How The Food Industry Is Sneaking Sugar Into Food

How The Food Industry Is Sneaking Sugar Into Your Food

Humans love sugar. Since the dawn of man we’ve been drawn to sugary foods as a simple form of energy, evolving to convert it to fat for times when food was scarce. An entire industry has risen up around sugar. We crave it. We’re literally addicted.

The presence of sugar alone isn’t bad for you. It occurs naturally in fruits, vegetables, dairy, some grains, and other unprocessed foods.

We’ve gone overboard though. The American Heart Association (AHA) recommends no more than 38 grams (150 calories) of added sugar per day for men and 25 grams (100 calories) per day for women. Guess what? A single 12-oz can of Coca-Cola has 140 calories of sugar.

Added sugar, or non-naturally occurring sugar, is the real culprit. According to Sugar Science, Americans eat 66 pounds of added sugar every year. This overload of sugar has led to an epidemic of obesity, heart disease, kidney disease, diabetes, and more.

It’s almost impossible to avoid sugar with the influence of the modern food industry. It’s too easy to make things more enticing by sneaking in some sugar, but does sugar by any other name taste as sweet? It sure does.

How about a vague scientific name?

Dextran
Dextrose
Diastatic malt
Diastase
D-ribose
Ethyl maltol
Galactose
Maltose
Maltodextrin

Or how about liquid sugar?

Mannose
Agave nectar
Blackstrap molasses
Brown rice syrup
Caramel
Carob syrup
Corn syrup or HFCS (A vague abbreviation of high-fructose corn syrup)
Golden syrup
Honey
Simple syrup (A common cocktail ingredient. One-part sugar, one-part water.)
Sorghum syrup
Malt syrup
Maple syrup

Or we could just add another word in front of sugar to make it seem better:

Barbados sugar
Beet sugar
Brown sugar
Castor sugar
Coconut palm sugar
Confectioner’s sugar
Date sugar
Demerara sugar
Golden sugar
Grape sugar
Invert sugar
Muscovado sugar
Turbinado sugar
Organic raw sugar (quick tip: Organic doesn’t always equal healthier)
Yellow sugar

And finally, the just plain weird:

Cane juice crystals
Evaporated cane juice
Florida crystals
Fruit juice concentrate (That’s right. All that remains when you remove the water from fruit is sugar.)
Panocha
Treacle

Whether it’s syrup, nectar, crystallized, or a vague chemical name, the food industry finds many ways to sugarcoat the amounts of sugar present.

How To Be Healthy In A Sugar-Filled World

Stick to whole, unprocessed foods whenever possible.
Check out the modern food pyramid. Harvard has refined the USDA’s “healthy eating plate” but states that theirs is “based exclusively on the best available science and was not subjected to political or commercial pressures from food industry lobbyists.”
Exercise. Burning calories will never go out of style. Whether you’re involved in a sport or have a regular running routine, focusing on your health will not only burn off those sugar calories, but make you more resistant to disease overall. So, strap on your running shoes and jump on the treadmill to get as far from those added sugars as you can.

Whatever you do, keep in mind the list above and remember: Just because it tastes good doesn’t mean it’s good for you.