Sugar: Is it the faux-friend that really could kill you?

There is an ocean of research that proves it. 

No but, if , when. No doubt. 

Sugar is doing to American civilization what lead did to Rome.

It’s making us fat, it’s making us crazy and it is slowly killing us. 

Are you scared of flying in a plane? Are you worried about terrorism? No need to stress your already panicked system. 

Sugar will kill you faster than Al Qaeda.

High-fructose corn syrup is taking the lion's share of our calories. In a mere 300 years, the average yearly consumption of sugar has gone from 4 pounds to 180 pounds (yes, that's one half-pound per day per person).

In the 1700’s, only the rich could afford sugar. Thus, they had very bad teeth. The lowly peasants, wanting to emulate their lords and ladies and appear what they were not, would blacken their choppers. Midwives and healers already could recognize all the signs of deterioration brought on by the consumption of sugar. Unfortunately but very predictably, those poor souls literally ended up in the fire for denouncing what would fuel the expansion of a few empires, the colonization of others and the slave-trade.

For the mere 2.3 million years of evolution, humans had quite a rough time trying to maintain their blood-sugar at the optimum level. Food was scarce and ability to store it even worse. Today, we are facing a crisis due to the reversal of these parameters. You can get your fill almost anywhere. Gas stations seem to be engaged into a war of which one can offer the most absolutely revolting concoction. Florist are pushing chocolate and office supplies stores rival each other with displays of potato chips!!

Simply put, sugar is everywhere, from sodas and candy, to sports drink and condiments. Most processed foods contain some sort of sweetener. From birth to death, we are being poisoned. Some infant formulas contain as much sugar as a can of soda. Medicines such as cough syrup are filled with the stuff.

And still, some wonder why we are becoming a nation of obese people. One third of the population is obese, the other third is overweight, which leaves only one third healthy (not a very large pool in which to find Olympians!) The rate of obesity of white middle- age men has gone from 3% to 30% in little more than 100 years and with it the rates of heart disease, diabetes and kidney failure.

Let’s take a look at the different sugars and sweeteners:

Glucose, fructose and dextrose are monosaccharides, simple sugars.  The  body metabolizes them differently, with glucose and dextrose being pretty much the same thing. They can form more complex sugars by recombining: table sugar is half fructose/half glucose and is a disaccharide. 

High-fructose corn syrup is also a combination of fructose and glucose (55/45).

Ethanol is obtained from fermenting sugars with yeast but is not a sugar.

Xylitol, sorbitol, mannitol, glycerol, erythritol and maltitol are very popular sweeteners that are neither alcohol nor sugars although they are dubbed “sugar alcohols” Partially absorbed by the small intestine, they can bring on a full array of problems such as diarrhea, bloating and flatulence.

Sucralose or Splenda is a freak, 600 times sweeter than table sugar, and obtained through a chlorination process. A small percentage of the sucralose ingested is absorbed by the small intestine but it has been shown that it is capable of destroying the bulk of the friendly intestinal bacteria on which our immune system depends.

Aspartame or NutraSweet is also an artificial sweetener with documented and devastating side-effects such as headaches, migraines, dizziness, seizures, nausea, numbness, rashes, depression, irritability, insomnia, hearing loss, vision problems, loss of taste vertigo and memory loss.

Agave syrup is a highly processed substance and it is about 80% fructose. Thanks to very smart advertising, it’s made a grand entrance on the shelves of natural-food stores but there’s really nothing natural about it.

Stevia derives from the stevia plant, which is very easy to grow in a lot of climates. It is 200 times sweeter than table sugar and does not raise blood sugar. However if you have insulin issues, it is best that to avoid  all sweeteners, including Stevia, as they all can decrease your sensitivity to insulin. Some object to the bitter metallic after taste of Stevia. It might be worth trying a different brand. The whole-leaf extract has not been approved by the FDA and can only been sold as a dietary supplement, while compounds from the Stevia plant can be legally used as a “natural” sweetener (Truvia a no-calorie sweetener is is not made from whole Stevia, just two of the sweetest compounds). Only the FDA can make it so confusing and complicated.

