You are here:Home Archives for high fructose corn syrup
October 25, 2012 By Leave a Comment

The Sweet, or Not-So-Sweet Truth

Along our weight loss journey,

who among us hasn’t used a sugar substitute, or enjoyed a diet cola thinking we are saving ourselves from unnecessary calories? Or savored sugar-free candy without guilt?

Artificial Sweeteners?? WTF

I hate to dampen your spirits, but sugar-free products are a no-go in the belly fat arena.

In fact, if you have to choose, real sugar is the better choice.

What’s the case against sugar substitutes?

  1. Most sugar-free items contain sugar alcohols or substitutes, including xylitol, maltitol, aspartame, and sorbitol.  Your gastrointestinal tract has a difficult time absorbing these sugar substitutes. This causes abdominal distention, cramping, gas and diarrhea.
  2. Sugar substitutes including diet cola have been known to spike insulin just like sugar does.   These chemicals confuse the body and the body responds by holding on to its fat reserves — about the last thing we want it to do!
  3. According to Dr. Oz, new research shows that artificial sweeteners stimulate taste receptors that sense sweetness in both the esophagus and stomach.  Anticipating energy, the pancreas releases insulin, an important hormone for accumulating body fat.At the same time, chemicals are sent to the brain’s satiety center which becomes confused as to whether or not the body is receiving calories. The result? You feel even hungrier and often eat more which results  in weight gain.

The horror stories go on, but I think you get the idea. Just as there is no such thing as a free lunch, sugar-substitutes are too good to be true. Not only are we finding out that they are dangerous, we are also discovering that sugar may not be the evil we made it out to be.

Bottom line: stay away from Saccharin, Aspartame, Sucralose, and high fructose corn syrup.  Many people think that even agave nectar is dangerous.  Jorge Cruise is not a fan of agave nectar while Dr. Oz is.  You be the judge for yourself on this one.

Another natural sweetener that is getting good reviews is  Stevia.

It is an herb that originated in South America and contains no calories.  Further good news: it does not cause blood-sugar to spike and it can be used in baking.  It is sweeter than sugar, so use less of it in your recipes (there are lots of little substitution guides online).

It is also FDA approved, but so are the dangerous chemical sweeteners we just discussed.

Stevia comes in liquid or crystallized form and is also known as Truvia or Sun Crystals. Make sure there are no extra additives and that it is the pure plant based sweetener.

Dr. Oz also recommends honey as a sweetener because it is a complex food containing 25 other compounds including proteins, amino acids and trace minerals.  Raw buckwheat honey is a darker version that isn’t strained or heated so it retains many disease-fighting nutrients and antioxidants.

♥  From a belly fat point of view, you can still enjoy sweetness in your foods.   Avoid chemicals and go for the real thing in moderation: sugar, stevia, or honey.

♥  But the more you avoid chemicals and preservatives, and the more you eat real, organically grown plants, mostly vegetables, the less you will crave sugar. That’s like a double bonus — fewer cravings and better health

Besides, you are sweet enough as it is! 

 

Filed Under: Ann White Articles, Bellyfat, Guest Authors, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Obesity, Stevia, Sugar, Sweeteners Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , ,
February 21, 2011 By Leave a Comment

5 Reasons for the Increase in Childhood Obesity

Childhood obesity is an epidemic. Today more than ever before children are struggling with weight gain and the subsequent health effects. Why is obesity on the rise? The answers are both simple and complicated.

•  Too Much Sugar

Take a look at the foods in your cupboard and refrigerator. Chances are that sugar is a major ingredient in most of them. It’s hard to get around it because often sugars are disguised in our foods.

Added sugars in beverages such as fruit juices are so unnecessary because there is already a good amount of naturally occurring sugar in them. Many children consume several glasses of juice and/or soda each day, adding up to thousands of calories from drinks alone. An extra thousand calories a day results in one extra pound of weight in just under four days.

Then pile on the sugars that are added to pasta sauces and condiments such as ketchup, and you’ve added a lot more unnecessary sugars, (never mind the calories).

As an aside, I recently picked up a bottle of Hunts tomato ketchup and found that it boldly displays on the label that it does not contain High Fructose Corn Syrup.  This is a great start Hunts!  It seems that some of the food manufacturers are starting to see that we know what they are doing.

Remember, you’ll find sugars added to foods that you normally don’t even think twice about, such as  in processed meats.

