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News & ArtsMonday, April 18, 2011
Chow / Life So, Wait, Can I Eat Sugar Anymore or Not?
Posted by Eli Sanders on Mon, Apr 18, 2011 at 6:02 AM
Meant to read "Is Sugar Toxic?" all weekend, didn't, and now begin my week not knowing what to do. Help!
2
Don't eat sugar. (heh)
Seriously, sugar does all sorts of bad things, and if you decided you'd try to avoid it as much as possible, you'd probably end up eating just the right amount. If you want something else to (not?) read, try this:
http://www.amazon.com/Why-We-Get-Fat-Abo…
It's a pretty amazing look at how the prevalence of simple carbs affects a person.
Bottom line: Ixnay on the upcakeskay.
Seriously, sugar does all sorts of bad things, and if you decided you'd try to avoid it as much as possible, you'd probably end up eating just the right amount. If you want something else to (not?) read, try this:
http://www.amazon.com/Why-We-Get-Fat-Abo…
It's a pretty amazing look at how the prevalence of simple carbs affects a person.
Bottom line: Ixnay on the upcakeskay.
4
Eat sugar in moderation. Stay away from HFCS, which only takes longer to be absorbed into your system than real sugar.
6
This tells me nothing I didn't already know. In moderation, sugar is fine. If you're consuming four bags a week of the stuff, not so fine. I could say the same thing about just about anything.
7
I had to laugh at this b/c I had the article open in one of the tabs on my browser all weekend, but I never got around to finishing it either... it was just too long. I need an abstract for the article.
8
I gave up soda about four years ago, and haven't missed it at all. In fact, I tried a Pepsi just last week and it was dreadful.
I used to eat a huge glazed donut with a hideous red filling each morning and gave that up as well.
Yet I'm still too fat. It must be the chardonnay. But you'll have to pry my chardonnay out of my cold dead hands.
I used to eat a huge glazed donut with a hideous red filling each morning and gave that up as well.
Yet I'm still too fat. It must be the chardonnay. But you'll have to pry my chardonnay out of my cold dead hands.
9
Also, for more books to (not) read, the classic The Sugar Blues, which I read about 50 years ago, and still remember this bit (apparently, the internet remembers it, too):
http://www.getting-started-with-healthy-…
*I didn't even realize the article had been written by Gary Taubes, whose book I mentioned above. That book is a more entertaining read than the Times article, fwiw.
Dufty mentions a shipwreck in 1793; the marooned sailors ate and drank their cargo of sugar and rum. Five emaciated survivors were rescued--after only nine days. Nine days without food, or even without water, ought to be easily survivable. He writes, "As a steady diet, sugar is worse than nothing."
http://www.getting-started-with-healthy-…
*I didn't even realize the article had been written by Gary Taubes, whose book I mentioned above. That book is a more entertaining read than the Times article, fwiw.
11
I did read the whole thing. It amounts to the following: if you feed rats or people unnatural amounts of fructose (not sucrose, straight fructose), you can induce fatty livers in your subjects. The speculation is that consuming any fructose over time will cause your liver to become fatty and thereby increase your risk of not just diabetes but also cancer.
However, from the research cited in this article, you have to feed obscene amounts of pure fructose to induce these changes--actual dietary studies using more realistic sugar sources (like high fructose corn syrup [which is not pure fructose] or sucrose [which is a molecule of fructose bonded to a molecule of glucose]) and quantities are forthcoming. So are studies that see what happens if there is starch in the diet (which is, in essence, sugar in a storable form--it's what plants make instead of fat to store excess food energy).
What does this ultimately mean? Things that you already knew, like don't eat an entire cake in one sitting. Eat straight up fruit instead of juices and juice blends. But, as with any of these "x in your food is killing you!" stories, eating any particular food item containing x (be it fat, sugar, cholesterol, etc.) in moderation is more likely to kill you via choking than cause something down the road.
There is no perfect way to measure dietary issues vs. later in life disease--we simply live too long. The takeaway for me from all of these rants is "eat well in moderation." We all die eventually anyway.
However, from the research cited in this article, you have to feed obscene amounts of pure fructose to induce these changes--actual dietary studies using more realistic sugar sources (like high fructose corn syrup [which is not pure fructose] or sucrose [which is a molecule of fructose bonded to a molecule of glucose]) and quantities are forthcoming. So are studies that see what happens if there is starch in the diet (which is, in essence, sugar in a storable form--it's what plants make instead of fat to store excess food energy).