Honey is 53% fructose. Used in its RAW form, it is natural and has wonderful healing properties when used in moderation.

Glucose vs. fructose

Glucose is the energy source of every living thing on our planet. The human body was design to run on the stuff. But now, we consume mostly fructose. In vegetable and fruit, fructose is mixed with minerals, enzymes, vitamins, fiber…All these contribute to modulating the effect fructose has on our body. But sadly, we now consume fructose in its most naked form: in drink, juice and processed foods. One century ago the average person ate 15 grams of fructose per day. Today, the average is closer to 75 grams with some people reaching a high of 130 grams.

Our liver is the poor lone work-horse in the metabolization of fructose. Every day, it receives massive amounts of fructose that has not been subjected to any break-down by the body. The fructose from your Coca-Cola (remember, it’s made from high-fructose corn-syrup, a mixture of unbound sucrose and glucose) goes straight for the liver and is turned into fat, ready to be deposited in those nice little areas we love to hate: thighs, belly, under-arms, buttocks. In the meantime, the glucose in your Coke, being what every cell in your body in programmed to use, is burned up soon after you have your drink.

The effects. Glucose vs. fructose

The problems of fructose metabolism don’t affect just your dress size. Here’s a sample of the effects of fructose on the human body:

-Raises blood pressure by elevating the levels of uric acid (a bit more complicated than that really so please don’t run to your doctor with this paper in hand!!!!)

-Damages kidneys,

-Increases chronic low-level inflammation, which can lead to heart attacks and strokes, and according to the latest research, to cancer,

-Promotes weight gain, abdominal obesity,

-Leads to Metabolic Syndrome (decreased HDL, increased LDL, high triglycerides, high blood-sugar and high blood-pressure)

-Promotes non-alcoholic fatty-liver.

A sugar break?

According to some research, it would seem that the more sugar you eat, the more effective your body is in absorbing it. Of course, the more you absorb, the more damage is done.

The body becomes "sensitized" to sugar and more sensitive to its toxic effects as well. But you can give a  sugar holiday to your body in as little as 2 weeks. The sensitization decreases and the body becomes less reactive.

But what about fruit?

Fruits are lovely and perfect the way they are. Yes, they contain fructose but their design also includes vitamins, fiber and antioxidants that minimize the negative effects of fructose. But what happen when you drink only their juices? You still get all the fructose but most of the antioxidants have been lost in the processing of the fruit. Bottled juices from the grocery store are probably the most hazardous for our health:  they tend to grow fungus as they sit nicely on their shelves waiting for a buyer. Fresh squeezed juices are fine to consume in MODERATION, that is not every day. Fructose is not the enemy per say, but the higher its consumption the higher the devastation it brings on the body.

I can hear the objection rising in the back of some heads: Didn't our ancestors evolve eating fruits and berries? They sure did, but they ate fruits when they were in season. They also ate fruits that had not been bred and modified over centuries, to be uniform in shape, size and color and to be SWEETER.

If you are a raw-foodist, eat the cleanest diet and get plenty of exercise, it is possible for you to consume fructose in excess and still remain perfectly healthy. But my friend, you are the exception.

My recommendation is to eat no more than 1 piece of fruit per day, unless you have insulin issues/diabetes in which case you should totally avoid it.

Here’s a chart of the fructose content of common fruits.

Brassica and Thyroid

If you've been diagnosed with hypothyroidism, you've probably been told to avoid eating certain foods that contain goitrogens.  This would include the brassica family: broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, kale, bok choi, turnips...Goitrogens are compounds that suppress the function of the thyroid by interfering with iodine uptake. 
Can the consumption of these foods cause hypothyroidism? 
Some physicians and nutritionists believe that this warning is unfair to the brassica family and exaggerated. 
Why?
-The goitrogenic compounds in these foods are destroyed by cooking.
-In order to have a negative effect on the thyroid hormones, one would need to ingest a huge amount of broccoli, which is very unlikely to happen over a long period of time. I'm yet to meet someone addicted to kale or Brussels sprouts (can't say that about sugar though, can I?)
Still, I would not recommend that anyone with hypothyroidism eat any of these foods in their raw form. Steaming, light sauteing are good options for these tender and beautiful veggies.