•  Not Enough Fruits, Vegetables and Lean Protein

The truth is that many children don’t eat at home any more. They’re eating breakfast at McDonalds and lunch at Del Taco.  Meals often come from a box or bag if they are prepared at home. These foods are shockingly short on nutrients. They’re also dangerously high in fat, sodium and sugar. A child eating three of these meals a day will definitely gain extra weight.

•  Overeating

Everyone loves to snack, but if the snacks are full of fat like you’ll find in potato chips, or are full of sugar like cookies, then your  child is consuming tons of calories but receiving very little food value or nutrients. Lack of nutrient rich food spells disaster for your child because they will be hungry again in a very short  period of time.  This is s cycle, and when this cycle is activated, children end up consuming way too many calories.  They then feel sluggish so aren’t as active as they could be if they’d eaten good nutritious foods and they start to gain weight.

•  Sedentary LifestylePhoto# 2012 - 2-22-2008

Computers, video games, and television access have kids sitting for hours doing nothing with their bodies. Consuming the amount of calories in chips and cookies and then sitting around means that the calories are not being burned. It also means that the child’s  metabolism has slowed, making it next to impossible to burn calories. It’s the perfect one-two punch for weight gain.

•  Depression

Being a kid is tough. Contemporary children face many stressors. And stress can cause depression even in kids. Just like in adults, depression can cause overeating because the child is trying to soothe themselves with food.

Overeating causes poor sleep, which causes the hormone Leptin to be decreased which results in their brain not alerting the child that they are full.  It’s all connected in a scary sort of way, and once a child is in this state, they need our help to retrain their brains and bodies.

Summary: The main causes of childhood obesity include:

  • Too much food
  • Too much sugar
  • Too many snacks
  • Lack of exercise and activity
  • Family lifestyle
  • Family history of obesity
  • Stress, depression, and/or anxiety

Childhood obesity is a growing problem. Parents and caregivers can make a huge difference. Children are adaptable. They lose weight and change their habits much more easily than adults. They’re strong and capable, and with support, can lose weight. If you know someone struggling with obesity or who are on the path toward obesity, help them make healthier choices. Help them live a healthier life.

Filed Under: Bellyfat and Depression, Childhood Obesity, Sugar, Sweeteners Tagged With: , , , , , ,
December 17, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Dr Robert H Lustig, UCSF Random Thoughts on Obesity

Full-Figured Man

  1. We all weigh 25 pounds more than we did 25 years ago.
  2. No one chooses to be obese.
  3. Leptin is a hormone that comes from your fat cell that tells your brain, ‘I’ve had enough. I don’t need to eat anymore’.
  4. One can of soda a day = 150 calories x 365 days/year + 3500 calories per pound = 15.6 pounds per year increase in weight. It’s not the fats — it’s the carbohydrates that are making us fat.
  5. The Coca Cola conspiracy: The first bottles of Coke were 6.5 ounces. They have progressively gotten bigger over time and the norm is now 20 ounces (which is actually 2.5 servings and is = to 26 additional pounds of weight per year), although you can buy a 44 ounce size of soda that will pack on approximately 57 pounds of excess weight.
  6. Currently we are all consuming 63 pounds of High Fructose Corn Syrup per year. This product was introduced to food manufacturing in the early 1970′s. Shockingly, most food products today contain HFCS.

Filed Under: High Fructose Corn Syrup Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,
August 12, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Causes of Childhood Obesity – Eating Habits

The Wrong Foods Lead to Obesity

In order to live, we must eat. Somewhere in our history, we stopped eating to live and started living to eat. This obsession with food has led to not only obesity in adults,  but a rising obesity in children. Let’s examine the eating habits that can lead to obesity in children and the ways to change those habits.

Marketing & Advertising

Advertising makes companies millions of dollars a year. Why? People view the ads or see commercials on television and buy, The Usual Suspectsbuy, buy. Unfortunately, this is turning us into a nation of obese people.

On a daily basis, we see numerous advertisements extolling the virtues of some sort of tasty food that is not necessarily good for us. You can probably hum those snack food jingles without thinking.  This marketing and advertising has us spending millions of dollars on unhealthy food in restaurants, very unhealthy fast food, and all sorts of prepackaged meals and snacks. This has lead to poor eating habits for adults, children and families.

Food Choices

Children have access to all types of food. There are snack vending machines, soda machines, and fast food restaurant counters in in school cafeterias. At one time, kids took their lunches to school, but now most kids buy their lunch. It’s fast and easy, and they can eat virtually anything  they want.  The majority of food in malls is non-nutritious such as burgers, fries and soda.

