High Fructose Corn Syrup - It Is Everywhere

[little koshka 0]

Ligonier brought up a very good point about high fructose corn syrup.

 

I thought this subject to be worthy of a topic. The more we know, the better, right? The scary thing is that this stuff hfcs is everywhere in processed foods - even in places you wouldn't think it would be. This stuff is in sugary drinks of course, but it is also found lurking in "whole wheat" bread and english muffins, "vegetable juice", spaghetti sauce, ect. etc. I have been trying to ban the stuff from my home, and it it is harder than you think, I just found some in my pantry in an unlikely product today - yet another change I will have to make.

 

This stuff is not natural and it is amazing how much we consume. Best bet for anyone is to consume the least amount of pre-packaged anything. My apologies for such a long post, but your health is important, right?

 

Here is some interesting reading..

 

 

 

The following is from an article in the San Francisco Chronicle..

 

An overweight America may be fixated on fat and obsessed with carbs, but nutritionists say the real problem is much sweeter -- we're awash in sugar.

Not just any sugar, but high fructose corn syrup.

The country eats more sweetener made from corn than from sugarcane or beets, gulping it down in drinks as well as in frozen food and baked goods. Even ketchup is laced with it.

 

Almost all nutritionists finger high fructose corn syrup consumption as a major culprit in the nation's obesity crisis. The inexpensive sweetener flooded the American food supply in the early 1980s, just about the time the nation's obesity rate started its unprecedented climb.

 

The question is why did it make us so fat. Is it simply the Big Gulp syndrome -- that we're eating too many empty calories in ever-increasing portion sizes? Or does the fructose in all that corn syrup do something more insidious -- literally short-wire our metabolism and force us to gain weight?

 

The debate can divide a group of nutritional researchers almost as fast as whether the low-carb craze is fact or fad.

 

Loading high fructose corn syrup into increasingly larger portions of soda and processed food has packed more calories into us and more money into food processing companies, say nutritionists and food activists. But some health experts argue that the issue is bigger than mere calories. The theory goes like this: The body processes the fructose in high fructose corn syrup differently than it does old-fashioned cane or beet sugar, which in turn alters the way metabolic-regulating hormones function. It also forces the liver to kick more fat out into the bloodstream.

 

The end result is that our bodies are essentially tricked into wanting to eat more and at the same time, we are storing more fat.

 

"One of the issues is the ease with which you can consume this stuff," says Carol Porter, director of nutrition and food services at UC San Francisco. "It's not that fructose itself is so bad, but they put it in so much food that you consume so much of it without knowing it."

 

A single 12-ounce can of soda has as much as 13 teaspoons of sugar in the form of high fructose corn syrup. And because the amount of soda we drink has more than doubled since 1970 to about 56 gallons per person a year, so has the amount of high fructose corn syrup we take in. In 2001, we consumed almost 63 pounds of it, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

 

The USDA suggests most of us limit our intake of added sugar -- that's everything from the high fructose corn syrup hidden in your breakfast cereal to the sugar cube you drop into your after-dinner espresso -- to about 10 to 12 teaspoons a day. But we're not doing so well. In 2000, we ate an average of 31 teaspoons a day, which was more than 15 percent of our caloric intake. And much of that was in sweetened drinks.

 

Beyond soda

 

So, the answer is to just avoid soda, right? Unfortunately, it's not that simple, because the inexpensive, versatile sweetener has crept into plenty of other places -- foods you might not expect to have any at all. A low-fat, fruit-flavored yogurt, for example, can have 10 teaspoons of fructose-based sweetener in one serving.

 

Because high fructose corn syrup mixes easily, extends shelf-life and is as much as 20 percent cheaper than other sources of sugar, large-scale food manufacturers love it. It can help prevent freezer burn, so you'll find it on the labels of many frozen foods. It helps breads brown and keeps them soft, which is why hot dog buns and even English muffins hold unexpected amounts.

