Down with HFCS!

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Originally Posted by Sohrshah

One of the alternatives they are using for sugar and HFCS is Splenda. I remember you telling me some interesting stuff about Splenda and free radicals. Any update on that research that you know of?

Breaking news: Splenda tastes like sh!t.

[BarTopDancer]

Splenda (and all fake sugars) give me near insta-headaches. Yes mom, even the 8oz of diet Sprite you put in the jello mold at Thanksgiving.

Cherny, I completely agree. Getting off ones butt and exercising is the best thing to do to lose weight. I wasn't trying to blame weight gain on HFCS. There are a lot of reasons for it - portion distortion (love that!), sedentary lifestyle, working longer days in front of a computer leave you tired and not wanting to cook.

[Ghoulish Delight]

Originally Posted by BarTopDancer

Sugar isn't great, hfcs is worse. Crack open those pixie stix and bring back sugar!

Originally Posted by Morrigoon

The issue with HFCS is it doesn't trigger the proper insulin response. As a result, we do not get the feeling of "fullness" we ought to for the amount of calories we consume, so we consume more. Plus it screws with our bodies.

I do feel the need to step in and call this for what it is. These are theories, entirely unproven, and there's actually quite a bit of data indicating that it's simply not the case.

ETA: In more detail. There are studies that suggest fructose itself may be worse than other forms of sweeteners, however high fructose corn syrup is only about 55% fructose. Sucrose (i.e. cane sugar) is 50% fructose. So the difference is minimal. There is a structural difference in that the fructose in sucrose is bonded while the fructose in HFCS is not, however it's believed that in products like soda, which are highly acidic, the bonds in sucrose are broken anyway, leaving them once again very similar.

There's a handful of studies that show a degree of correlation between HFCS and obesity/diabetes, but there's been nothing showing anything causal.

[BarTopDancer]

I suck and haven't provided any sources. I'll look later when I get home (trying to remember where I read it, though I'm sure it's biased). When you have a chance can you post links to this? Maybe it's all psychosomatic.

[Not Afraid]

I just don't drink soda.

I lost 20 pounds by eating in moderation, always eating breakfast and staying away from fast food. I'm about to get back on the post holiday band wagon by eating more fish and lean meat, fewer starches, more veggies and limiting my chocolate intake. Keeping away from fatty dressings and sauces as well as lots of cheese helps too. Salsa is a fantastic low-fat topper for flavor.

[Ghoulish Delight]

Wiki link

[Ghoulish Delight]

Originally Posted by Not Afraid

as well as lots of cheese helps too.

Hahahahahahahahaha!

[Not Afraid]

Yeah, cheese and chocolate are the toughest things to avoid.

[Chernabog]

Originally Posted by Ghoulish Delight

Actually, neither of them is terrible for you if you're eating in moderation.

Meth isn't terrible for you if you take it in moderation either.

OK yeah that was a cheap strawman. But people's ideas of "moderation" are vastly different. Having a high-fat, high-calorie meal once in a while is fine. But if that's more than one or two meals per week, that isn't moderation, it's the rule (unless you are an athlete and are burning a seriously high amount of calories, in which your weight goals are probably different anyway, or you have an abnormally fast metabolism). Foods high in fat raise your cholesterol levels and clog your arteries. Sorry, but that is bad for you. I find, for me personally, eating a Double-Double is hard to justify except a couple times a year (and only then, it's if I've been doing the regular gym thing and not kidding myself about how many calories I've eaten that week).

I think the feeling of "satisfaction" though when you eat is sort of a cop-out. You can't just eat until you're satisfied. If you're eating ANYTHING after you're full, you're overeating. Frankly, if you ARE full, you're overeating. Like Morrigoon says, it is portion control, but in that portion one needs to take into account how many calories one wants to eat, and stop. You can eat MORE (volume-wise) of lower calorie food.

At the beginning of any weight-loss regimen, where your calories expended are greater than your calorie intake, I know I'm going to feel hungry. I try and avoid this by eating smaller portions at regular intervals, but I'm still gonna feel hungry at the beginning. As long as my calories are around 1400 per day, I'm gonna feel hungry but I'm not starving myself (I think under 1200 calories, your body goes into starvation mode, which has its own set of issues).

[Morrigoon]

Well, my point about eating non-lowfat foods is that you need to control portions of normal food. "Diet" foods are often less satisfying for the same number of calories, and lead you to want to eat more. I feel it's preferable to eat food that will satisfy you at smaller amounts. If you feel like you're denying yourself, you're going to want more.

This doesn't apply as well to sodas (140 calories vs. 0-1 calories) as it does to things like, say, bread and cheese, where the highly-processed "reduced fat" versions save you from 10-30 calories at great expense to substance and satiety. But I think we know there's a lot of reasons out there already to avoid diet sodas or to choose them very carefully (In my case I might drink a Splenda-sweetened diet drink on occasion, but very rarely). However, given the choice, I would prefer a sugar-sweetened Coke over an HFCS-sweetened one, not just for the health issues but also for flavor.