What does this ultimately mean? Things that you already knew, like don't eat an entire cake in one sitting. Eat straight up fruit instead of juices and juice blends. But, as with any of these "x in your food is killing you!" stories, eating any particular food item containing x (be it fat, sugar, cholesterol, etc.) in moderation is more likely to kill you via choking than cause something down the road.
There is no perfect way to measure dietary issues vs. later in life disease--we simply live too long. The takeaway for me from all of these rants is "eat well in moderation." We all die eventually anyway.
12
Drink water. I didn't even let my daughter touch soda until she was about and now she doesn't have a taste for it. It's amazing how much shit we drink.
I replaced sugar with honey in my coffee, but I'm a freak that way. And I try not to eat too much sugar on a daily basis, though sometimes that chocolate just screams out to me.
I replaced sugar with honey in my coffee, but I'm a freak that way. And I try not to eat too much sugar on a daily basis, though sometimes that chocolate just screams out to me.
13
I always remember what Michael Pollan says. Nutrition is a promising science, but it's only 200 years old. Listening to doctors and scientists talk about nutrition is like listening to surgeons from 1650. Lots of passion, and some truth, but a lot of superstition and ignorance still.
Eating less sugar and eating less refined sugar (including HCFS) is probably helpful, but be cautious trusting anyone making absolutist statements. Whatever they're sure about will probably be discovered as wrong in the next couple hundred years.
Eating less sugar and eating less refined sugar (including HCFS) is probably helpful, but be cautious trusting anyone making absolutist statements. Whatever they're sure about will probably be discovered as wrong in the next couple hundred years.
14
I think you're okay, as long as you don't eat sugar while sitting down.
...Or maybe you should eat it in your sleep.
There were a lot of weird headlines in this week's Magazine.
...Or maybe you should eat it in your sleep.
There were a lot of weird headlines in this week's Magazine.
15
It's clear that @3 and @4 skipped the article as well, which argues that HFCS and table sugar are both the same and have the same impact on the body.
End of the article is interesting. If you accept a link between sugar and obesity / metabolic disorder, which is not new and accept that there is an increased rate of cancer for the obese, then high dose sugar may be causing cancer.
My take away, eating only sugar found naturally in unprocessed fruits and veggies is safe. Eating the amount found in the modern American diet is unsafe. Somewhere in between is unknown, and the tipping point may vary by person and over time for each person, so it will be nearly impossible to define what is a general safe limit.
End of the article is interesting. If you accept a link between sugar and obesity / metabolic disorder, which is not new and accept that there is an increased rate of cancer for the obese, then high dose sugar may be causing cancer.
My take away, eating only sugar found naturally in unprocessed fruits and veggies is safe. Eating the amount found in the modern American diet is unsafe. Somewhere in between is unknown, and the tipping point may vary by person and over time for each person, so it will be nearly impossible to define what is a general safe limit.
16
My dad, an internationally renowned epidemiologist, says the NYT article is horseshit. Eat sugar in moderation. Exercise more.
18
Anyone who tells you all our problems can be reduced to one simple thing is wrong. There is not one cause of obesity, or heart disease, or whatever it is we want to say is wrong with the kids today.
19
For bkfst, I had a serving of cooked regular oatmeal with fresh frozen blueberries, a chunk of fresh apple cut in pieces, some 1% milk and about 1/4 cup of raisin bran (I do this for the sweetness of a few raisins and the extra fiber in the bran cereal. I found some made without HFCS!) and even though that sounds pretty darn healthy, I still got a good dose of natural sugars in the berries, the raisins, the apple, the milk, and the added bit in the bran cereal and ON THE RAISINS. Why do all raisIn bran makers roll the raisins in extra sugar? grrrr... Anyway, you see, Canuck @2 is right. Even if you try your best not to add any extra sweeteners to your food, it's in there. Most processed foods have sweeteners added--from spaghetti sauce to soups. Read those labels!
21
Good morning, Canuck. I love you for helping a man who won't read one decently long article by suggesting he instead read two books of over 250 pages each.
23
(8:21 am, just sayin...)
Why good morning, gus! I know, I know, but logic was one of those classes I skipped, along with geology...
Why good morning, gus! I know, I know, but logic was one of those classes I skipped, along with geology...
25
Shop at a co-op instead of the QFC's and Safeways and Costcos and Walmarts. I want to put Mr. Yuck stickers on almost everything they sell at those stores.
26
my aunt mae kept just a minimal amount of food in her larder and fridge, at times having nearly nothing to eat. when i asked her 'why ?', she replied ' baby... food kills you'
27
I .pdf'd the article last week after noticing it was 7 pages.... Sounds like it will be more of the usual "moderation is key" type article.