 

The question remains just how much more dangerous high fructose corn syrup is than other sugars.

 

Fructose, as the name implies, is the sugar found naturally in fruit. It can be extracted, turned into granules and used like sugar in the kitchen. It used to be considered a healthier alternative to sucrose -- plain old table sugar. It's sweeter, so less is needed to achieve the same taste. Diabetics use it because fructose doesn't stimulate insulin production, so blood sugar levels remain stable.

 

The process of pulling sugar from cornstarch wasn't perfected until the early 1970s, when Japanese researchers developed a reliable way to turn cornstarch into syrup sweet enough to compete with liquid sugar. After some tinkering, they landed on a formula that was 55 percent fructose and 45 percent glucose -- sweet enough and cheap enough to make most soda companies jump from liquid sugar to high fructose corn syrup by the 1980s.

 

The results were dramatic. -- a whopping increase of 4,080 percent.

 

Journalist Greg Critser lays out a compelling case against high fructose corn syrup in his 2003 book, "Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World." He argues that federal policies that aimed to stabilize food prices and support corn production in the 1970s led to a glut of corn and then to high fructose corn syrup. With a cheaper way to sweeten food, producers pumped up the size and amount of sweet snacks and drinks on the market and increased profits.

 

It's not natural

 

Critser writes that despite the food industry's arguments that sugar is sugar, whether fructose or sucrose, no group "has yet refuted the growing scientific concern that, when all is said and done, fructose ... is about the furthest thing from natural that one can imagine, let alone eat."

 

Although some researchers have long been suspicious that too much fructose can cause problems, the latest case against high fructose corn syrup began in earnest a few years ago. Dr. George Bray, principal investigator of the Diabetes Prevention Program at Louisiana State University Medical Center told the International Congress on Obesity that in 1980, just after high fructose corn syrup was introduced in mass quantities, relatively stable obesity rates began to climb. By 2000, they had doubled.

 

Further, the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in 2002 published research that showed that teenagers' milk consumption between 1965 and 1996 decreased by 36 percent, while soda consumption increased by more than 200 percent. Bray argues that without calcium, which nutritionists agree can help the body regulate weight, kids got fatter. He says that he could find no other single combination of environmental or food changes that were as significant to the rise in obesity.

 

Other studies by researchers at UC Davis and the University of Michigan have shown that consuming fructose, which is more readily converted to fat by the liver, increases the levels of fat in the bloodstream in the form of triglycerides.

 

And unlike other types of carbohydrate made up of glucose, fructose does not stimulate the pancreas to produce insulin. Peter Havel, a nutrition researcher at UC Davis who studies the metabolic effects of fructose, has also shown that fructose fails to increase the production of leptin, a hormone produced by the body's fat cells.

 

Both insulin and leptin act as signals to the brain to turn down the appetite and control body weight. And in another metabolic twist, Havel's research shows that fructose does not appear to suppress the production of ghrelin, a hormone that increases hunger and appetite.

 

"Because fructose in isolation doesn't activate the hormones that regulate body weight as do other types of carbohydrate composed of glucose, consuming a diet high in fructose could lead to taking in more calories and, over time, to weight gain," he says.

 

However, Havel isn't convinced high fructose corn syrup is by itself the problem. That's in part because it is composed of 55 percent fructose and 45 percent glucose, which is similar to the 50-50 combination of fructose and glucose found in table sugar. Havel's studies have focused on fructose by itself and not as part of a high fructose corn syrup mixture.

 

"Whether there is an important difference in the effects of consuming beverages sweetened with a mixture of 55 percent as opposed to 50 percent fructose would be hard to measure," he says. "Additional studies are needed to better understand the nutritional impact of consuming different types of sugars in humans."

