You’d think you could just look at the label to see how much sugar a food contains, but it’s not that easy. Just as your friend Kathryn might go by Katy, Kath or Kat, added sugar has a lot of aliases, and by a lot I don’t mean three. Try 56.
There’s brown rice syrup, barley malt, high fructose corn syrup and even organic evaporated cane juice – which sounds healthy, but when you evaporate it, you get sugar.
Chemically speaking, it’s all the same. Even trickier, when multiple types of sugar are used in one product, they get buried down in the ingredient list. So the sugar content may appear to be okay, but when you add them all together, it’s a different story.
A good thing to remember is: the ingredient contained in the highest quantity is listed on a food label first. Often you’ll see wheat flour, which metabolises into sugar in the body, or maltose, dextrose or any other word ending in -‘ose’, which all end up meaning the same thing: sugar.
Recently, World Health Organisation (WHO) findings have confirmed what we all know – we’re eating far too much sugar. On average, Kiwis consume 37 teaspoons of the stuff a day. That’s 31 teaspoons more than the healthy amount recommended by WHO. Today there are all sorts of ‘healthy’ sugar-based sweeteners on the market.
Yet many are just as bad as regular sugar. In some cases, they’re even worse, and they’re added liberally to all sorts of products that are marketed as health foods.
Maple Syrup
Pure maple syrup contains a decent number of minerals, including manganese and zinc, but keep in mind that it also contains a whole bunch of sugar – about 67 per cent sucrose (as in table sugar). However, if you are going to eat a sugar-based sweetener anyway, replacing refined sugar in recipes with an identical amount of maple syrup will cut the total sugar content by a third.Make sure you buy 100 per cent Canadian maple syrup, not the cheaper maple-flavoured syrup, which is made from a mix of sugar and corn syrup.
Agave
This sweetener is touted as a healthy alternative to sugar because of its low glycaemic index (GI). It has a very low GI because almost all of the sugar in it is fructose. The agave sweetener you find in stores is made by treating the sugars with heat and enzymes, which destroys all the beneficial health effects of the agave plant. The resulting product is a highly refined, unhealthy syrup. When consumed in large amounts it can lead to the development of insulin resistance.
Honey
Honey has antimicrobial and antioxidant properties and contains some nutrients, with trace amounts of vitamins and minerals. It’s about 80 per cent sugar, by weight. If you’re substituting a tablespoon of honey for sugar, you’re consuming more calories, not fewer. That said, several studies have compared honey and plain sugar and noted that honey had slightly less harmful effects on metabolism. If you’re healthy, eating good quality honey in moderation is fine; it’s definitely a better choice than plain sugar or high fructose corn syrup. But honey is not a harmless sweetener and won’t help you lose weight.
Stevia
Stevia is a no-calorie sweetener derived from a plant and is 30 times sweeter than sugar in its whole leaf form and almost 300 times sweeter once it’s been refined. Given that stevia is much sweeter than sugar, less is needed when using it as a sugar substitute; when a recipe calls for a cup of sugar, one teaspoon of stevia is needed. Stevia doesn’t add calories, affect blood sugar or insulin levels, or contribute to dental cavities. I’d say this is a win.
Coconut Sugar
Coconut sugar retains quite a few of the minerals and nutrients found in the coconut palm, but it’s still 70-79 per cent sucrose (table sugar). It does contain a fibre called inulin, which may slow glucose absorption and explain why coconut sugar has a lower GI than regular white sugar. I’m going to have to put coconut sugar in the same boat as honey. It’ s a little healthier than refined sugar, but not as good an option as consuming no sugar at all.
In a nutshell…
All the sugar you eat gets broken down into glucose and fructose and eventually reaches the liver. Your liver doesn’t know (or care) whether the sugar you eat is organic or not. So try to stick to whole foods, but if you have to have something in a packet, make sure you read the ingredients list and stay away from the -‘ose’.
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