High-Fructose Corn Syrup: Safe as sugar?

One way or the other, the whole routine of putting sugar in a high proportion of packaged foods is problematic. I luckily lost a lot of my sugar craving over the years and now I can hardly understand it... at the same time I remember it.

I did go crazy yesterday and have "dutch babies" with maple syrup.. but that syrup has been in the fridge for probably a year and a half.

What am I getting at.. I think sugar craving feeds more sugar craving. I won't go so far as to call it addictive, but I do remember myself in some kind of salty snack-sugar treat-salty snack cycle, with the odd meat or vegetable in between.
Once I got out of that, it's gone..
well, mostly. (I still love potato chips, but I don't buy them. )

I think that's the crux of it. It's feeding and encouraging a sugar addiction. Plus a salt addiction. Consider the flavors of foods. The real flavors of real foods. And then consider all the crap that's added to them in packaging, all in the name of ... what, exactly? It's not to preserve it because there are other preservatives for that.

So what's it for? Could it be -- a lack of imagination on the part of the manufacturers? A bad taste desire among enough people so as to make this stuff profitable? I don't claim to never, ever eat processed stuff. I eat plenty of it. But I eat far, far less of it these days and I'm a lot happier and lighter these days. Sugar and salt, sugar and salt. There are other things in the world.

We are a fatter country than we ever have been, and we're getting fatter. We have a serious dependence on foreign oil (used in making, among other things, plastic packaging and takeout boxes). We have serious trash issues with non-biodegradable waste (more plastic packaging). We've had issues with imported food safety, too. Heart attack, anyone? How about a nice stroke instead? Or is cancer the preferred means of self-destruction?

So how about eating better? How about grabbing a skillet and a saucepan and cooking every now and then? How about replacing yesterday's Big Mac or packaged Rice-a-Roni or Little Debbie cake with skinless chicken breast, brown rice made at home, a salad and a side of asparagus, and fruit and real ice cream (in moderation) for dessert? These are not difficult things to make, and they allow for indulgences. They don't take forever (heck, waiting for takeout or delivery can often take longer than cooking) and cleanup is not hard if you use a little nonstick spray or olive oil.

The more I see of manufactured, processed foods, the more they make me shudder, and the more I shrink away from them. And then I shrink more. Coincidence? I think not.

I could not agree more.

One other thing I am noticing..

i people watch. To a point of insanity sometimes.. but when I go grocery shopping, if I can, I like to look in peoples carts first. Before making a decision.

To me, it is like peeking in someones kitchen, or recipie book then oooohhhing and aaaahhing at thier creativity... taking that idea and running with it.

One thing I am learning quickly is that the 'poorer' shoppers cart is FULL to the brim of cheap, super processed foods. Canned foods, macaroni, 79 cent packages of hot dogs. 80 cent loaves of bread....you name it.
And not a one fresh food. Well.. I can almost always guarantee seeing a bag of white potatoes and a bag of carrots. Not even a cheap head of iceburg lettuce .

The richer persons cart can have processed foods in it as well.. But there are two types of 'rich shopper' .
The fresh shopper-
more fruits, more handmade bakery breads, more green things, and more fruit then you SHOULD eat in a week. One or two packaged foods usually placed at the end of the cart.. like a siren... and frozen foods galore. Its almost as if they went from veggie section, to frozen section with out a care.

Then there is the other type of rich shopper -
meat, and more meat, and big cuts of meat, frozen items and a few veggies on top. A packaged flavoring of some kind, milk, and off they go.

granted.. I dont have any way of knowing if these people are TRULY rich so dont take that statement literally. What i mean when I say rich and poor is that it is obvious the poor person is shopping on little money. It can be assumed that the other person ( the rich) is not. They dont seem to notice prices, quantity nor do they have a list. They seem to just walk around and put stuff in. Again.. may not be 'rich' but you get the idea.


Of these three shoppers, you know who is the fattest? Who appears to have the most health issues? Whos children are over weight?

The poor shopper.

more often then not, the poor shopper who only earns enough money to feed thier family for a day or two at a time HAS TO buy the packaged foods. It becomes about quantity instead of quality because their money is so thin.
They can not afford the fruits and veggies they should eat..... 2.00 a lb for a head of broccoli? Sheesh. One head of broccoli wont feed three people. So you have to get several just to make one meal... and that is.. ehh lets say.. 6 bucks.
When those savy shoppers know, they can take 6 bucks, get a cheap bag of pasta, 2 - 50 cent cans of tomatos, 1/2 lb of 80/20 meat and cheap oily cheese and make enough food for three WITH left overs.

savvy , poor shoppers may get over at the cash register, but they are the ones suffering the most from this processed food crap. And it is unfair.

I don't do it for others, but whenever I get to the checkout and lay all my purchases out, I wonder what a watcher would think. Ice cream, beer, hot sauce, apples, asparagus, and a light bulb. Hmmmm.

One other thing, about poor shoppers. I agree that they get the short end of the stick on groceries. If they are shopping in their own neighborhood, chances are they don't have access to very much fresh food anyway. They probably take a bus or two just to get to grocery that has affordable produce. Then they can't buy anything refrigerated without the risk of it going sour or melting while they wait in the hot sun for the bus to take them back. Ok, I'm generalizing, but I see these people every single day.

There are also a lot of people with strained finances in neighborhoods rated as 'good' or 'so so'. One can eat adequately on a spare budget, but that takes a lot of shopping know how, and does have a bottom line with no money. It also takes an ability to hang in there with not a full range of food choices.

I remember hearing that beans and rice as a combo was a perfect food... an exaggeration in that I'm guessing one needs some other nutrients, but.. a lot of people live on that, or something similar, as a basic diet. Hard for many or most people in the US to get used to what would seem a monotonous diet.

We should cook together some time.

It's also interesting, not just the carts or the aisles and the people in them, but also when people seem to go against type. Family types are in produce; students in the snack aisle. And often I'm the only person at the fish counter.

When I was a kid, I used to put sugar on bread to eat it like candy; I was immediately hooked.

More advertising that makes me go grrr:

That's got to be a joke. Did you pull that off the Onion?

I was in Costco one day and this "woman" starts giggling to whoever was with her - I probably shouldn't be doing this, but he loves it! She had a coke with a straw and was giving her baby some coke with the straw.

No, but I agree on closer inspection of the small text there that it absolutely has to be a joke.



I have been humbugged!

From my readings about HFCS and sugar, they are all bad. Moderation is the key to good health.

looking for vigor and drive?
a marvelous beverage healthful as a winter wind?






(more vintage beverage ads here

Just wanted you to know that there is a happy ending to my search for yogurt that is yummy without hfcs. I got plain yogurt and put simply fruit - blueberry in it...probably only a tsp full...and it was very yummy - one of you told me to do that and it was a great idea. Not as yummy as the other - but I bet I get to a point where I like it better. It is very good though.

The fruit in yogurt reco came from hamburger - the only thing better is mrs. hamburger's homemade preserves in/on yogurt. Yum.

I think if you try a couple of different plain yogurts, you'll find one that has a mouthfeel you really like - once you add fruit to the right yogurt (for you), you'll think it's at least as good as pre-mixed.

Thank you Hamburger (thanks for letting me know Beth - wee bit lazy huh?) It is good -

I just bought an organic one the other day(well 0 my Mom did) that is new to me...I am looking forward to trying it

So, from Marion Nestle, I gather a respected nutritionist ---

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/09/24/FDDS12UH12.DTL

That's a good read Osso - thank you

I thought it was a good read too. I've read her before on other issues, but fairly sporadically. Now I think I might google some of her other columns at the SFChronicle (SFGate.com)