Corn Syrup No Different The Table Sugar?
Corn Syrup is a form of sugar that everybody loves to hate. Various forms of sugar are found everywhere - but corn-based sugars have become increasingly prevalent due to the heavy subsidies paid to US corn farmers over the last decade or two.
So does corn syrup impact appetite in a different way to standard table sugar? Do you end up eating more?
Two researchers at the University of Toronto compared different sugar mixtures. Their results are published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
They took 31 young men and gave them various sugar blends - such as High Fructose Corn Syrup, table sugar, and other glucose and fructose blends.
All sugar mixtures had the exact same number of calories.
One and a half hours later, the men were told to eat as much pizza as they wish.
The outcome: There was no difference in food intake or reported appetite whether they consumed the corn syrup or table sugar. These results are similar to another recent study.
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These results brought to you by the Corn Refiners Association (bottom of the article).
ReplyThe government interference in the sweetener market goes back 50 years or more. There have been huge tariffs on imported sugar for at least that long.
It's time to end government involvement in the food business.
This is a good story. It's nice to see a blog story without the hysterical hate-based "our food is possessed by evil voodoo spirits that corporations put there to kill our children!!!" nonsense.
ReplyHonestly, I don't eat a lot of corn syrup because I don't buy a lot of prepared foods, but I will use corn syrup if a recipe I'm making calls for it. What bothers me more than any health claims are the corn subsidies that end up impacting the ingredients of so many prepared foods. All those corn subsidies mean that corn ends up in almost everything in some form.
ReplyYou know, it's funny but the longer you go without eating any processed sugars the less you can tolerate them. The problem is is that there is so much hidden corn syrup in foods that if you made them yourself would have no added sugar. So - no boxed food in my house! It's a pain sometimes to make everything from scratch but I do feel better for it.
You know I am starting to sound like an ex-smoker - just a little too much on the soapbox! But believe me, as a former sugar-junkie, I just don't miss any of it!
ReplyHFCS has about the same ratio of fructose/glucose as sucrose, so it should have a similar metabolic affect. Not sure why the researchers would have expected otherwise...
ReplyThe second study referred to was funded by a number of groups:
ReplyWhy do we care who funded the studies? Are you implying that the scientists that conducted the studies are corrupt?
If so, which scientists are immune to the implication of corruption? (The ones that produce results you agree with, no doubt.)
Reply31 people? What is this, an 8th grade science project? Puh-lease! If I'm going to take a study like this seriously, they've got to have a much larger sample size than that and it had better be double blind. This test is not science, it's just silly.
ReplyI agree with RooGrrl. The sample size is too small. I also think the study itself is flawed in design. I'm not sure whether it was double-blinded or placebo controlled.
Even if the study is correct, it is similar to saying cocaine is not worse than heroine.
ReplyI'll still skip HFCS in my whole wheat bread, soup, applesauce, etc. thanks.
Also, ketchup with sugar (Heinz organic) instead of corn syrup (reg.Heinz) rocks your socks off!
Reply31 people is definitely too small of a sample size. However, I do try to limit HFCS only because it adds extra calories to foods that don't really need the sweetness (like barbecue sauce, ketchup, bread, etc.). I follow the mantra that sugar is sugar, no matter what form it is in, so I try to limit it when I can. Usually, that is by avoiding most processed foods.
ReplyI just don't like the taste of HFCS and yes, I can taste the difference. Since moving to Australia, I no longer have to deal with HFCS, but things are still full of sugar. It was kind of comforting when I moved here to look at labels and see simply, "sugar." Sodas here are normal sized, too. A small is ACTUALLY small. American sodas are only big because HFCS is so cheap (due to those big farm subsidies that your tax dollars pay for), that it gives people a false sense of value to get more soda. BTW, it's not a bargain if you pay for it on your waistline!
ReplyThe corn syrup does not increase appetite what it does is bypass certain steps in glucose metabloism that allow it to be easily converted and stored as fat, that is why nutritionists are against it and rightfully so, and that is another reason why who funds the research is important, if the people pushing it know what it does not do then they can fund such research and make their products look good with the general public not knowing any different.
ReplyI definitely have my tinfoil hat safely in place when it comes to HFCS (or glucose-fructose as it's called in Canada). I avoid the stuff wherever I can.
ReplyIs that really that good of a test?
I am not an expert of high fructose corn sugar, but isn't it so bad for your body you could pretty much consider it a slow acting poison for diabetes and other inflammatory diseases?
ReplyThis study means nothing and was very poorly planned scientifically. A sample size of 31 is very small and the results are meaningless.
The real issue is that the way HFCS is metabolized in the body compared to other sugars makes it more likely to lead to Diabetes. HFCS is an industrial product; because it is party enzymatically degraded to yield free fructose molecules (basically pre-digested) it spikes blood sugar up faster when you eat it than other types of sugars. Table sugar (sucrose) is composed of a glucose molecule bound to a fructose molecule, and the body must first use it's own enzymes to break the two apart, so it does not spike blood sugar up quite as fast as HFCS, and may be less likely to cause Diabetes. The huge increase in Diabetes in the US may be due in part to the common use of HFCS.
"Sucrose is broken down during digestion into fructose and glucose through hydrolysis by the enzyme sucrase, by which the body regulates the rate of sucrose breakdown. Without this regulation mechanism, the body has less control over the rate of sugar absorption into the bloodstream."
In addition to the altered matabolism caused by excess Fructose possibly also contributing to obesity.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_fructose_corn_syrup
Conclusion: don't eat HFCS if possible.
ReplyThe reason you see so much corn sugar is that corn, sugar cane and sorghum are all members of the grass family. You can grow corn and sugar beets in zones 4 through 7. Sugar cane is a tropical plant that grows in zone 9. It's not about subsidies. You can't grow sugar cane (or pineapples) in the midwest where the topsoil is the most amenable to corn and soybeans. Are you telling us that sugar cane farmers aren't subsidized--and hire illegal immigrants--and have to compete with crops grown south of the border thanks to NAFTA.
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