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High fructose corn syrup rebranded as 'corn sugar'
- tptacek 16y agoAnd? Sugar is what's bad for you. The "high fructose" in HFCS is "high" relative to other corn syrup; table sugar breaks down into glucose and fructose during digestion. "Big Corn" is probably right, here; "HFCS" is a misleading term (for one thing, it doesn't mean anything --- different HFCS blends have wildly different amounts of fructose), and more importantly, the notion that it's just "the bad kind of sugar" that's hurting people is dangerous. What is it with health reporting on the Huffington Post, anyways?
- nimai 16y agoFructose has proven to be particularly harmful - your liver shuts down while it's being processed, leading to all sorts of fun side effects. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fructose#Liver_disease http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fructose#Liver_disease
- tptacek 16y agoAnd, like I just said, table sugar breaks down into fructose during digestion, and "HFCS" isn't "HF" compared to "all other sweeteners"; it's "HF" compared to plain corn syrup, which is unpalatable. HFCS alarmism is knee-jerk wishful thinking from people who want to blame some boogeyman industrial process for all the nation's health problems. The problem is our addiction to sweetness. HFCS obviously abets this by making it cheaper to sweeten things, but get rid of HFCS and it'll just get replaced with some other sugar. Sugar is bad for you. http://www.ama-assn.org/ama1/pub/upload/mm/443/csaph3a08-summary.pdf http://www.ama-assn.org/ama1/pub/upload/mm/443/csaph3a08-sum... - The primary difference is that these monosaccharides exist free in solution in HFCS, but in disaccharide form in sucrose. The disaccharide sucrose is easily cleaved in the small intestine, so free fructose and glucose are absorbed from both sucrose and HFCS.
- CWuestefeld 16y agoAs I understand it, the complaint isn't over the "H" part, but the 'F'. Obviously nothing is going to be "higher" sugar than a spoonful of, um, sugar (setting aside issues of density). But I'd point out that you've taken a page from the corn industry and edited your previous words. You had said earlier "table sugar breaks down into glucose and fructose during digestion", but revised that to "table sugar breaks down into fructose during digestion". The controversy here is that (AFAIK) HFCS is all, or much more, fructose than glucuse, relative to table sugar; how does the body react to the difference between fructose and glucose?
- tptacek 16y agoThat last sentence is false. HFCS is not "much more" fructose than glucose relative to table sugar. It's "much more" fructose than other sugars relative to unpalatable plain corn syrup. Table sugar is metabolized very similarly to HFCS, with very similar (some sources would say nearly identical) fructose loads. The difference is that HFCS contains free-floating fructose, and sucrose is a disaccharide (of glucose and fructose) that is very quickly broken into plain 'ol glucose and fructose as soon as it hits your digestive system. 'carbocation may jump in here to set me straight (I'd be surprised but happy to have learned something), but my understanding here is that there is nothing more healthful about plain table sugar than HFCS. They are both very bad for you in the same way.
- Xurinos 16y agoThe way I learned it from the nice professor in the video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM) was simply: fructose = bad, poison glucose = good sucrose = fructose + glucose, unsafe because the composition preserves the fructose portion HFCS = 25% fructose, not as bad as sucrose (IIRC) Mitigate fructose intake with fiber. apple juice = bad, but apple = good because of the fiber countering the effect of the poison at a higher point in our internal food processing chain. I noticed you were getting downvotes, and I suspect it is because of the general "Sugar is bad for you" statement, which is -- as far as the studies go -- half correct. The rest of your text makes the distinction, so I hope it is not wholly ignored. HFCS is a scapegoat, as you point out, and it would help if we focused on the one part that is important: fructose is poison. And it can be mitigated with fiber. But that's just what I learned from some video. One thing that always bugged me: glucose is known commonly as "grape sugar". Do grapes have fructose? Without any fructose added, is grape juice a healthy fruit juice?
- mambodog 16y agoA study by UC Davis also found that fructose causes more intra-abdominal fat buildup (around the organs) relative to glucose. Apparently also causes man-boobs. The paper: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2673878/?tool=pubmed http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2673878/?tool=pu... highlights: http://heartscanblog.blogspot.com/2009/07/goodbye-fructose.html http://heartscanblog.blogspot.com/2009/07/goodbye-fructose.h...
- ajscherer 16y agoWhile I agree with you about HFCS, it does strike me as slimy to rename a product in order to trick people specifically trying to avoid that product into continuing to consume it.
- tptacek 16y agoThey're rebranding it to "sugar". Good for them. Sugar is the problem. Singling out HFCS actually does everyone a disservice, by making them think that if they just seek out "HFCS-free" foods they'll be fine. No they won't.
- lftl 16y agoIn my practical experience at the grocery store, avoiding HFCS will at least accidentally lead you to a lower sugar diet. This is mostly due to the fact that at a typical grocery store you won't be able to find many of the more processed goods that don't have HFCS in it (there is literally 1 brand of bread out of 10-15 at the local Publix without HFCS), so you'll basically be forced to buy more raw vegetables, fruits, meats, etc.