But it’s not just about what we eat – in fact, it’s more about what we drink. According to various studies, drinking one soda per day increases the childhood obesity risk by sixty percent!  This bears repeating, – just one soda a day can increase a child’s risk of being obese by 60 percent!

Sodas are High Fructose Corn Syrup, sugar, and empty calories. A single serving of soda can pack a whopping 120 to 180 calories. And remember: that’s  PER SERVING (with most sodas being 20 ounces, they actually contain 2.5 servings). This adds up to about 300 calories — and 300 calories is almost an entire meal’s worth of calories with absolutely no nutritional value.

“Diet” sodas are full of empty calories, and they give a false sense of security, leaving people thinking they are consuming a healthy alternative. But diet drinks have been shown to cause weight gain because people falsely believe they can have a diet drink (or two) and then eat a donut because they saved those extra calories. But there are a lot of obese people walking around carrying diet drinks – why is that?

Snacking

Kids usually come home from school and are looking for a snack. They just naturally reach for whatever is available to snack on. While doing homework or watching TV, they mindlessly overeat, consuming a lot of calories in a short period of time. Maybe even skipping supper because they have filled up on high sugar snacks.  By then, the damage to our daily caloric intake is done.

Turning Eating Habits Around

Changing eating habits requires changing how you look at food. To save your children from the dangers of obesity, don’t go for convenience; make time to eat the right foods. Purchase and prepare healthy snacks. Cut up an apple to give it to them with a  little peanut butter. Have bananas onhand for a quick snack. Have healthy snacks available for those times when we all naturally snack.

January 7, 2010Remove sodas that are loaded with High Fructose Corn Syrup.  Educate yourself on what the foods you purchase really contain. Learn to read the nutrition labels. Get rid of high sugar content foods. A high sugar diet is a high fat diet and the main cause of obesity in children. It is too easy to reach for quick, convenient snacks, and the temptation is everywhere — we are bombarded with unhealthy foods both at home and away. Make your home a healthy atmosphere by removing unhealthy foods from your pantry. Good health and the fight against obesity in children begins in the home.

Causes of Childhood Obesity – Eating Habits

In order to live, we must eat. Somewhere in our history, we stopped eating to live and started living to eat. This obsession with food has led to not only obesity in adults, but a rising obesity in children. Let’s examine the eating habits that can lead to obesity in children and the ways to change those habits.

Advertising

Advertising makes companies millions of dollars a year. Why? People look at ads or see commercials on television and buy, buy, buy. Unfortunately, this is also turning us into a fat nation. On a daily basis, you will see numerous advertisements extolling the virtues of some sort of tasty food that is not necessarily good for you. You want to go get that tasty morsel right now, don’t you? You can probably hum those snack food jingles without thinking.

Because of the draw of these advertisements, millions and millions of dollars are spent on unhealthy fare at restaurants, fast food, and all sorts of prepackaged meals and snacks. This leads to poor eating habits for not just adults, but children, too.

Food Choices Available

Nowadays, children have access to all types of food. In school cafeterias, there are snack vending machines, soda machines, and fast food restaurant counters. It used to be that kids brought their lunches to school, but now most kids buy their lunch since it’s easy and they can eat virtually anything they want. At malls, the availability of non-nutritious foods is more prevalent than good, healthy food choices.

And it’s not just about what we eat – it’s about what we drink. According to various studies, drinking sodas even once a day increases the childhood obesity risk by sixty percent – let me repeat that – just one soda a day can increase a child’s risk of being obese by 60 percent!

Sodas are sugar and empty calories. A single serving of soda can pack a whopping 120 calories to 180 calories. Remember, that’s per serving. And if you’ve read a soda “nutrition” label, you’ll see that in a twenty ounce soda there are two and a half servings. Drinking the entire bottle will fill you with about 300 calories added to your daily consumption. That amounts to an entire meal’s worth of calories with absolutely no nutritional value. That’s 300 calories of absolutely zero nutrition.

Even so-called diet sodas cause a risk as they give a false security that a child is receiving a healthy alternative. Diet drinks have been shown to actually cause weight gain for this reason. Children, and adults alike, falsely believe they can have a diet drink and then eat a donut because they saved those extra calories. There are a lot of obese people walking around carrying diet drinks – why is that?