 

Still, other researchers are finding new problems with high fructose corn syrup. A study in last month's Journal of the National Cancer Institute suggests that women whose diet was high in total carbohydrate and fructose intake had an increased risk of colorectal cancer. And Dr. Mel Heyman, chief of pediatric gastroenterology and nutrition at UCSF, is seeing sick children whose bodies have been overloaded with fructose from naturally occurring fructose in fruit juice combined with soda and processed food.

 

"The way the body handles glucose is different than fructose,'' he says. "It can overload the intestines' ability to absorb carbohydrate by giving it too much fructose. That can cause cramps, bloating and loose stools."

 

The jury's still out

 

Like others in the field, he says there is much to discover in how sugar works, but he disagrees that high fructose corn syrup is somehow reprogramming our bodies toward obesity. Rather, he says, we're just eating too much of it.

 

Nutrition theory holds that the basic make-up of fructose-laced corn syrup is not much different than table sugar. They react about the same in the body, says Dr. Walter Willett, a professor of epidemiology and nutrition at Harvard School of Public Health. "There are some modest differences in metabolism, but I don't think fructose per se is the culprit."

 

Neither do the food companies that use it in copious amounts.

 

Says Stephanie Childs, a spokesperson for the Grocery Manufacturers Association: "At the end of the day, how any sweetener affects your weight depends on how many calories you are taking in overall. Overemphasizing one nutrient at the detriment of others is not going to solve the problem."

 

Even some leading nutrition reformers aren't convinced that high fructose corn syrup is of itself the issue. The bigger battle, says Michael Jacobson, executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer advocacy group, is to get added sugars listed on food labels with a percentage of daily value. That means a consumer could look at a package and see that, for example, one soda provides almost all the sugar a person should eat in a day.

 

"It simply comes down to this,'' he says. "We're eating too much refined sugars, be it sucrose or high fructose corn syrup or any other refined sugar."

 

 

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A sugar glossary

Here's a rundown of the various types of sugar you'll find on product labels.

 

Brown sugar. Sugar crystals contained in a molasses syrup, with natural flavor and color; 91 to 96 percent sucrose

 

Corn syrup. Made from cornstarch. Mostly glucose. Can have maltose

 

Dextrose. Commonly known as corn sugar and grape sugar. Naturally occurring form of glucose

 

Fructose. Sugar found in fruit and honey. Sweetest natural sugar

 

Galactose. Sugar found linked to glucose to form lactose, or milk sugar

 

Glucose. Also called dextrose. The human body's primary source of energy. Most of the carbohydrates you eat are converted to glucose in the body.

 

High fructose corn syrup. Derived from cornstarch, usually a combination of 55 percent fructose and 45 percent sucrose. Treated with an enzyme that converts glucose to fructose, which results in a sweeter product. Used in soft drinks, baked goods, jelly, syrups, fruits and desserts

 

Honey. Sweet syrupy fluid made by bees from the nectar collected from flowers and stored in nests or hives as food. Composed of fructose and glucose

 

Lactose. Sugar found in milk and milk products that is made of glucose and galactose

 

Maltose. Also called malt sugar. Used in the fermentation of alcohol by converting starch to sugar

 

Maple syrup. A concentrated sucrose solution made from mature sugar maple tree sap that flows in spring. Mostly replaced by pancake syrup, a mixture of sucrose and artificial maple flavorings

 

Molasses. Thick syrup left after making sugar from sugarcane. Brown in color with a high sugar concentration

 

Powdered or confectioner's sugar. Granulated sugar that has been pulverized. Available in several degrees of fineness

 

Sucrose. Commonly called cane sugar, table sugar or simply sugar

 

Sugar (granulated). Refined cane or beet sugar; 100 percent sucrose

 

Turbinado sugar. Raw sugar that has been partially refined and washed

 

 

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Awash in corn syrup

It should come as no shock to most consumers that a Pepsi or a Fig Newton has plenty of sugar - most of it from high fructose corn syrup. But what's surprising is the products where the sweetener hides out and how disguised it can be by the deceptively small serving size listed on the nutrition label. Although the numbers below show teaspoons of sugar per serving, people often eat more than one serving. The U.S. Department of Agriculture advises most people to limit themselves to 10 to 12 teaspoons of added sugars a day.

