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Reducing sugar in packaged foods can prevent disease in millions

eurekalert.org

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Re: Reducing sugar in packaged foods can prevent disease in millions

#51

Post by gregsq »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #9

The nice thing about reducing sugar is that after a while your taste buds realize how insanely over-sweetened many products are in the US. My current favorite example is bottled teas. When I was a kid I remember drinking Snapple, now I can't understand how I ever downed that stuff, it's like drinking syrup. If I'm lazy I'll get a bottle of unsweetened tea and mix it about 4-1 with sweetened tea. I get something that…

As a person whose lived mostly in the UK and Australia, and now the US for six years, I still can’t eat many American versions of things I know. Ordinary things like Kit Kat’s or any chocolate, supermarket cakes and so on. They’re almost unpalatable to me. Cadbury’s chocolate, made under license here, is another example. In a shop the other day and the lady at the checkout was discussing with the lady she was serving how some salt she had in store had sugar in its ingredients list. We were all bemused.

Re: Reducing sugar in packaged foods can prevent disease in millions

#52

Post by ksaj »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #9

The nice thing about reducing sugar is that after a while your taste buds realize how insanely over-sweetened many products are in the US. My current favorite example is bottled teas. When I was a kid I remember drinking Snapple, now I can't understand how I ever downed that stuff, it's like drinking syrup. If I'm lazy I'll get a bottle of unsweetened tea and mix it about 4-1 with sweetened tea. I get something that…

As a Canadian, may I offer you a double double?

I love coffee. Not Timmie's -- good proper coffee. And I only ever add a dash of milk and about 1/4 tsp of sugar.

The rationale behind making a weak cup of coffee sweeter than the accompanying donut has never made sense to me. It's so hard to drink like that. I'm clearly outnumbered by people who are used to taking in that much sugar with every syrupy mouthful.

Re: Reducing sugar in packaged foods can prevent disease in millions

#53

Post by wefarrell »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #9

The nice thing about reducing sugar is that after a while your taste buds realize how insanely over-sweetened many products are in the US. My current favorite example is bottled teas. When I was a kid I remember drinking Snapple, now I can't understand how I ever downed that stuff, it's like drinking syrup. If I'm lazy I'll get a bottle of unsweetened tea and mix it about 4-1 with sweetened tea. I get something that…

I once fasted for a week and when I started eating again I remember being amazed at how flavorful plain oatmeal was, without any additives. Never before had I been able to eat oatmeal without fruit or sweetener but after resetting my taste buds it was enough by itself.

Re: Reducing sugar in packaged foods can prevent disease in millions

#54

Post by lemming »

nimbius wrote: post #26

American here. I generally stick to a vegan/vegetarian diet to try and work on my "numbers" from our company healthcare bio-screening. My woke moment was when I was told exactly how much sugar is in a teaspoon. 4 grams. After that day I started seeing just how criminally insane some food products were and just how far most companies go to make sure you dont accidentally find out how much refined sugar you eat. tricks…

At my dentist growing up, they used to have little plastic bags stapled to the wall labelled with the product that that amount of sugar came from. A can of Coke has a pretty big bag of sugar in it, as does a glass of orange juice. It's amazing seeing it visualised like that.

Re: Reducing sugar in packaged foods can prevent disease in millions

#55

Post by chadcmulligan »

nimbius wrote: post #26

American here. I generally stick to a vegan/vegetarian diet to try and work on my "numbers" from our company healthcare bio-screening. My woke moment was when I was told exactly how much sugar is in a teaspoon. 4 grams. After that day I started seeing just how criminally insane some food products were and just how far most companies go to make sure you dont accidentally find out how much refined sugar you eat. tricks…

these are US measures. Metric 5ml is a teaspoon, 20ml a tablespoon. In case anyone else was confused like me.

Re: Reducing sugar in packaged foods can prevent disease in millions

#56

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

ksaj wrote: post #52
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #9

The nice thing about reducing sugar is that after a while your taste buds realize how insanely over-sweetened many products are in the US. My current favorite example is bottled teas. When I was a kid I remember drinking Snapple, now I can't understand how I ever downed that stuff, it's like drinking syrup. If I'm lazy I'll get a bottle of unsweetened tea and mix it about 4-1 with sweetened tea. I get something that…

As a Canadian, may I offer you a double double? I love coffee. Not Timmie's -- good proper coffee. And I only ever add a dash of milk and about 1/4 tsp of sugar. The rationale behind making a weak cup of coffee sweeter than the accompanying donut has never made sense to me. It's so hard to drink like that. I'm clearly outnumbered by people who are used to taking in that much sugar with every syrupy mouthful.