Snacking

When kids come home from school and start in on their homework, they get the munchies. Their little hands just naturally grab for something to snack on. Then, it’s time to relax. That’s when our snacking goes into overdrive. We easily overeat when we are mindlessly watching television, looking through a magazine, or surfing the Internet. Typically, the snacks we grab are sugary, salty, high calorie, and high fat. The problem with this snacking is, just like with sodas, we can eat a lot of unhealthy snacks before we are filled up and those snacks have no nutritional value. By then, the damage to our daily caloric intake is done.

Turning Eating Habits Around

Changing eating habits requires changing how you look at food. Don’t go for convenience; make time to eat the right foods. Get into the habit of preparing healthy snacks. Cut up an apple to eat with a little peanut butter. Grab a banana and eat it while you study. Have healthy snacks available for those times when we all naturally snack.

Bad eating habits is one of the biggest causes of obesity in children. It is far too easy to fall into an unhealthy eating habit. We are bombarded with unhealthy foods both at home and away. Make your home a healthy atmosphere by removing unhealthy foods from your pantry. Good health and the fight against obesity in children begins at home.

To learn more about how to deal with childhood obesity, check out this excellent book by Susan Okie. To order the book, click on this image.

What are your thoughts?  Leave a comment or sound off about the epidemic.

Filed Under: Childhood Obesity, High Fructose Corn Syrup Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,
August 5, 2010 By

Eco Vitamin Drink not so Body Friendly

Well, we hit a wall.  What the heck do we drink on hot days now that soda and fruit juices are out of the question (full of Sugars, Artificial Sweeteners, and High Fructose Corn Syrup).

Vitamins the natural wayBut then we came across EcoDrink Complete Multivitamin at Costco the other day. It cost $19.99 for 30 packets — 15 berry flavor and 15 orange flavor. You mix it with water in the BPA free shaker bottle that is provided, and it gives you enough for two people (or a big dose for one person).

It’s

  • Gluten Free
  • Full of Antioxidants, Nutritients, and Electrolytes
  • Diabetic Friendly
  • 100% Natural Flavors and Colors
  • 31 Highly Absorbable Vitamins, Minerals, and Nutrients
  • And it’s great for the whole family too!

It supports:

  • Heart Health
  • Eyes and Skin
  • The Reduction of Leg & Muscle Cramps

It’s got

  • Zero Calories
  • Zero Carbs
  • Zero Sodium
  • Zero Caffeine
  • Zero Sugar

What?? Zero sugar. Why is this drink so grossly sweet that we could barely drink it.  Oh, of course! It might have zero sugar, but it’s loaded with Sucralose, the artificial sweetener that is shown to overexcite and kill off our brain cells!  We should know better by now to REALLY look at the labels and not leave it up to the manufacturers to have the contents CLEARLY stated.

As an aside, the side panel has blurbs about how this product helps with heart health, a healthy immune system, healthy eyes, joints, and skin, and bone health.  Then right below that in little tiny print, it says: “These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration“. Hmm, interesting.

Well, I have to go and return this product to Costco.  See you later.

HERE IS AN UPDATE TO THE ORIGINAL POST:

http://bellyfatcentral.com/update-to-original-eco-vitamin-drink-not-so-body-friendly-blog-post/

TRY THIS WONDERFUL ALTERNATIVE INSTEAD!

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: Diabetes and Belly Fat, Sweeteners Tagged With: , ,
August 4, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Are you concerned about the amount of sugar in milk? Here’s a great milk alternative

Kitty with Milk Bottle - old pc - Photochrom Co - Tunbridge Wells, KentI’m looking at a container of 2% milk right now and the Nutrition Facts say that there are 12 grams of sugar in one cup of milk.  That is equivalent to almost 2 1/2 teaspoons of sugar.  Can you see yourself pouring a glass of milk and then putting 2 1/2 teaspoons of sugar in it before you drink it? I sure can’t, and when I realized this I started looking for alternatives. (if you have read The Belly Fat Cure by Jorge Cruise or watched THIS VIDEO CLICK HERE then you already know that a high SUGAR diet is really a HIGH FAT diet).

One of the many alternatives I personally use is Coconut Milk.  The brand I am looking at right now is called So Delicious and it is unsweetened (very important). It’s also USDA Organic and Certified Gluten Free if that is an issue for you.

So what are the benefits of using a cup (8 oz) of Coconut Milk over a cup of milk?

