Facts About Sugars and Added Sugars
Facts About Sugars and Added Sugars
For optimal health we should all be aware of the amount of naturally occurring sugars and added sugars and facts about sugars and added sugars that we consume daily. Naturally occurring sugars are found naturally in foods such as fruit (fructose) and milk (lactose). Added sugars are sugars and syrups put in foods during preparation or processing.
We tend to think that added sugar is mainly found in desserts like biscuits and cakes, unfortunately it’s also found in many savoury foods, such as bread, canned foods and even pasta sauce. We tend to feel if you skip dessert you have avoided sugar quite often this is not the case as you may still be consuming more added sugar than is recommended.
The food industry has processed lots of foods to hit a certain “bliss point” which is the perfect amount of sweetness that has consumers craving for more and this added can be hidden in foods like bread, baked beans and pasta sauce. They employ psychologists, doctors and other professionals to engineer, plan and meticulously research to calculate to find the “bliss point” in processed food products found on the supermarket shelves today.
The top executives of many major food companies are manipulating their products in order to get you addicted to them, with no concern for the potential health impact. That’s the claim from New York Times reporter Michael Moss’s new book Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us.
“Salt, sugar, and fat: a powerful trio deployed with sophisticated precision by the processed food industry. The result? The average American eats 33 pounds of cheese and 70 pounds of sugar annually, and 8,500 milligrams of salt each day. In industry terms, “mouthfeel” has been perfected” Michael Moss
https://youtu.be/bs2auTOPUxE Check out Michael Moss’s YouTube Interview
Foods promoted as “natural” or “healthy” are laden with added sugars compounding the confusion. In fact, manufacturers add sugar to 74% of packaged foods sold in supermarkets.
Facts About Sugars and Added Sugars
Food companies have realised there is a loophole with labelling sugars and have taken some extreme liberties. Not only are they using some of those tricky sugar synonyms in the ingredient list, but they’re also using several of them, in a single product.
While product labels list total sugar content, manufacturers are not required to say whether that total includes added sugar, which makes it difficult to know how much of the total comes from added sugar and how much is naturally occurring in ingredients such as fruit, fruit juice or milk (lactose). Amylopectin A (natural sugar) in wheat causes you blood glucose to rise more than simple carbohydrates such as table sugar. The GI (glycaemic index) for white bread 70, whole grain bread, 71, fruit loops 69 oats 66, snickers 55.
The modern problem with sugar is that it lurks everywhere. It is found in canned tuna, roasted chicken, peanut butter, baked beans, sports drinks, coffee mixtures, fruit teas, frozen dinners, white wine, dried cranberries, cereals, meats, healthy fruit yoghurts, low fat yoghurts, soups, smoothies, packaged salads, protein bars, spaghetti, BBQ sauce, tomato sauce (ketchup), as well as the obvious places such as biscuits, milk chocolate, cakes and fizzy drinks.
Of course, all fruits and vegetables contain sugar; that’s what makes them carbohydrates. How nature balanced the natural sugars by having more soluble fibre than sugar, so they don’t raise blood sugar as much as grain products and other refined carbohydrates do.
Remember “added sugars are added sugars”.
Beware on labels some food companies are dividing the total amount of added sugars into 3 or 4 different sugar names instead of using just one type of sugar, that allows them to drop their added sugars further down the list (the less weight, the lower rank on the ingredient list).
Currently the only way to tell that sugars have been added is by checking the ingredients list – the higher up the list, the more sugar the product contains. If a manufacturer wants to sweeten a pasta sauce, they could say contains 20gr of “sugar” or 5gr of “malt syrup”, 5gr of “glucose “5gr Invert sugar” and 5gr agave. Which has the consumer believing they are purchasing a product that is lower in sugar.
For example let examine a Granola Bar and what ingredients it contains.
Granola (whole grain oats, brown sugar, crisp rice (rice flour, sugar, salt, malted barley extract), whole grain rolled wheat, soybean oil, dried coconut, whole wheat flour, sodium bicarbonate, soy lecithin, caramel color, nonfat dry milk), corn syrup, semisweet chocolate chips, brown rice crisp, sunflower oil, oligofructose, polydextrose, corn syrup solids, glycerin. Contains 2 percent or less of water, invert sugar, salt, molasses, sucralose, natural and artificial flavor, BHT, citric acid
So the sugars are invert sugar, molasses, sucralose, polydextrose, corn syrup, oligofructose, malted barley extract, sugar, brown sugar, and the natural sugars.
Fruit and vegetables naturally contain small amounts of sugar, but they also contain fibre, nutrients and various beneficial compounds.