- Goladus 16y agoI thought this too, until I read this: http://www.princeton.edu/main/news/archive/S26/91/22K07/ http://www.princeton.edu/main/news/archive/S26/91/22K07/ A Princeton University research team has demonstrated that all sweeteners are not equal when it comes to weight gain: Rats with access to high-fructose corn syrup gained significantly more weight than those with access to table sugar, even when their overall caloric intake was the same.
- nopassrecover 16y agoAnd yet, assuming the mice on table sugar weren't more hyped up than those on HCFS, we still perpetuate the leaky abstraction of calories in, calories out.
- tptacek 16y ago
- kiuyhjk 16y agoI thought the "High Fructose" was an earlier attempt to make it sound good to the consumer. Fructose = fruit, fruit = good, therefore "High Fructose" = good
- RyanMcGreal 16y agoMaybe, but the consumers have adapted.
- Goladus 16y agoSo, it should be labelled what it actually is, not rebranded to something more broad and misleading. HCFS-55 or HCFS-42 or HCFS-90, or whatever.
- gte910h 16y agoActually all HFCS is HFCS-90 mixed with pure glucose corn syrup, I'd prefer they just listed them as separate ingredients (as they do with "Milk Chocolate" and the like).
- tptacek 16y agoOk, can we label cane sugar as "CS-50" then? Labeling so people can pay attention to the amount of fructose they're metabolizing seems like a good thing. Setting up a system that gives a free pass to anything that doesn't start with "HFCS" seems like a very bad thing.
- gte910h 16y agoWhile sugar is bad for you, there is some evidence that corn syrup is especially so. Not conclusive yet, but enough that some cautious souls are avoiding it. In the vein of truth in labeling, I think the goods should be well enough labelled that is possible.
- technomancy 16y agoNot everyone avoids HFCS because of health reasons; some of us avoid it because it tastes like shit.
- m0nastic 16y agoWe avoid it because my girlfriend is allergic to it; which seriously limits what foods we can buy from the store.
- dangrossman 16y agoI don't understand how that's even possible. Is she also allergic to all fruit and most vegetables?
- m0nastic 16y agoYeah, I don't know how it works. She's actually also allergic to Canola oil, so she's basically a walking litmus test for packaged foods. She's not allergic to any fruit, but is allergic to potatoes and onions (which made bringing her home to meet my Irish family an interesting experience). Oh, and beef and dairy.
- gxti 16y agoIndeed, HFCS and sugar are biologically equivalent. The problem is that since it became available it is being put in everything as a substitute for real flavor. People are more likely to buy products that "taste better" when really it's just saturated with sugar.
- patrickgzill 16y agoWhat bothers me more is the possible presence of mercury in HFCS, as tested by Consumer Reports: http://blogs.consumerreports.org/health/2009/01/mercury-in-high-fructose-corn-syrup.html http://blogs.consumerreports.org/health/2009/01/mercury-in-h... (Mercury is really bad for you, of course.) Also of note: HFCS is even found in whole wheat bread at my local grocery store, which seems quite odd. I can understand saving money by using HFCS over sugar in a sugar-laden soft drink, but the few grams of sugar needed to get the yeast going?!
- Tangurena 16y agoTrying to eliminate what I consider "bad" foods from my diet is becoming harder as the producers change the name. I really don't care if it has been proved beyond a shadow of a doubt to be bad - because that process took over 100 years for tobacco. I want X out of my life, I should be allowed to detect items containing X.
- araneae 16y agoYou eat tons of things every day that are equivalent to X without realizing it. Would you shy away from foods that have list of ingredients that included fructose and glucose? That's all corn syrup is (and a few random corn solids here and there.) Apples have a really high fructose content too, so technically drinking apple juice can be worse than drinking a dilute corn syrup solution (depending on the kind of HFCS), but almost no one thinks twice about that because it's "natural." (Although there is a growing anti-juice movement.) Data from Wikipedia (remaining content is glucose): HFCS90: 90% Fructose Apple Juice: 63-78% Fructose HFCS55: 55% Fructose HFCS43: 43% Fructose
- Tangurena 16y agoMaybe I'm Jewish and I want to keep kosher. Maybe I'm not. It is my decision what goes into my body. Not yours. Not some company's. There are a lot of foods I don't eat anymore. I happen to love chocolate. But I don't want to eat chocolate with PGPR in it, therefore I don't purchase Hershey's anymore. Is PGPR "bad" for me? Umm, no. When you were a child, you had (and ate) "wax lips" which are PGPR with some color added. It doesn't belong in my chocolate, therefore I refuse to eat it, and refuse to purchase foods with PGPR
- araneae 16y ago>It doesn't belong in my chocolate, therefore I refuse to eat it, and refuse to purchase foods with PGPR You're weird. Chocolate originally comes in bean form; some brilliant South Americans got the idea to grind it up with sugar and water and drink it. Chocolate in solid form is a pretty damn new idea and hardly even counts as a food; it's a pretty weird concoction to be a "purist" about. Where does your platonic idea of chocolate come from? I have a few friends that keep pretty strict kosher, and I think they're weird too. But at least I can get a handle on it because it's written in book they feel like following the rules of. I don't really understand this extreme fetishism we have for what we eat that people pull out of their anal area.