  • Milk: 130 calories vs Coconut Milk at 50 calories
  • Total fat in milk: 8% or 5 grams and total fat in Coconut Milk 8% or 5 grams
  • Both contain about the same Percent Daily Values of vitamins and minerals
  • Coconut Milk is both Soy and Dairy Free

But more than that, I don’t tolerate milk products very well. But I have no problem with Coconut Milk at all. And it is really like a treat — rich, thick, and creamy.  Since the container of Coconut Milk I’ve purchased isn’t sweetened, I can control the sweetness. I sweeten the whole container (32 fluid ounces) with one packet of STEVIA

The side panel on the container adds that “Consumption of good fats is an important part of a balanced diet”. This is a very true statement. Remember that low fat products will always have sugar, High Fructose Corn Syrup, or Artificial Sweeteners in them and they are all very detrimental to our health.

To read more about the So Delicious product line, CLICK HERE

Which alternatives to milk do you use? Leave a comment below.

Filed Under: Good Foods, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Stevia Tagged With: , , , , , ,
August 3, 2010 By 1 Comment

Are breads contributing to your weight gain? Try this one

I found this bread suggestion in Jorge Cruise’s book, The Bellyfat Cure.

I tried it and have to report that it is awesome. Now, I love breads. I have also realized recently that breads often have High Fructose Corn Syrup AND usually about 5 grams of sugars in each slice.

Whole Grain BreadSo what is so special about Ezekiel 4:9 (that come from the ovens over at Food For Life)? Well, here’s what they say on the package:

  • The Original Flourless Low Clycemic
  • Sprouted 100% Whole Grain Bread
  • Certified Organic Grains
  • All Natural
  • No Preservatives
  • Complete Protein
  • Glycemic Index: 36
  • There are 18 Amino Acids Present in this Unique Bread From All Vegetable Sources – Naturally Balanced in Nature

It really does taste good.  It might be a bit of an adjustment if you normally eat white bread, but your health is worth having a quality bread that won’t contribute to illness and/or weight gain.

PS I first bought the bread in a health food store (frozen foods area) for $5.95.  I then realized I could purchase it at Fred Meyer and it is only $3.49

This just  proves that eating “health foods” doesn’t necessarily mean you have to purchase them from an overpriced health food store.

Filed Under: Good Foods Tagged With: , , , , , , ,
August 2, 2010 By 1 Comment

Using Stevia for Sweetening Everything

Stevia Plant

Stevia Plant

Since deciding to get off of artificial sweeteners and refusing to consume anything with High Fructose Corn Syrup, I have discovered Stevia.  Personally, I love the taste, although I don’t get the same response from everyone. It seems to be an acquired taste for some…

What is Stevia?

Well Stevia is a herb. It’s really delicious and sweet. And a really good substitute for any kind of sugar.

But to see what the real definition of Stevia is, I tapped into Wikipedia.

Wikipedia says:

Stevia is a genus of about 240 species of herbs and shrubs in the sunflower family (Asteraceae), native to subtropical and tropical regions from western North America to South America. The species Stevia rebaudiana, commonly known as sweetleaf, sweet leaf, sugarleaf, or simply stevia, is widely grown for its sweet leaves. As a sweetener and sugar substitute, stevia’s taste has a slower onset and longer duration than that of sugar, although some of its extracts may have a bitter or licorice-like aftertaste at high concentrations.

So basically what they are saying is that Stevia is a herb, used for centuries for naturally sweetening foods and drinks.  There are no apparent side effects from using it. It is not a sugar so does not pack on bellyfat, and won’t overexcite your brain cells (whew, what a relief that is).

Wikipedia continues with this:

With its extracts having up to 300 times the sweetness of sugar, stevia has garnered attention with the rise in demand for low-carbohydrate, low-sugar food alternatives. Medical research has also shown possible benefits of stevia in treating obesity and high blood pressure. Because stevia has a negligible effect on blood glucose, it is attractive as a natural sweetener to people on carbohydrate-controlled diets.

So it even helps us lose weight, but more than that, it is used medicinally in some populations.

For medicinal use, Wikipedia says:

For centuries, the Guaraní tribes of Paraguay, Bolivia and Brazil used stevia, which they called ka’a he’ê (“sweet herb”), as a sweetener in yerba mate and medicinal teas for treating heartburn and other ailments.[11] More recent medical research has shown promise in treating obesity[12] and hypertension.[13][14] Stevia has a negligible effect on blood glucose, even enhancing glucose tolerance;[15] therefore, it is attractive as a natural sweetener to diabetics and others on carbohydrate-controlled diets.

