Posted on 03/21/2009 3:32:08 PM PDT by neverdem
Sugar, the nutritional pariah that dentists and dietitians have long reviled, is enjoying a second act, dressed up as a natural, healthful ingredient.
From the tomato sauce on a Pizza Hut pie called “The Natural,” to the just-released soda Pepsi Natural, some of the biggest players in the American food business have started, in the last few months, replacing high-fructose corn syrup with old-fashioned sugar.
ConAgra uses only sugar or honey in its new Healthy Choice All Natural frozen entrees. Kraft Foods recently removed the corn sweetener from its salad dressings, and is working on its Lunchables line of portable meals and snacks.
The turnaround comes after three decades during which high-fructose corn syrup had been gaining on sugar in the American diet. Consumption of the two finally drew even in 2003, according to the Department of Agriculture. Recently, though, the trend has reversed. Per capita, American adults ate about 44 pounds of sugar in 2007, compared with about 40 pounds of high-fructose corn syrup...
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Some shoppers prefer cane or beet sugar because it is less processed. High-fructose corn syrup is produced by a complex series of chemical reactions that includes the use of three enzymes and caustic soda.
Others see the pervasiveness of the inexpensive sweetener as a symbol of the ill effects of government subsidies given to large agribusiness interests like corn growers.
But the most common argument has to do with the rapid rise of obesity in the United States, which began in the 1980s, not long after industrial-grade high-fructose corn syrup was invented. As the amount of the sweetener in the American diet has expanded, so have Americans.
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Both sugar and high-fructose corn syrup are made from glucose and fructose. The level of fructose is about 5 percent higher in the corn sweetener.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I found out I’m allergic to corn so had to cut out all corn products. I’m almost 50 and I weigh the same now as I did at 16. I dropped down from 192 to 152 and I’m 6’1” (and ripped). I can drink as much beer (no corn) and eat as much bacon / steak as I want without gaining an ounce.
Costco’s in AZ have the Mexican coke also — the taste is vastly superior to the Coke they sell us here
Well, the “fad” of HFCS to replace sugar has nearly wiped out the cane sugar industry in the US. The false information and “latest craze” mentality has nearly wiped out sugar in Hawaii, except for a fraction of previous production. Most cane sugar producers in Hawaii were in business for over 100 years. Florida will soon see the end of cane sugar production.
NorCal Costcos also sell Mexican Coke. We enjoy it on special occasions.
I am allergic to corn too, but I haven’t had the drop in weight that you have.
I just discovered HFCS in tomato soup the other day. I guess I’ll have to start making my own.
Yeah, I thought a lot had to do with the protectionism with sugar.
Pepsi Natural? Pepsi with real sugar??? YEA!!!!!!
I’m a Pepsi-holic but with sugar, NOT that crappy high fructose corn crap. And I for one will be very very very happy to buy my first can of Pepsi Natural.
Every once in a while husband surprises me with a bottle of real Pepsi made with sugar that he get’s at a store that stocks Pepsi from Mexico. I Love it!!
I tell him all the time that when I drink the crappy high fructose corn syrup kind that I feel like a heifer being fattened up for slotter.
Another strange thing. The high fructose corn syrup Pepsi hurts my kidneys but the Pepsi made with sugar doesn’t. I don’t know why that is, but it is.
Try your local Mexican market. A 12-ounce bottle (glass, not plastic!) runs me $1.50. It’s a treat, not an everyday drink, at those prices. Though not as tasty, I now drink Jones Soda, because I just can’t stomach the aftertaste of corn syrup any longer. I also stopped buying Pepsi when they went with the Hussein logo.
Do a keyword search on soup.....
Why do you say that, a lot of people do. Unless you do aerobic exercise all day (or unless you mean economically) I think people are addicted to an unnecessary substance.
I happen to believe that the massive consumption of simple carbs (other than sugars) is the real culprit in the unprecedented proliferation of metabolic syndrome and type 2 diabetes, and btw, heart disease.
I agree, and don't forget the biggie...obesity. It is the cause of many chronic conditions and circulatory ailments.
Americans are fatter than most on the planet, and I believe it is their sugar habit that causes it...not fatty foods.
If they go back to real sugar I might try one now and then.
There is no comparison in flavor between real sugar and corn syrup.
The powerful corn lobby, through its huge kickbacks to politicians, has kept cheaper and more flavorful imported sugar out of the USA for years.
You'll have to wait in line behind my teenage son. He had Coke in Mexico a few years ago and has missed it ever since.I'd go out of my way to buy products with real sugar than HFCS.
Actually, the body cannot break down high fructose corn syrup...thus the unadvertised problem of insulin dependency. The body can break down sugar. I avoid anything with high fructose corn syrup and look for the sugar.
traderrob6 said:
“Sugar consumption is important but I happen to believe that the massive consumption of simple carbs (other than sugars) is the real culprit in the unprecedented proliferation of metabolic syndrome and type 2 diabetes, and btw, heart disease.”
I am not convinced, and am more inclined to suspect HFCS, at least in the huge increase in Diabetes.
I don’t think Americans are consuming more carbs that convert so easily to sugars - like potatoes, or rice - than they did 100 years ago.
And, is there any study that looked at the 5% greater portion of fructose in HFCS, compounded by the massive degree with which HFCS permeates the food industry, and asked about how the increased rate and dosage of the metabolization of that may, possibly, have adverse long term consequences.
My lifetime family anecdotal evidence says my great-grandparents, grand-parents and parents generations all ate mostly “regular” sugar (and lots of potatoes, rice and other starches), had more dental problems than most people do today, but with whom diabetes was very rare - with none anywhere in our family tree until my generation - the HFCS generation.
I know mere correlation is not causation.
But, one thing correlation can suggest - is there statistical evidence that suggests an area of research is needed? I think research is needed.
I think one could take a twenty year study of a group like the Amish (who consume but a fraction of HFCS) and a equal number of “average” American families; find a way to factor in/out for “carb” consumption; look at the rates of Diabetes between the two groups; and, if correlation looks like it is pointing to causation then expand the research into the full metabolic processes that actually take place in the body when glucose and fructose are extracted and broken down from HFCS sources vs from natural sources - is there in fact a difference? Is there something about the delivery vehicle itself - HFCS vs “natural” sugar - that affects that rate?
I don’t think those studies have been done.
That, and we're setting the stage to prop up Cuba by buying massive amounts of sugar from them.
Thanks for the tip.
Available for only a limited time.
Isn’t it amazing that in the home of Coke we are provided with an inferior product? The only proper use for corn is Jack Daniel’s.
Corn syrup is a fraction of the sweetness of sucrose sugar. So to get something sweet we eat or drink many times the amount of corn syrup than we would of sugar. “High fructose corn syrup” is high on calories but low on sweetness.
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