 

How much is too much?

 

The list below shows how much sugar, mostly in the form of high fructose corn syrup, is in each of these single servings.

 

Sunkist soda: 10 1/2 teaspoons of sugar

 

Berkeley Farms low-fat yogurt with fruit: 10 teaspoons of sugar

 

Mott's applesauce: 5 teaspoons of sugar

 

Slim-Fast chocolate cookie dough meal bar: 5 teaspoons of sugar

 

1 tablespoon ketchup: 1 teaspoon of sugar

 

Hansen's Super Vita orange-carrot Smoothie: 10 teaspoons of sugar

 

E-mail Kim Severson at kseverson####sfchronicle########.

 

 

 

Yet another article.. not from the SF Chronicle, though

 

The Murky World of High-Fructose Corn Syrup

By Linda Joyce Forristal, CCP, MTA

 

Think of sugar and you think of sugar cane or beets. Extraction of sugar from sugar cane spurred the colonization of the New World. Extraction of sugar from beets was developed during the time of Napoleon so that the French could have sugar in spite of the English trading blockade.

 

Nobody thinks of sugar when they see a field of corn. Most of us would be surprised to learn that the larger percentage of sweeteners used in processed food comes from corn, not sugar cane or beets.

 

The process for making the sweetener high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) out of corn was developed in the 1970s. Use of HFCS grew rapidly, from less than three million short tons in 1980 to almost 8 million short tons in 1995. During the late 1990s, use of sugar actually declined as it was eclipsed by HFCS. Today Americans consume more HFCS than sugar.

 

High-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) is produced by processing corn starch to yield glucose, and then processing the glucose to produce a high percentage of fructose. It all sounds rather simple--white cornstarch is turned into crystal clear syrup. However, the process is actually very complicated. Three different enzymes are needed to break down cornstarch, which is composed of chains of glucose molecules of almost infinite length, into the simple sugars glucose and fructose.

 

First, cornstarch is treated with alpha-amylase to produce shorter chains of sugars called polysaccharides. Alpha-amylase is industrially produced by a bacterium, usually Bacillus sp. It is purified and then shipped to HFCS manufacturers.

 

Next, an enzyme called glucoamylase breaks the sugar chains down even further to yield the simple sugar glucose. Unlike alpha-amylase, glucoamylase is produced by Aspergillus, a fungus, in a fermentation vat where one would likely see little balls of Aspergillus floating on the top.

 

The third enzyme, glucose-isomerase, is very expensive. It converts glucose to a mixture of about 42 percent fructose and 50-52 percent glucose with some other sugars mixed in. While alpha-amylase and glucoamylase are added directly to the slurry, pricey glucose-isomerase is packed into columns and the sugar mixture is then passed over it. Inexpensive alpha-amylase and glucoamylase are used only once, glucose-isomerase is reused until it loses most of its activity.

 

There are two more steps involved. First is a liquid chromatography step that takes the mixture to 90 percent fructose. Finally, this is back-blended with the original mixture to yield a final concentration of about 55 percent fructose--what the industry calls high fructose corn syrup.

 

HFCS has the exact same sweetness and taste as an equal amount of sucrose from cane or beet sugar but it is obviously much more complicated to make, involving vats of murky fermenting liquid, fungus and chemical tweaking, all of which take place in one of 16 chemical plants located in the Corn Belt. Yet in spite of all the special enzymes required, HFCS is actually cheaper than sugar. It is also very easy to transport--it's just piped into tanker trucks. This translates into lower costs and higher profits for food producers.