Look who’s has been using Stevia for decades. Again from Wikipedia:

In the early 1970s, Japan began cultivating stevia as an alternative to artificial sweeteners such as cyclamate and saccharin, which were suspected carcinogens. The plant’s leaves, the aqueous extract of the leaves, and purified steviosides are used as sweeteners. Since the Japanese firm Morita Kagaku Kogyo Co., Ltd. produced the first commercial stevia sweetener in Japan in 1971,[8] the Japanese have been using stevia in food products, soft drinks (including Coca Cola),[9] and for table use. Japan currently consumes more stevia than any other country, with stevia accounting for 40% of the sweetener market.[10]

Today, stevia is cultivated and used in food elsewhere in east Asia, including in China (since 1984), Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, and Malaysia. It can also be found in Saint Kitts and Nevis, in parts of South America (Brazil, Colombia, Peru, Paraguay, and Uruguay) and in Israel. China is the world’s largest exporter of stevioside.[10]

Where to buy Stevia:

I have found that Walmart has the best deal on Stevia. Look for it in the pharmacy/supplements area. You can purchase a box of 100 packets for $6.  I paid that for 50 packets in a health food store!

 

Check out the Cuisipro Herb Keeper

Storing herbs seems simple but unless you properly store your herbs they will only last a few days. Herbs are sold in bundles and for most recipes a bundle is too much. What happens to the leftovers? If they are not used right away most of what was bought is thrown out.

Cuisipro Herb Keeper’s unique suspended tray system makes it easy to store and access herbs. Other herb keepers tend to be overcomplicated to use or drip water all over the place when gathering herbs.

The Cuisipro Herb Keeper comes in 2 convenient sizes so you can choose the one right for you; large one that handles multiple bunches of herbs and compact size for a single herb bundle.

Click the image to learn more about this product. 



Filed Under: Good Foods, Stevia, Sugar, Sweeteners Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,
August 2, 2010 By 1 Comment

Sugar May Be Bad, But This Sweetener is Far More Deadly

No High Fructose Corn Syrup

No High Fructose Corn Syrup

View this incredible video presentation by Robert H. Lustig, MD UCFS Division of Endocrinology and Metabolism. It is about 1.5 hours in duration, but if you want the truth about High Fructose Corn Syrup, this is the presentation to see.

Filed Under: High Fructose Corn Syrup, Sugar Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,
July 29, 2010 By Leave a Comment

High-fructose corn syrup: What are the concerns?

High-fructose corn syrup seems to be a common ingredient in many foods. What are the concerns about high-fructose corn syrup?

Answer from Katherine Zeratsky, R.D., L.D.

High-fructose corn syrup is a common sweetener and preservative. High-fructose corn syrup is made by changing the sugar (glucose) in cornstarch to fructose — another form of sugar. The end product is a combination of fructose and glucose. Because it extends the shelf life of processed foods and is cheaper than sugar, high-fructose corn syrup has become a popular ingredient in many sodas, fruit-flavored drinks and other processed foods.

So far, research has yielded conflicting results about the effects of high-fructose corn syrup. For example, various early studies showed an association between increased consumption of sweetened beverages (many of which contained high-fructose corn syrup) and obesity. But recent research — some of which is supported by the beverage industry — suggests that high-fructose corn syrup isn’t intrinsically less healthy than other sweeteners, nor is it the root cause of obesity.

While research continues, moderation remains important. Many beverages and other processed foods made with high-fructose corn syrup and other sweeteners are high in calories and low in nutritional value. Regularly including these products in your diet has the potential to promote obesity — which, in turn, promotes conditions such as type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and coronary artery disease.

If you’re concerned about the amount of high-fructose corn syrup or other sweeteners in your diet, consider these tips:

  • Limit processed foods.
  • Avoid foods that contain added sugar.
  • Choose fresh fruit rather than fruit juice or fruit-flavored drinks. Even 100 percent fruit juice has a high concentration of sugar.
  • Choose fruit canned in its own juices instead of heavy syrup.
  • Drink less soda.
  • Don’t allow sweetened beverages to replace milk, especially for children.

To view this article at the Mayo Clinic site (and for other fantastic articles) go to:

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/high-fructose-corn-syrup/AN01588

Filed Under: High Fructose Corn Syrup Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,