Moods Changed by High Sugar Intakes
A sugar high and subsequent crash can cause shaking and tension, which can make anxiety worse. Glucose is rapidly digested, and your spiked dopamine and blood sugar levels fall quickly. A elevated blood glucose crash depends on the individual and it can be 15 minutes to a couple of hours after eating. When a sugar crash happens and your blood glucose drops below the normal range, your body is not going to be happy. You may experience hunger, irritability, headache, fatigue, anxiety, depression and difficulty concentrating.
Added sugar can do irreversible harm to our brains and body by producing addictions similar to cocaine weakening athletic performance and causing deep depression following its high.
All disease can be linked back to your microbiome. The correct balance of bacteria in your gut is responsible for exactly how healthy you are. You can either feed good bacteria or bad bacteria by the foods you choose to eat. Sugar is the perfect fuel for all types of bad bacteria including yeast overgrowth such as Candida.
An overload of bad bacteria leads to none other than chronic systemic inflammation. And even though you might not have digestive symptoms, you can still have digestive problems. They are most likely just manifesting themselves in another part of your body.
When you consume too much sugar it can lead to blood sugar spikes, imbalances, and insulin resistance and when your blood sugar is on a roller-coaster it throws off you’re your hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis (HPA axis) which is responsible for releasing your stress hormone cortisol. Your “fight or flight” response that happens when you are stressed or anxious is due to an increased stream of cortisol. Because of this constant up and down your body never really gets a chance to calm down which further perpetuates the feelings of anxiety.
When 90% of your mood hormone, Serotonin is produced in your gut, good gut health makes sense. Eliminating excess added sugar is a key part of any effective leaky gut treatment plan, moods and optimal health.
These are frightening stats, that the average Person consumes 19.5 teaspoons 82 gram every day.
The negative health effects of high sugar consumption are due to the massive amount of added sugar that is present in the Western diet.
Here are the names of Sugar used on food labels:
- Agave nectar
- Anhydrous Dextose
- Barbados sugar
- Barley malt
- Barley malt syrup
- Beet sugar
- Brown sugar
- Buttercream Icing
- Buttered syrup
- Cane juice
- Cane juice crystals
- Cane sugar
- Caramel
- Carob syrup
- Castor sugar
- Coconut palm sugar
- Coconut sugar
- Coffee sugar cystals
- Confectioner’s sugar
- Corn sweetener
- Corn syrup
- Corn syrup solids
- Crystalline Fructose
- Date sugar/syrup
- Dehydrated cane juice
- Demerara sugar
- Dextrin
- Dextrose
- Diastatic Malt
- D-ribose (Deoxyribose)
- Ethyl maltol
- Evaporated cane juice
- Fondant
- Free-flowing brown sugars
- Fructose
- Fruit juice
- Fruit juice concentrate
- Galactose
- Glucose
- Glucose solids
- Golden sugar
- Golden syrup
- Grape sugar/syrup
- HFCS (high-fructose corn syrup)
- HFCS 55 55% fructose 45% glucose
- HFCS 90 90% fructose
- Honey
- Icing sugar
- Invert sugar
- Malt syrup
- Maltodextrin
- Maltol
- Maltose
- Mannose
- Maple syrup
- Milk protein isolate still contains between 1 to 2 percent lactose
- Molasses
- Muscovado
- Nectars
- Oligofructose
- Palm sugar
- Pancake Syrup
- Panela
- Panocha
- Polydextose
- Powdered sugar
- Rapadura
- Raw sugar
- Refiner’s syrup
- Rice syrup
- Saccharose
- Sorghum syrup
- Sucanat
- Sucrose
- Sucralose
- Sugar (granulated)
- Sweet sorghum
- Syrup
- Treacle
- Turbinado sugar
- Yellow sugar
- White Granulated Sugar
- Xylitol is Sugar Alcohols not as sweet as sugar
Glucose C6H12O6 (Blood sugar)
Table Sugar C12H22O11 (Sucrose)
Fructose C6H12O6
Lactose C12H22O11 (Milk Sugar)
Galactose C6H12O6
Maltose C12H22O11(Malt Sugar)
Inverted Sugar Syrup C12H24O12
Deoxyribose C5H10O4
IUPAC name for sucrose, table sugar is:
(2R,3R,4S,5S,6R)-2-[(2S,3S,4S,5R)-3,4-dihydroxy-2,5-bis(hydroxymethyl)oxolan-2-yl]oxy-6-(hydroxymethyl)oxane-3,4,5-triol.