 

The development of the HFCS process came at an opportune time for corn growers. Refinements of the partial hydrogenation process had made it possible to get better shortenings and margarines out of soybeans than corn. HFCS took up the slack as demand for corn oil margarine declined. Lysine, an amino acid, can be produced from the corn residue after the glucose is removed. This is the modus operandi of the food conglomerates--break down commodities into their basic components and then put them back together again as processed food.

 

Today HFCS is used to sweeten jams, condiments like ketchup, and soft drinks. It is also a favorite ingredient in many so-called health foods. Four companies control 85 percent of the $2.6 billion business--Archer Daniels Midland, Cargill, Staley Manufacturing Co. and CPC International. In the mid-1990s, ADM was the object of an FBI probe into price fixing of three products--HFCS, citric acid and lysine--and consumers got a glimpse of the murky world of corporate manipulation.

 

There's a couple of other murky things that consumers should know about HFCS. According to a food technology expert, two of the enzymes used, alpha-amylase and glucose-isomerase, are genetically modified to make them more stable. Enzymes are actually very large proteins and through genetic modification specific amino acids in the enzymes are changed or replaced so the enzyme's "backbone" won't break down or unfold. This allows the industry to get the enzymes to higher temperatures before they become unstable.

 

Consumers trying to avoid genetically modified foods should avoid HFCS. It is almost certainly made from genetically modified corn and then it is processed with genetically modified enzymes. I've seen some estimates claiming that virtually everything--almost 80 percent--of what we eat today has been genetically modified at some point. Since the use of HFCS is so prevalent in processed foods, those figures may be right.

 

But there's another reason to avoid HFCS. Consumers may think that because it contains fructose--which they associate with fruit, which is a natural food--that it is healthier than sugar. A team of investigators at the USDA, led by Dr. Meira Field, has discovered that this just ain't so.

 

Sucrose is composed of glucose and fructose. When sugar is given to rats in high amounts, the rats develop multiple health problems, especially when the rats were deficient in certain nutrients, such as copper. The researchers wanted to know whether it was the fructose or the glucose moiety that was causing the problems. So they repeated their studies with two groups of rats, one given high amounts of glucose and one given high amounts of fructose. The glucose group was unaffected but the fructose group had disastrous results. The male rats did not reach adulthood. They had anemia, high cholesterol and heart hypertrophy--that means that their hearts enlarged until they exploded. They also had delayed testicular development. Dr. Field explains that fructose in combination with copper deficiency in the growing animal interferes with collagen production. (Copper deficiency, by the way, is widespread in America.) In a nutshell, the little bodies of the rats just fell apart. The females were not so affected, but they were unable to produce live young.

 

"The medical profession thinks fructose is better for diabetics than sugar," says Dr. Field, "but every cell in the body can metabolize glucose. However, all fructose must be metabolized in the liver. The livers of the rats on the high fructose diet looked like the livers of alcoholics, plugged with fat and cirrhotic."

 

HFCS contains more fructose than sugar and this fructose is more immediately available because it is not bound up in sucrose. Since the effects of fructose are most severe in the growing organism, we need to think carefully about what kind of sweeteners we give to our children. Fruit juices should be strictly avoided--they are very high in fructose--but so should anything with HFCS.

 

Interestingly, although HFCS is used in many products aimed at children, it is not used in baby formula, even though it would probably save the manufactueres a few pennies for each can. Do the formula makers know something they aren't telling us? Pretty murky!

 

 

 

[lindsay90 0]

Good job LK makes you want to make your own food from now on.

[little koshka 0]

Thanks!

 

The ban here in our house is going well.

 

A couple of things that can be helpful:

 

1. Read all labels. This should be easy, since we were all brought up to read labels to look for (and avoid) lard or animal shortening in crackers, cookies, etc.

 

2. Shop at places like Trader Joe's or Whole Foods Market when possible, they carry products that have natural sweeteners.

 

3. Purchase things that are not processed like fresh fruits and vegetables and make things from scratch when you can.

 

 

Next up - Sodium - It Too, Is Everywhere!