- wccrawford 16y agoGood. Now that it's easier to say, maybe it'll be easier to get people to rally against it.
- MartinCron 16y agoBack when I was in Business School, I did some strategic analysis role-modeling as if I were in charge of Monsanto. At the time, Monsanto was best known for the "terminator gene", suing farmers allegedly stealing their agricultural IP, and BT corn that killed monarch butterflies. I suggested that they change their name as the first part of their strategy to turn over a new leaf in both PR as well as core business activity. My peers mocked me, saying that no big evil corporation would be so brazen as to just change their name to clean up their brand, as their critics would see right through it. The very next week, Philip Morris rebranded itself to Altria.
- poutine 16y agoIt's a good strategy. Interestingly Blackwater changed their name to Xe to try and shake off the bad image. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwater_Worldwide http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwater_Worldwide Still a nasty organization, name change or not.
- hyperbovine 16y agoI think the trick is in choosing a new name that actually sounds nicer than the old one, and not that of an alien overlord.
- poutine 16y agoWell, they are mercenaries after all... I half suspect they picked a difficult to pronounce name so nobody would talk about them.
- gojomo 16y agoNeither of the names are PR gold. 'Blackwater' is the plumber's term for sewage. 'Xe' sounds alien or like a B-movie villain accent: "We have xe plans, nothing will prevent xe final solution now!"
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- MartinCron 16y agoThe grammar geek in me likes the parallel construction between "corn sugar" and "cane sugar". No matter what they call it, I will still prefer the taste of my imported Mexican Coke made with cane sugar.
- gruseom 16y agoWow, you know what, I bet that's exactly why they picked the name. "Corn syrup" and "cane sugar" are comfortable and familiar. What could fit in with those better than "corn sugar"? One has to make a cognitive effort to distinguish them, and people don't make that kind of cognitive effort very often. This is brilliant marketing. The tobacco industry must be green with envy.
- nopassrecover 16y agoJust like distinguishing baking soda from baking powder.
- philwelch 16y agoHave you ever eaten something baked by someone who missed that distinction? It is an unpleasant experience.
- blackguardx 16y agoBaking powder has baking soda as an ingredient.
- zbanks 16y agoBaking soda = sodium bicarbonate = a base Baking powder = a base + a (dry) acid (+ an anti-caking agent) Baking soda lowers acidity of foods. Baking powder, however, will create air bubbles whenever exposed to moisture. ("Double-acting" versions create a second wave of bubbles after being heated to around 150F. This is actually kind of a Big Deal.)
- tlrobinson 16y agoCompletely agree on the Mexican Coke.
- warfangle 16y agoI don't eat HFCS because of semi-dubious claims as to health. I don't eat HFCS because I refuse to help the industry that is most to blame for the algae bloom in the Gulf, and I don't believe that government subsidies should be what makes a given industry profitable (outside, say, weapons research, development, and manufacture - but that's an entirely different can of worms that I oppose on an entirely different reasoning).
- jcl 16y ago(I guess you mean "I don't not eat HFCS..." in the first sentence. Substituting "avoid" for "don't eat" might be clearer.)
- mdasen 16y agoPersonally, I'd like to see Sugar Alcohols get more widely used (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugar_alcohol http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sugar_alcohol). Sugar alcohols are not metabolized by oral bacteria so they're much better for dental health (and used in many chewing gums today such as Trident). They also have fewer calories and are metabolized slower by the body. That means there's less chance that they'll contribute to obesity (fewer calories) and they have a lower impact on the body's blood sugar levels (with a low glycemic index due to the way it's slowly metabolized). I'm guessing the reason that they're not widely used would be cost and difficulty. Still, if we could figure out a way to produce sugar alcohols cheaply, we could keep our sweet food while having a meaningful and scientifically proven positive impact on our bodies.
- rbranson 16y agoSugar alcohols create a cooling sensation on the tongue, so they aren't appropriate for everything. They've also got somewhat of a stigma from causing digestive problems. Erythritol, which doesn't cause digestive problems, is starting to gain popularity though.
- marknutter 16y agoWhat's the big deal? If people are being "hurt" by HFCS or "Corn Sugar" or whatever you want to call it, then they can avoid eating it - it says right on the label what's in the food. If you drank 10 beers a day it'd probably be harmful as well. We shouldn't be focusing on the "evil" companies, we should be focusing on ourselves and our own diets. We allowed these "evil" companies to grow this big in the first place by willingly and eagerly buying their HFCS saturated products. (Not that HuffPost said companies are "evil" but that's the commonly held belief among HuffPost readers)
- Parabola 16y agoIf HFCS as produced in sodas is the same thing, why does it make sodas taste significantly different?
- lookACamel 16y agoAccoding to wikipedia, honey is about 38% fructose and 30% glucose. HFCS 55 (mostly used in soft drinks), approximately 55% fructose and 42% glucose. Why aren't people rally against honey? Because it's "natural".