Sugar in food

If you eat a high protein meal of egg and bacon and toast and marmalade, the marmalade will give you a quick boost, whilst the protein will sustain you for longer.

Nothing wrong with that. Especially if the bread is wholemeal to give you complex carbs and fibre.

Nothing wrong with that..

I do not believe that a reasonable intake of sugar will give you cancer or arthritis. Both those diseases are likely to be due to genetics, or more harmful substances such as tobacco and alcohol. And ageing.

What you are talking about, Jingle, is the glycaemic load of a meal. Even diabetics need fast acting carbohydrate if they are having a hypo.
Most of the research into fructose has been undertaken in the USA, where they eat nearly 25kg. of added high fructose corn syrup per person per year. In this country we eat less than 0.5kg. per person per year.
Fructose gets broken down into glucose in the liver. It only gets converted to triglycerides, or fat, if you are fructose intolerant. Most people are not. Diabetesuk.org will tell you all about this.

Yes. I know about the glyceamic index. Grapes are better than grape juice as they release energy at a slower rate.

And so all the codswallop advice goes on coming. Ad infinitum. What would we do without the experts.

And we, each of us, think we know more than everyone else. Because we have all been suckers and bought the books.

You don't need the instant energy to 'get you going' unless you're a poorly managed diabetic and have become hypoglycaemic.
If you're not diabetic, your body is pretty good at maintaining blood sugar levels by burning your fat stores when necessary

Oh good grief I have just seen all your other posts now jingl
I'll read them and if I still have the will to live will comment further.

Cancer is a multi-factorial disease jingl, and not eating excessive amount of refined carbohydrates is just one way of modifying your risk.

This is a digest rather than a scholarly article, but it is of a higher standard than the average newspaper or magazine article.
www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130201100149.htm

In case you can't be bothered to read it, this is the first paragraph:
Sugars are needed to provide us with energy and in moderate amounts contribute to our well-being. Sustained high levels of sugars, as is found in diabetics, damages our cells and now is shown that can also increase our chance to get cancer: The dose makes the poison as Paracelsus said.

The last sentence is particularly apposite I think.

And here is another quote:
Colin Goding, Professor of Oncology at the University of Oxford, UK said 'Previously we were unsure about how increased blood sugar found in diabetes and obesity could increase cancer risk. This study identifies a key molecular mechanism through which high blood glucose would predispose to cancer.

I'm sure you know best jane. Forgive me if I don't read all your scholarly articles and, no doubt lengthy, posts. The sun is shining and my porridge (with a tiny bit of golden syrup ) awaits.

Off to a nice country pub later where we will all have a hopefully well balanced roast dinner, which will definitely include a pud!

It's amazing how common sense has so far seen me through to a healthy seventytwo years of age.

I would just say - don't cut out all the harmless little pleasures in life.

Moderation is the keyword.

Actually jane the paragraph you have posted agrees totally with my posts! When did I say anything about eating sugar to excess?

(changed my mind about brekker btw. Had Waitrose Essential Marmalade with Ginger on seedy bread toast. Sooo delicious!!! ) It has broken my nighttime fast beautifully and I can feel the old blood sugar regaining a lovely level.

I am very thankful I have neither diabetes or obesity.

I think I agree with jingles - enjoy a balanced diet which includes some sugary pleasures but don't overdo it. If you get to 72 you must be doing something right. The trouble with all this diet advice is that it seems to change with alarming speed. It seems like common sense to eat everything in moderation.

Maple syrup is a great natural sweetener for porridge and many other things! Expensive (make sure it's pure maple syrup, not maple flavoured syrup) but truly scrumptious!

Thanks for the tip, Silverfoxette.

My point in raising this issue was concern over how much hidden extra unnecessary sugar goes into everyday foods, usually processed or packaged and ready made things like bottled sauces, ready meals, breakfast cereals, cakes and biscuits, sweets, snacks and cans of drink etc. This has come about since the last war and post rationing (noticeably sugar and sweet rationing) and you only have to see the rise in obesity, diabetes and other related diseases to make a sensible connection. I'm not suggesting everyone give up on the simple pleasures of life but wouldn't it be sensible to be aware of what we are putting into our mouths?

You are so right. Virtually all packaged food seems to have some sugar added, even very savoury things. I have made a concerted effort to cut down on sugar as there is Diabetes in my family. I have a very sweet tooth but I have found that the less I eat of it, the less I crave it. i eat fruit but try to avoid it in unnecessary things like bought sauces, ketchup etc. When i have a sweet treat I really enjoy it but now it is the exception rather than the rule!

I do agree that packaged food has too much sugar. You can really taste it in low fat yogurt - makes me shudder.

I agree Mollie, my issue would be that we do not know how much sugar is in processed food. I have no wish to evangelise and ask others to look at the sugar in their diet but I would like to be able to understand my own.

Siverfoxette and Mollie Although maple syrup contains traces of some minerals, vitamins and amino acids, it is mainly composed of varying proportions of sucrose, fructose, and glucose, depending on the grade of the syrup. If you add a dessert spoon of it to your porridge, that's probably going to be about 15grams of your daily sugar intake - as I said before, the RDA is 90grams, so whether it's a good idea to use it on your porridge depends on how much sugar you're consuming during the rest of the day.

Gracesgran processed food manufacturers are required by law to state the sugar content of their products on their packaging, so you can work out how much you're getting.

I would quite like a standard teaspoon so that it is obvious. I think it was 10 teaspoons in a can of Coke. I don't drink it anyway but that would certainly put me off. In one report (not verified) it said that there are 44 in a large cinema serving!

I also found the following:

"A can of Heinz tomato soup contains the equivalent of four teaspoons of sugar while a mug of Cadbury’s drinking chocolate holds six teaspoonfuls. A Yeo Valley vanilla yoghurt contains five teaspoons of sugar."

The problem is that they all add into our diet and we are generally unaware of them.

I use maple syrup, but only a tsp. You get used to it. The alternative is to use a dsstsp of dried fruit, which is like eating a small bunch of grapes as well as the porridge, I suppose. I love cake, I love eating it (homemade) but I realised it was an addiction years ago. I would stop eating sugar and making cakes, then one slice pushed on me that it would have been rude to refuse, and I was off again. I think it's just as hard to give up as smoking.

I try not to buy processed foods like biscuits, yogs etc but I do like to make a cake or two now and then.

Over Christmas I ate too many chocolates and it has been hard work to resist sweet temptation!

I agree it is sensible to eat a varied diet but in moderation... gosh if only I could keep to my own good advice! A bit of sugar will probably not do much harm but it is knowing where it is hidden!

If you read the labels on processed foods like Heinz soup and breakfast cereals and then weigh the amount of sugar per portion in each product, (put it in a bowl) you will get quite a shock at the end of the day when you actually see how much sugar you have consumed without realising it.

I stopped eating any processed foods long ago, they were too scary. When you go to a restaurant, you can tell if they have been 'cheating' too. I buy things like biscuits for cheese, life is just too short for some things, but then you look at the amount of salt in them... None of us seem to ever need to go to the dentist, though.