Thanks Canadian Nurse @13 for the reminder from Michael Pollan. His books have fundamentally changed the way I approach food!
Thanks Canadian Nurse @13 for the reminder from Michael Pollan. His books have fundamentally changed the way I approach food!
28
@11 agreed. Even with the "terrible American diet," people on average live longer today than at most times & places in history. Could we live longer? Probably. Might many of us take up the slack by driving or biking or hiking or having sex more dangerously? Probably. Take away: life is fatal.
@24, except coffee - file it under "everything in moderation including moderation."
@24, except coffee - file it under "everything in moderation including moderation."
29
@15 is taking the article at face value. Sugar and HFCS operate the same in the body... to a degree. HFCS takes longer for the body to absorb; your body will take in the real sugar before it starts on the HFCS. It would have helped had the article chosen to include that little bit of information.
32
Think of it like Pascal's Wager: Even if we don't know for sure, eating too much sugar is more likely to be bad for you than not eating any sugar. You won't get sick from not enough sugar, but you might get sick from too much. @2 has a good point: they put it in everything, so if you try to avoid it, you'll probably end up eating a moderate amount.
33
@6 - Actually (with all respect) it tells you not to even eat the sugar in moderation and tries to link it with cancer as well as obesity and diabetes (even in thin people)...
34
And of course, with that said, I am a major sugar addict! A 4 bags a week fanatic.
I hope that the post above is not read as obesity in thin people!! Aigh.
I hope that the post above is not read as obesity in thin people!! Aigh.
35
Table sugar is about 50/50 fructose/glucose. The most common HFCS is about 55/45 fructose/glucose. As is honey. So, anyone saying that "real sugar" is harmless but decrying every gram of HFCS isn't operating from a sound position, it seems.
36
@31- if you had actually read the article, you would have seen that the author is attacking fructose while exonerating glucose. What he's saying is that fructose, if delivered too often and too quickly into the system, will fatten your liver and mess up your metabolism, which in turn makes you obese and diabetic. Soda is the worst thing for causing this, with fruit juice and sweets following close behind.
Any discussion of obesity, diabetes, and heart disease must reckon with this fact: these diseases went from rare to common at the same time that we switched from eating a traditional diet to a modern one high in heavily refined foodstuffs, and this pattern has been seen all over the world. Some think it's because of the trans fat. Others say it's sugar. Some have said that it's saturated fat (but this doesn't hold much water, because our traditional diets had plenty of butter and lard.) But it is basically impossible to argue that it's not because of food.
Bottom line? Until they get it sorted out, eat traditional foodstuffs. Shy away from things that are heavily processed, eschew anything that contains hydrogenated oils, avoid both sugar and HFCS. And if there are a lot of ingredients whose names you don't recognize, don't eat it.
Any discussion of obesity, diabetes, and heart disease must reckon with this fact: these diseases went from rare to common at the same time that we switched from eating a traditional diet to a modern one high in heavily refined foodstuffs, and this pattern has been seen all over the world. Some think it's because of the trans fat. Others say it's sugar. Some have said that it's saturated fat (but this doesn't hold much water, because our traditional diets had plenty of butter and lard.) But it is basically impossible to argue that it's not because of food.
Bottom line? Until they get it sorted out, eat traditional foodstuffs. Shy away from things that are heavily processed, eschew anything that contains hydrogenated oils, avoid both sugar and HFCS. And if there are a lot of ingredients whose names you don't recognize, don't eat it.
37
@36 - conversely any discussion of the switch from a traditional diet to a modern one high in heavily refined foodstuffs has to also admit that we live longer than we did on the traditional diet. Or name the decade in which people in the US lived longer, on average, than they do now and cite your statistics.
Hysteria is eternal. The sky is always falling, if you look for it.
Alternatively, if we have time to save the world, we could go listen to people who we think are less fortunate than ourselves, find out what they want, and try to give it to them. (Or decide they shouldn't want that, and go back to managing our own lives.)
Hysteria is eternal. The sky is always falling, if you look for it.
Alternatively, if we have time to save the world, we could go listen to people who we think are less fortunate than ourselves, find out what they want, and try to give it to them. (Or decide they shouldn't want that, and go back to managing our own lives.)
38
If you want a great hour and a half lecture about sugar and the evils of i HIGHLY recommend going to youtube and typing in Sugar:The Bitter Truth. Has some really great research and data throughout the video. Please everyone take a hour and a half out of the day and learn about food, after all we eat three times a day everyday.
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