No calorie sweeteners may sound like a good idea when you look to lose weight, but they aren’t. Their side effects far outweigh potential benefits of a low-calorie sweetener, and they are actually linked with weight gain, not weight loss. The results of a 2017 randomized trial suggest artificial sweeteners may increase BMI, weight, metabolic syndrome and type 2 diabetes, although more information is needed to be conclusive.
Another study on the effects of artificial sweeteners on atherosclerosis found that daily consumption of drinks with artificial sweeteners creates a 35 percent greater risk of Metabolic syndrome and a 67 percent increased risk for type 2 diabetes. Atherosclerosis is when plaque builds up inside the arteries leading to strokes, heart attacks and even death.
There is additional evidence that links artificial sweeteners to the development of glucose intolerance and other metabolic conditions that result in higher than normal blood glucose levels. According to a study published in Trends in Endocrinology and Metabolism, frequent consumption of sweet-tasting, non-caloric foods interferes with metabolic function.
Sugar Substitutes Artificial Sweeteners
People are often surprised at how often dangerous artificial sweeteners are included in prepared foods, medications and beverages.
- Aspartame
- Acesulfame potassium
- Alitame
- Cyclamate
- Dulcin
- Equal
- Glucin
- Kaltame
- Mogrosides
- Neotame
- NutraSweet
- Nutrinova
- Phenlalanine
- Saccharin
- Splenda
- Sorbitol
- Sucralose
- Twinsweet
- Sweet ‘N Low
- Xylitol
Facts About Sugars and Added Sugars: Triglycerides and cholesterol
Triglycerides and cholesterol are separate types of lipids that circulate in your blood. Triglycerides store unused calories and provide your body with energy, and cholesterol is used to build cells and certain hormones. Because triglycerides and cholesterol can’t dissolve in blood, they circulate throughout your body with the help of proteins that transport the lipids (lipoproteins).
High triglycerides are often a sign of other conditions that increase the risk of heart disease and stroke as well, including obesity and metabolic syndrome — a cluster of conditions that includes too much fat around the waist, high blood pressure, high triglycerides, high blood sugar and abnormal cholesterol levels.
Sugars converted into Triglycerides
When your body has more glucose than it needs for energy and has reached its storage capacity for glycogen, the increased insulin prompts the liver to convert glucose into triglycerides, which are then transported to fat cells.
Excess calories, alcohol or sugar in the body turn into triglycerides and are stored in fat cells throughout the body. Added sugars intake does appear to be connected with increased triglyceride levels, a known risk factor for developing heart disease. Eating added sugars often means a person is consuming less fibre.
How to Cut Down on Sugars Intake
fruit paste
These tips can help you cut down:
- Instead of sugary soft drinks and juice drinks, go for water or unsweetened fruit juice (remember to dilute these for children, to further reduce the sugar).
- Have live unpasteurised Kombucha Tea instead of soft drinks
- Swap cakes or biscuits for a piece of fruit.
- If you take sugar in hot drinks, or add sugar to your breakfast cereal, gradually reduce the amount until you can cut it out altogether
- Rather than spreading jam or honey on your toast, try a low-fat spread, sliced banana, avocado or make a fruit paste from dates or apricot – Recipe for our Fruit Paste
- Check nutrition labels to help you pick the foods with less added sugar, or go for the low-sugar version.
- Try halving the sugar you use in your recipes. It works for most things except jam, meringues and ice-cream.
- Choose fresh fruit juice rather than fruits syrup and drinks
- Choose wholegrain breakfast, homemade cereals but not those coated with sugar or honey.
Check the Food Labels
Nutrition labels often tell you how much sugar a food contains. You can compare labels, and choose foods that are lower in sugar. You can tell if the food contains lots of added sugars by checking the ingredients list.
Sometimes you will see a figure for ‘Carbohydrates’, and not for sugar/s. The ‘Carbohydrates’ figure will also include starchy carbohydrates, so you can’t use it to work out the sugar content. In this case, check the ingredients list to see if the food is high in added sugars.
Author: “Facts About Sugars and Added Sugars” Penelope Jayne Holistic Health and Wellness Coach, Global Recharge
“We should all be aware of the amount of naturally occurring sugars and added sugars that we consume daily”
All content and media on Global Recharge is created and published online for informational purposes only. It is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice and should not be relied on as health or personal advice.
https://academic.oup.com/advances/article/4/2/220/4591630
https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/93/6/1321/4597819
https://www.bmj.com/content/346/bmj.e7492/
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1081120610610101
http://www.cmaj.ca/content/189/28/E929.short
https://www.healthdirect.gov.au/cutting-down-on-sugars
