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How Much Sugar Can You Avoid
- Girlang 10y agoThere's a related factor -- don't be obese or overweight! Eliminating sugar is a good way to do this, but people who are non-obese and are aware of the total number of calorie they eat every day can enjoy everything--including "processed foods" with added sugar, and have as good health as is possible.
- ejcx 10y agoWhat's important to remember is that everything is okay in moderation. If you're looking to improve your health/diet then don't buy in to "good food", "bad food", "sugar is evil", etc mumbo-jumbo. Count your calories. Health articles usually make me really angry, and this one is no exception. I totally agree with what it says, though "that still lets you make good decisions".
- bluedino 10y agoThe article stresses that everyday foods can contain a ton of added sugar without people realizing it. So read the labels when you buy and evaluate all your options, there's more than just soda to keep your eyes out for.
- altoz 10y agoThe dinner choices were the worst. Where's steak or grilled chicken? Basically, the only meat options were a hamburger (with bun) or kosher hot dogs.
- thoughtsimple 10y agoPretty awful choices on everything but breakfast. Where are the whole foods. The only fresh fruit was blueberries with low fat yogurt and an apple listed twice.
- Filligree 10y agoIs this seriously the kind of food that Americans eat? If this is at all realistic, then I don't see why anyone is surprised at the obesity epidemic.
- acchow 10y agoNot all Americans. I think it probably also varies by income levels. I don't eat any of the foods on the "breakfast" or "lunch" tabs, and only 1 from the "snack" tab (apples). I make up for all that deficit by consuming a copious quantity of ice cream.
- lobotryas 10y agoIt's not, of course. But it takes a lot of awareness to eat well in the US, especially if you follow traditional nutrition advice such as that taught in most high schools (if you were lucky). Recently I had a friend complain about his weight so we went shopping for groceries together. After he loaded his cart with the usual stuff we went through the labels and he was shocked at bow many empty carbs and sugar he was eating (he had plenty of canned fruits, instant oatmeal, apple sauce, bananas and grapes, all stuff that's usually considered "healthy"). Helped him pick out some chicken, fish, vegetables, nuts and real cheese instead.
- hoorayimhelping 10y agoNo. I couldn't even enter my breakfast cause it didn't just have eggs, or eggs in butter.
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- skookum 10y agoThe article says "Challenge: Construct a day’s worth of eating, from items at a typical supermarket we visited, that meets the guidelines for added sugars." ... then proceeds to let the reader build meals entirely composed of brand name packaged foods. This article is a pointless straw man, unless the point is a covert attempt at making the reader realize they should skip the food with the brand names on it and eat real food instead... but that seems way too nuanced for the NY Times.
- brianwawok 10y ago8 packaged trash foods or an apple. I would literally die if those were my choices. You know how hard it is to get 2500 calories from apples?
- smallnamespace 10y agoAs someone who semi-regularly cooks, all the prepared food choices looked really unappetizing to me. It's easy to avoid added sugar if you make your own food: just don't dump sugar in while you cook. I think the bigger story here is that for most of human history, every single household cooked because it was the only economical way to feed yourself (restaurants have always been a luxury good). In the US, we've recently had this weird economic inversion where it's become cheaper to feed yourself off of junk food, so now cooking has become some sort of luxury good. Come to think of it, exercise has followed the same path. In the past, only the rich could avoid physical activity. Nowadays, it's rich people who can afford pricey gym passes and personal trainers while their poorer compatriots also work in a call center or some other sedentary setting.
- Nition 10y ago> It's become cheaper to feed yourself off of junk food Has it really though, or are people just drawn to the convenience?
- smallnamespace 10y agoIf by convenience, you include cooking time, then junk food is pretty cheap. A lot of working poor juggle multiple part-time jobs or the like (in families, sometimes both adults), so there's no stable schedule and no guarantee you'll have the time or energy to cook on any given day.
- yummyfajitas 10y agoMost poor are not working poor. Many of those that are working don't work that much. Here are the facts: http://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/working-poor/archive/a-profile-of-the-working-poor-2013.pdf http://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/working-poor/archive/a-profi... The less money you have, the more leisure time you have. That leisure time is just spent in front of the TV rather than working out in a park. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/atus.t11.htm https://www.bls.gov/news.release/atus.t11.htm
- zzxxccddeeffjj 10y agoThis is what happens when you let the spectrum of products stocked in a typical supermarket govern what's eligible for consumption. Such an article is thinly veiled marketing for food products IMHO. Eating well is _trivial_ once you learn to ignore the vast majority of what's outside the produce department of your grocery store. A simple approach is to treat everything on shelves with shelf life as trash, forget about it. But that's not what the massive food industry wants you to do.
- dang 10y agoPlease don't routinely create throwaway accounts. We ban those. HN is a community—anonymity is fine, but users should have some continuous identity that other users can relate to. Otherwise we might as well have no usernames and no community, and that would be an entirely different site.
- throwaway73828 10y agoMaybe if your user community wasn't brimming with pedantic assholes we wouldn't have to. No matter how much you ban us, dang, at least we'll always know we have you as an audience. You'll be reading my comments forever, dang.
- grzm 10y agoMaybe if your user community wasn't brimming with pedantic assholes we wouldn't have to. If this is your opinion of the community, why choose to participate in it?
- luckman212 10y agoDisgusting choices. I'm American (born and raised) and found almost nothing edible on any of the pages. As others have pointed out, this seems like a thinly-veiled fluff piece marketing prepared/packaged foods. I do indulge in a Snickers bar myself once in a while, but come on - can't we do better than salami on Wonder bread washed down with Coke for lunch?
- haddr 10y agoOrange juice for breakfast is really without added sugar?
- analog31 10y agoYes, but the juice itself is a sugar bomb.
- jschwartzi 10y agoWhat was really surprising is that there's sugar in every single deli meat. Even beef has sugar in it. It's still cheaper than an equivalent amount of beef jerky though. Speaking of jerky, I've noticed that cheaper brands are actually pork jerky.