13 Aug Bitter Sweet

For the past few months I’ve had to avoid refined sugar. I don’t mean that I gave up having treats or that I’m simply abstaining from dessert. For health reasons, I had to go cold turkey-clean off the magic white stuff. And it worked. Within 10 days I felt better. After three weeks, I felt back to my old self. After five weeks, I felt amazing. This is all more or less beside the point. The point is: do you know how hard it is to avoid sugar? I’m not talking about how hard it is to have willpower to refuse the slice of cake at a birthday party or the boss’ candy jar on a bad day, I mean do you know how hard it is to eat out in the world, regular breakfast, lunch and dinner food, and not unknowingly have refined sugar?

Sidebar: In case you haven’t already heard, Americans typically eat 150-170 pounds of added, processed sugar each year (i.e. this doesn’t count natural sugars in fruits, vegetables and other whole foods) – that’s 22.2 teaspoons or 355 calories per day. What’s so bad about sugar? Here’s a short list of consequences to this kind of consumption: an extra 355 calories per day (which could lead to 36 extra pounds each year), jerking around your blood sugar levels, developing hypoglycemia or type 2 diabetes, suppressing your immune system, adrenal fatigue … really it goes on.  Thankfully, for people who like numbers, the American Heart Association now recommends some specific limits on sugar consumption: 100 calories/~25 grams/6 teaspoons for women and 150 calories/~37.5 grams/9 teaspoons – or roughly one 12 ounce soda. (For the Diet Coke addicts who just passed out, sorry.)

Back to avoiding sugar. Like I said, the challenge isn’t necessarily in choosing to avoid the obvious sources: baked treats, soda, candy, etc. The biggest lesson I’ve learned is that it’s everywhere – in packaged food that would surprise you, in medicine and in freshly prepared restaurant food.

So, whether you just want to be more aware of your sugar intake or you want to control the amount of sugar you consume – here are some tips to navigating this bitter sweet world:

1. Read your labels – Get into the habit of scanning ingredients lists on everything, especially condiments, until you get a sense of likely sources in your regular diet. Most ketchup, mustard, vinaigrettes, soy, rice and nut milks contain sugar. Even deli meats – including lean roasted turkeys – contain sugar. And can you believe I only found one – ONE – cough syrup without high-fructose corn syrup in the wall of cough and cold meds at Safeway. Seriously.
2. Learn how to spot sugar in disguise – Sugar often likes to fly under the radar, so take some time to educate yourself on its aliases (brown sugar, cane or beet sugar, evaporated cane juice, high-fructose corn syrup, corn syrup, etc.), and don’t forget the chemical derivatives (the “oses” – dextrose, crystalline fructose, maltose).  This will help with the label reading, for sure, especially if a sweet product claims to be “sugar free”.
3. Beware of healthy snacks – Most sports drinks, energy bars and yogurts have some form of processed sugar in them (see vocab list above). Don’t assume because a food is branded as healthy or branded for athletes that it’s free of processed sugar.
4. Eating at a restaurant is not the same as eating at home - Eating out has been the hardest part of this and I learned quickly to ask about everything because restaurants add sugar to the least obvious dishes. For example, I found sugar in sushi rice, stirfry sauces (Thai, Chinese, Vietnamese), and hummus. What to do? ASK. You don’t have to apologize for wanting to know what’s in a dish – you’re the one who has to eat it, right? And, if everything you want on the menu has sugar in it, order off the menu. Most places will accommodate special requests, as long as (1) you’re polite and (2) you’re not asking for major ingredients you don’t already see on the menu (e.g. featured vegetables or meats). This may sound extreme, but… if you’re shy about asking at the table, do a little recon ahead of time by looking up the menu online. I’ve even called ahead of time to ask if sugar was added to sauces and I was so glad to be able to walk in, confidently order without any fuss and focus on my dining companion.

Really, the challenge has been eating out. At this point, I’m rarely surprised to see sugar added to packaged foods, even when it doesn’t really make sense (maybe the sweetness is to mask preservatives or bland, low-quality ingredients). But eating out, where food is being prepared fresh… the needless addition of refined sugar totally baffles me.

I suppose the biggest take away from all of this is not to be deterred. I certainly don’t eat a pristine diet – what’s the fun in that – but I like to make conscious choices about the foods I eat. Information is power and helps you be in control of your health. You want the sugar? GO FOR IT! And love every bite, knowing that you made the choice, not someone else.

If you’re interested in cutting back your sugar intake but are afraid to miss out on satisfying sweet things, don’t be alarmed. I feel like I should’ve earned a merit badge in alternative sweets this summer! Look out for more information on natural sweeteners and recipes that allow us to have our cake, eat it, too and not send our bloodsugar through the roof!