On the other hand, soy (I love to hate soy, so easy to do) by affecting the absorption of iodine has goitrogenic properties.  It's unfortunate that most people eat soy every day. Not just your garden variety vegetarian or vegan, mind you, but every person who buys processed foods ingests a fair amount of soy. 
Soy is everywhere, from energy bars to fake meats, from baked goods to cheese (cheese?!), from baby-formulas to noodles. Just check the labels of some of the packaged foods in your kitchen and look for these terms:
soy flour, hydrolysed vegetable protein, soy protein isolate, protein concentrate, textured vegetable protein, vegetable oil (simple, fully, or partially hydrogenated), plant sterols, or the emulsifier lecithin. 
Its many uses and disguises are telling of its value to manufacturers: endless and cheap.
Many vegetarians rely on tofu for proteins. Tofu is highly processed and difficult to digest. The human digestive tract is just not able to utilize tofu's proteins.
Tempeh and miso are the exceptions, as long as they've been fermented properly, using traditional and ancestral methods.
Seitan (which I aptly pronounced Satan for the longest time until I was corrected by an irate fundamentalist vegan who probably mistook my accent for a fashion statement) might take the first prize for ultimate franken-food. It's made from wheat gluten, the most allergenic part of wheat. I wonder who ever came up with this genial idea: let's make fake meat out of grains that most of us should not be eating in the first place, slap a label with a sunrise-over-a-cute-farm on it and promote it to eager non-meat eaters as the most ethical food ever to hit the shelf! 
It is a challenge to get quality proteins, whether one is carnivorous or not. Avoiding adulterated and toxic foods should be a priority if we are to avoid getting sick.
Buy grass-fed meats, more and more available in mainstream stores - even Costco sells grass-fed beef.
Support your local farmers by getting pastured chickens, eggs, pork.
And even though I'm no big fan of protein shakes (I think food should be chewed), high quality protein powders are available through health-care professionals. I would stay away from most powders sold in grocery stores or vitamins stores, as they're made from poor quality proteins, such as whey from cows raised in factory-farms, and processed at very high temperature. They also tend to include an arm-length list of unpronounceable ingredients.

We all know that processed foods are not healthy but they are source of iodized salt, and hence iodine. A lot of salt is lost when we shift from processed foods to a whole-food nutrient-rich diet and getting enough iodine can become a problem.
I usually recommend cooking with sea salts but most contain very little of no iodine at all. Adding kelp or kelp seasoning to the diet is a good option unless you've been diagnosed with Hashimoto's disease.
The use of iodine in the treatment of thyroid disease is controversial. Some hypothyroid patients  have successfully been treated with iodine. For people who have hypothyroidism caused by iodine deficiency, supplemental iodine is both necessary and effective but should only been done under a physician's watch.

Enough blah blah blah, let's move on to serious matters: a recipe!

And today's winner is quick and simple and delicious.

Roasted Cream of Broccoli Soup

preparation: 5mns
Servings: 6

Ingredients

    1 1/2 lbs. broccoli florets
    4 shallots, peeled and sliced
    1/4 cup olive oil
    1 tsp. Celtic salt
    1 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
    4 cups organic chicken broth or vegetable broth
    1 cup coconut milk
    
Directions

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. 
Put  broccoli florets and shallot slices in a bowl. 
Pour olive oil over, add salt and pepper and mix well.
Spread mixture onto a large cookie sheet.

Roast in the oven for 15 minutes, remove and cover with foil. Let it sit.

Bring the stock to a boil in a large stockpot. 
Add the broccoli mixture and return to a boil. 
Lower heat down to simmer for 10 minutes.

Blend with wand-mixture until smooth. Stir in coconut milk and reheat to warm.