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The two big ones are high fructose corn syrup and alcohol. I feel the hfcs is the bigger issue here because it is put in everything in the US, but moderating

The two big ones are high fructose corn syrup and alcohol. I feel the hfcs is the bigger issue here because it is put in everything in the US, but moderating both of these will help. Look at labels and put back anything with hfcs. https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/how-high-fructose-intake-may-trigger-fatty-liver-disease https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/how-hig... https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6549781/ https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6549781/

crazygringo 1y ago
HFCS isn't any meaningfully different from sugar. It's basically chemically the same as honey. And no, they don't put it in everything. It's in soda and certain sweets (obviously) and sweet sauces, but it's not like it's creeping into unexpected places in some huge way. Yes, there may be foods with a hint of sweetness that have a hint of HFCS, but then it's a negligible amount anyways. HFCS isn't some kind of bogeyman. It's essentially just sugar. Treat it accordingly.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
- chris_va 1y ago
  Fructose is processed by the body quite differently than sucrose, in a way quite relevant here. And actually one of humanity's major evolutionary advances.
  - eurleif 1y ago
    HFCS is typically 42:58 or 55:45 fructose:glucose. Table sugar is 50:50. HFCS is only "high fructose" relative to unprocessed corn syrup, not relative to table sugar and other common sweeteners.
    - Tallain 1y ago
      A small difference at small levels but one which obviously matters when it's shoved into countless foods without most people event realizing. It's not just in soda and candy; it's in bread, pasta, almost any processed food (crackers, ketchups and other sauces, canned fruit, applesauce, lunch meat, peanut butter, the list goes on) and many foods one might not considered processed. It makes sense to try to eliminate it even though it's "only" a small difference. Might as well remove the difference at all and look out for things with no HFCS shoved in it for no reason.
      - nradov 1y ago
        Plain pasta almost never contains any HFCS. Maybe you can find some that does but that's not what most people are buying in their local grocery store. (The sauce is often a different story.)
        Tallain 1y ago
        Fair - I went back and re-edited enough times my original message got jumbled, and I had been thinking of pasta dishes you could buy, which almost invariably have HFCS, but absolutely correct plain pasta pretty much never does.
        crazygringo 1y ago
        The point is, it doesn't matter if your ketchup is made with sugar or HFCS. If it weren't HFCS, it would be sugar, because ketchup is supposed to be sweet, and they have the same nutritional effect. Similarly, it's not suprising when pasta sauce has some sweetness added -- grandma also likely added a bit of sugar if she found tomatoes too acidic, which many do. The only thing that matters is that it's sugar. HFCS isn't somehow worse. If you're trying to eliminate sugar overall then sure, of course avoid HFCS. But if you're fine with a certain moderate amount of sugar per day, then the relatively small amounts of HFCS in things like pasta sauce and peanut butter are fine. The same way the sugar or honey in teriyaki sauces is. They count towards your daily allotment of sugar. For people trying to eat relatively healthily, avoid the soda but there's no reason to worry about the HFCS in ketchup or normal amounts of tomato sauce, for goodness' sake. The only reason to avoid HFCS entirely is if you're truly cutting sugar out of your diet entirely. Otherwise they're just substitutes for practical nutritional purposes.
- hxorr 1y ago
  This is wrong. As another commentator pointed out,the body processes fructose differently from sucrose. As for honey (and fruit, for that matter) - they are full of beneficial compounds that help your body regulate blood sugar. To illustrate this, someone I know of with type I diabetes who ate natural honey didn't need to inject as much insulin as when eating commercially processed/heated honey - those beneficial compounds are destroyed during the process. Same for fruit vs fruit juice...
  - ianburrell 1y ago
    Sucrose is glucose-fructose, and is easily split. My understanding is that it is all split by digestion. The glucose and fructose than act the same as glucose and fructose from HFCS.
  - SlowTao 1y ago
    I cannot find the study at the moment (Google you used to be great at this!) but there was one seeing how diabetics blood sugar was impacted from just fruit consumption. Got to the point where even at 20 serves per day (4 times the recommended) in most people it didnt cause an issue. Bundling that sugar with fiber was a big part of regulating sugars. Corn syrup might or not be different, Im no expert in that field, but simply having highly refined sugars without the filler is monocropping your diet in weird ways. In the same way soil is being killed by mono cropped agricuture, we are doing the same with our gut biome. The flow on impacts are still being discovered.
- tryasimight 1y ago
  [dead]

