibly on multiple occasions. I don’t know if it uses real sugar, though.
Well, I don’t think I remember original Coke, like the stuff that supposedly had cocaine in it. I was born in 1978 so I’m guessing I only remember the pre-New Coke of the early to mid-1980s.
1. I 100% agree that there is much more to the body fat equation than calories in to calories out. The only place equations like that work is in physics class. We all know people who eat like horses and stay rail thin, and people who carry more pounds than their calorie ins and outs would indicate. There are just so many metabolic variables.
2. I heard on a radio talk show once that there are over 200 different factors in how one perceives satiety (when your body realizes, “I’m full) and that HFCS, since it’s been modified, doesn’t trip any of them. So it’s much easier to overeat foods with HFCS. (Ditto Mama Owl, Erik and Ellyn — I think that’s true of most highly processed foods — they’re just not satisfying and they’re short on micronutrients, so people overeat them.
2.5 I bet processed food does ruin our taste for homemadefood. My mom has noticed that some people accustomed to cakes from mixes turn up their noses at homemade cake.)
3. One of the reasons it’s cheaper for food processors to use HFCS instead of cane sugar is because the US Government subsidizes corn growers. That makes the price of corn and corn derivatives artificially low.
4. Don’t forget to read your labels on bottles of juice. I was shocked when I read the back of the Ruby Red Grapefruit Juice bottle and saw that it was heavily sweetened with HFCS. Other Ocean Spray juices, including their basic Cranberry Juice “Cocktail”, are sweetened with HFCS.
5. D’s mom — have you tried that spaghetti sauce recipe in How to Cook Without a Book. I am so pleased with that recipe — I’ve haven’t bought a jar of sauce in years.
5.5 Come to think of it, I have come across recipes for homemade spaghetti sauce (not the one I just mentioned) that call for sugar. Why? Just to emulate the sweet taste of commercial sauces?
6. I’ve heard that about Passover Coke too. Never tried it, myself; I’m not much of a Coke fancier. Too sweet! My new thing is flavored seltzer water.
7. This handout gives HFCS a glycemic index of 62. I’m surprised it isn’t higher.
8. While I was Googling for the GI info, I came across the depressing news that commercial pizza seems to cause a long surge in blood sugar. I am surprised — sure, there’s white flour in the dough, but I would have thought the cheese and other toppings would have mitigated the effect. Maybe there’s sugar in the sauce and starch in the cheese to keep it from caking?
I hope my homemade pizza (with a crust made from high-protein bread flour) is not the same glycemic train wreck.
For those of us who remember New Coke — anyone remember M-m-m-Max Headroom?
Just to make sure we are all on the same page, Splenda (used in the newest low-cal coke products including Minutemaid) is not an artificial sweetener )like sacharin or aspartime.) It is cane sugar, processed with ammonia to reduce it’s calorie and carbohydrate content. It is not “natural” in the way that sucking on a peice of cane is, but it isn’t much more processed than regular sugar.
I myself always cast a jaundiced eye on folks concerned with the levels of chemicals and processed sweeteners in their foods. I really don’t care and cannot understand getting all up in arms about it.
But then, I cook about 805 of my diet from whole foods, in my own kitchen. Chemicals are the price of convenience. Just wait until the food replicator becomes the must-have home appliance.
Whoops, 80%, not 805. Dang shift key!
Answer to Peony’s question:”I have come across recipes for homemade spaghetti sauce (not the one I just mentioned) that call for sugar. Why? Just to emulate the sweet taste of commercial sauces?”
A bit of sugar actually cuts down on the acidity that the tomatoes bring to the sauce. It balances out some of the sharpness in the tomatoes. You can probably use a lot less sugar than what’s asked for in the recipes, but be mindful that you’re only adding it to take away the acidity of the tomatoes, and not to make your sauce taste like tomato candy.
Mmmm…Tomato Candy!
You know what works better than sugar (I will not snidely point out that using good varieties of vine-ripened, preferably dry-farmed, tomatoes is the real way to go)? A dash of balsamico. True, it is adding acid to cut the flavor of acidity, but the lingering sweetness helps a lot.
Also, it is tomato sauce, not soup, so if you do not oversauce your pasta (no puddles at the bottom), a touch of extra acidity will balance out. Then, when you finish with ribbons of basil or a sprinkling of parsley, all will be very good indeed.