I think part of the issue with coffee, at least in the US, is that most mainstream coffee is ghastly over-roasted (hence the nickname Charbucks), so you need to add sugar to make it palatable.

I'm big into home espresso, and my morning breakfast drink is a 5-6 oz cappuccino. With a delicious, medium roast coffee and properly steamed milk the drink is more than sweet enough (heating milk to the right temp makes it taste sweeter) with no additional sugar. I contrast that when the rare occasions I get something from Starbucks and I always need to add sugar to mask the burnt taste of the coffee.

Re: Reducing sugar in packaged foods can prevent disease in millions

#57

Post by sjf »

yellow_lead wrote: post #4
EamonnMR wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What baffles me is that artificial sweeteners exist and yet there is enough (imo) unfounded FUD about them that leads people to instead choose Sugar or Nothing (which inevitably translates to Sugar because of the pseudo-addictiveness you mention.) Is wireheading bad? Maybe, but if I'm going to be doing it either way I'd rather reduce the harm.

Well, they also taste pretty bad to some people.

I am one of those people. If even sip something with stevia in it I am going to be trying to get the taste out of mouth for hours. It makes me want to scrap my tongue off. It was truly the worst thing I have ever consumed. It has only happened a couple of times, now I am literally traumatized and check the ingredients on anything that is likely to have it. For context, I am not a picky eater, there are things I don't like, but this is on a whole other level.

Re: Reducing sugar in packaged foods can prevent disease in millions

#58

Post by worik »

ksaj wrote: post #52
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #9

The nice thing about reducing sugar is that after a while your taste buds realize how insanely over-sweetened many products are in the US. My current favorite example is bottled teas. When I was a kid I remember drinking Snapple, now I can't understand how I ever downed that stuff, it's like drinking syrup. If I'm lazy I'll get a bottle of unsweetened tea and mix it about 4-1 with sweetened tea. I get something that…

As a Canadian, may I offer you a double double? I love coffee. Not Timmie's -- good proper coffee. And I only ever add a dash of milk and about 1/4 tsp of sugar. The rationale behind making a weak cup of coffee sweeter than the accompanying donut has never made sense to me. It's so hard to drink like that. I'm clearly outnumbered by people who are used to taking in that much sugar with every syrupy mouthful.

I only once got a good cup of coffee in Vancouver when I visited for two weeks about seven years ago.

I expected to get good coffee, it was insipid shit.

I drink it black unsweetened.... So my fault...?

Re: Reducing sugar in packaged foods can prevent disease in millions

#59

Post by paraph1n »

betwixthewires wrote: post #46

I'd add salt to that. Americans consume way too much of these two ingredients. I cook some good stuff but I take it easy on the salt, it tastes better that way, and almost everyone that tries it says it needs more. I like sugar, I use a little bit in my coffee, tea, I like fruits and stuff. But I don't drink soda or eat pastries or candy (except in November). Knowing how much sugar I used to consume really baffles me…

Hold on a second, the linked research is about sugar. I've seen a lot of similar studies suggesting sugar consumption is a problem. Is salt consumption also unhealthy? I was under the impression that it's not.

Re: Reducing sugar in packaged foods can prevent disease in millions

#60

Post by TedDoesntTalk »

o10449366 wrote: post #15
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #9

The nice thing about reducing sugar is that after a while your taste buds realize how insanely over-sweetened many products are in the US. My current favorite example is bottled teas. When I was a kid I remember drinking Snapple, now I can't understand how I ever downed that stuff, it's like drinking syrup. If I'm lazy I'll get a bottle of unsweetened tea and mix it about 4-1 with sweetened tea. I get something that…

Yep. Cereals, fruit juices, mainstream coffee (Starbucks, Dunkin, etc.), yogurt, baked goods... It's insane to me that society in the US has been conditioned to consume literally hundreds of grams of sugar for breakfast. If you need caffeine (which is a separate discussion), you don't need to consume what's essentially a frozen milkshake as the delivery vehicle.

> yogurt

I don’t think unflavored yogurt has much sugar, does it?

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