crazygringo 1y ago

HFCS isn't any meaningfully different from sugar. It's basically chemically the same as honey. And no, they don't put it in everything. It's in soda and certain sweets (obviously) and sweet sauces, but it's not like it's creeping into unexpected places in some huge way. Yes, there may be foods with a hint of sweetness that have a hint of HFCS, but then it's a negligible amount anyways. HFCS isn't some kind of bogeyman. It's essentially just sugar. Treat it accordingly.

deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
chris_va 1y ago
Fructose is processed by the body quite differently than sucrose, in a way quite relevant here. And actually one of humanity's major evolutionary advances.
- eurleif 1y ago
  HFCS is typically 42:58 or 55:45 fructose:glucose. Table sugar is 50:50. HFCS is only "high fructose" relative to unprocessed corn syrup, not relative to table sugar and other common sweeteners.
  - Tallain 1y ago
    A small difference at small levels but one which obviously matters when it's shoved into countless foods without most people event realizing. It's not just in soda and candy; it's in bread, pasta, almost any processed food (crackers, ketchups and other sauces, canned fruit, applesauce, lunch meat, peanut butter, the list goes on) and many foods one might not considered processed. It makes sense to try to eliminate it even though it's "only" a small difference. Might as well remove the difference at all and look out for things with no HFCS shoved in it for no reason.
    - nradov 1y ago
      Plain pasta almost never contains any HFCS. Maybe you can find some that does but that's not what most people are buying in their local grocery store. (The sauce is often a different story.)
      - Tallain 1y ago
        Fair - I went back and re-edited enough times my original message got jumbled, and I had been thinking of pasta dishes you could buy, which almost invariably have HFCS, but absolutely correct plain pasta pretty much never does.
        crazygringo 1y ago
        The point is, it doesn't matter if your ketchup is made with sugar or HFCS. If it weren't HFCS, it would be sugar, because ketchup is supposed to be sweet, and they have the same nutritional effect. Similarly, it's not suprising when pasta sauce has some sweetness added -- grandma also likely added a bit of sugar if she found tomatoes too acidic, which many do. The only thing that matters is that it's sugar. HFCS isn't somehow worse. If you're trying to eliminate sugar overall then sure, of course avoid HFCS. But if you're fine with a certain moderate amount of sugar per day, then the relatively small amounts of HFCS in things like pasta sauce and peanut butter are fine. The same way the sugar or honey in teriyaki sauces is. They count towards your daily allotment of sugar. For people trying to eat relatively healthily, avoid the soda but there's no reason to worry about the HFCS in ketchup or normal amounts of tomato sauce, for goodness' sake. The only reason to avoid HFCS entirely is if you're truly cutting sugar out of your diet entirely. Otherwise they're just substitutes for practical nutritional purposes.
hxorr 1y ago
This is wrong. As another commentator pointed out,the body processes fructose differently from sucrose. As for honey (and fruit, for that matter) - they are full of beneficial compounds that help your body regulate blood sugar. To illustrate this, someone I know of with type I diabetes who ate natural honey didn't need to inject as much insulin as when eating commercially processed/heated honey - those beneficial compounds are destroyed during the process. Same for fruit vs fruit juice...
- ianburrell 1y ago
  Sucrose is glucose-fructose, and is easily split. My understanding is that it is all split by digestion. The glucose and fructose than act the same as glucose and fructose from HFCS.
- SlowTao 1y ago
  I cannot find the study at the moment (Google you used to be great at this!) but there was one seeing how diabetics blood sugar was impacted from just fruit consumption. Got to the point where even at 20 serves per day (4 times the recommended) in most people it didnt cause an issue. Bundling that sugar with fiber was a big part of regulating sugars. Corn syrup might or not be different, Im no expert in that field, but simply having highly refined sugars without the filler is monocropping your diet in weird ways. In the same way soil is being killed by mono cropped agricuture, we are doing the same with our gut biome. The flow on impacts are still being discovered.
tryasimight 1y ago
[dead]