I have one major vice -- I like soda pop. In particular, I like coca-cola.
In my personal consumption, I've switched from the corn-syrup sweetened version to the sugar-sweetened version, and after doing that I've noticed that I've lost weight. Same consumption, "same" product.
So then I read a report from princeton university that points that that rats fed the same number of calories in the form of corn syrup gain more weight than sugar-fed rats. And the industry is trying to change the name of the product (High Fructose corn syrup) to something shorter (Corn Syrup)...
Our american culture has consumed a lot of sugar for the last 100 years, and we haven't had the obesity problems that we now have. It's only in the last 20-30 years that our weight has ballooned. And my opinion is that corn syrup is the major cause of that gain. It's inescapable if you each any sort of processed food.
Mind you, I have nothing against eating corn direct. I like corn.
Yes, I quite agree with you and all you said. Our family went off of corn syrup in 2007 and haven't felt so good, kids and all. I've done a pretty good job of washing my kids brains in that they now are my helpers in checking for corn syrup in any form in foods. However, they do make an exception for corn syrup in the form of mashmallows when we camp.
ReplyDeleteI read a year or two ago that they are also wanting to change "corn syrup" to "corn sugar" and I am not sure if they got the gov't to go for it, however... we have occasionally seen the ingredient "corn sugar" in a few items.
Our family, too, lost weight from dropping corn syrup and also dropping additives and preservatives. Our skin got better, heartburn disappeared, lots of good things came of it. What we put into our bodies definitely makes a difference.
Where do you get a sugar sweetened version of Coca Cola???
ReplyDeleteUsually buy it at costco - 12oz glass bottles - but I've seen it at walmart and other stores in the area. It's marked "hecho en mexico" (made in mexico) and it's the only glass-bottled coke that I've seen for a while.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure if the corn syrup is truly causal or merely just a concurrent contributor. American weight gain and weight related conditions have been on the rise since post-WWII. In the post-WWII era, convenience foods replaced most traditional foods. Essentially, food went from a farm product to a manufacturing product. Corn syrup usage happens to coincide with a lot of other refined/processed foods. Eating food is better than eating food-like substances. But food-like-substances are generally cheaper. As the saying goes... 'You can have it good, fast or cheap. Choose any two.' Most Americans have chosen fast and cheap. And what we lack in quality, we make up for in quantity. Corn syrup certainly isn't great, but then again, neither are BHA, BHT, BVO, Aspartame and a host of other processed food additives.
ReplyDeleteThe customs peopel at Blain are also used to people bringing Flats of soda back across the border, if you are looking for something other than Coca Cola
ReplyDeleteCanadian coke is truly the Real thing, the recipe we had before new coke
I think that it is interesting that Pepsi has been experimenting with "retro" Pepsi and Mountain Dew. Frankly, they are doing a pretty poor job of marketing since the cans look like something that an elderly person would be interested in. I think that if they market it as a trendy, healthy alternative, it would sell better. But then, it would probably take away customers from their cash cow products. (That's probably the real reason why they look so bad!)
ReplyDelete@Nancy - Yes, the corn industry has been heavily promoting "corn sugar" despite not getting formal approval from the government. At present, HFCS, "corn syrup", and "corn sugar" all refer to different products when found on an ingredients label, but the industry is keen to muddy the waters by re-labeling HFCS just as it is getting a lot of bad press.
ReplyDeleteU.S. soda is made from high fructose corn syrup only because the U.S. has been manipulating the sugar market since the 1800s. Through a combination of government quotas and price guarantees to a small group of wealthy sugar growers in the south east, we Americans get to pay 4x the world price for sugar. This makes the (also subsidized) corn industry's HFCS product much more economically attractive. I suspect that the sugar-based Coca-Cola is made is Mexico specifically to access their cheaper sugar prices.
@Bill - I'd agree with you based on common sense, but rat studies like the one Bruce linked to show otherwise. HFCS (fructose and glucose) and table sugar (sucrose) both contain sugar compounds, but they are really different molecules and can trigger different metabolic responses in the human body. While existing research has not conclusively provided the negative impact of HFCS, if I was going to cut back on sweeteners I'd start with the one that was invented in 1957 vs the one that's been in the human diet for thousands of years.