No More High Fructose Corn Syrup

Sorry

2006-07-31T22:27:00.000-07:00

Well.. it's almost over. I stunk at two things. First, actually blogging about my experience, and second, actually not eating any Corn Syrup. It's hard. But I think I'm more aware of it or something, and I'm proabbly a better person.

Oh well.

Yeah, this is hard

2006-07-16T18:03:00.000-07:00

So it actually is more of a challenge than I thought it would be. I thought it would be incredibly easy just to go cold turkey on everything with HFCS. But it's not. Soda and ice cream. Those are my two weaknesses. It's just easier not to make a big fuss about it- if I'm served ice cream at a friend's house... I take it. If it's soda, and the day's hot, I take it. Oh well. Sorry for not updating this recently. Earlier this week, I was doing really good, but I also was really low on energy. I also had a pretty bad headache.

One question I have is this- High Fructose Corn Syrup, by definition, has a lot of Fructose in it. this is also the sugar in fruits. So are fruits also not good for you? This is an interesting thought... until next time... use sucrose.

How its goin'

2006-07-10T19:03:00.000-07:00

Well.. It's going, alright. I'm doing pretty good overall, with not eating any HFCS. It's not incredibly hard. The hardest part I think is just finding the food without HFCS. Also, if you're a fan of soda or iced tea (Turkey Hill is the best, by the way), then it's incredibly hard. I did find some grapefruit soda (my favorite kind) without any corn syrup in it, so I was happy about that. Today I went shopping, and got some orange juice, salad, grapes, and yogurt. Even the yogurt that I foud was HFCS free.
I came home, and decided to try to make a grape dressing for my salad, since most salad dressings have HFCS. I blended the grapes, and added some vinegar, spices and honey. It wasn't too bad, but i think I'll work on the recipe a bit more before putting it up here :-).

I found this web site, put up by the "Corn Refiners Association." What it says doesn't jive with that other article I read. It looks like people are coming out on both sides of this, including researchers. Some are saying that HFCS is a direct cause of rising obesity rates, while others say that is BS. Who knows?

But it's hard for me to trust an industry's web site. It's public relations. It will not provide balanced coverage of both sides.

Ahh... Proof, Proof, It's Proof at last

2006-07-07T11:54:00.000-07:00

So I figured I had heard some good reasons to avoid HFCS at some
point... and I guess I probably did. It is pretty bad for you,
evidently. I googled "high fructose corn syrup," and the first result
was <a href="http://www.westonaprice.org/motherlinda/cornsyrup.html">this
page.</a>

According to Mother Linda, who wrote the article, most of the
sweetener in processed food comes from HFCS, which passed sugar as a
sweetener in the 1990's. It turns out that, while it is a long process
and involves lots of chemicals and enzymes and fungus and stuff like
that, HFCS is actualyl cheaper overall than sugar.

And it's big business. According to Mother Linda, "Four companies
control 85 percent of the $2.6 billion business—Archer Daniels
Midland, Cargill, Staley Manufacturing Co. and CPC International."

The article goes as far as saying that children should not drink fruit
juices, which is high in fructose. Fructose, although it is related to
fruit, has some pretty nasty side effects, and can really screw stuff
up. Rats who lived on a diet of fructose ended up with major heart
problems, high cholestrol, and the livers that looked like they were
alcoholic.

So wow... this actually is good for me. :-)
More to come.. some time...

Yesterday was good

2006-07-06T19:29:00.000-07:00

So I think yesterday was my first day without any at all... ever. I
managed to avoid every single thing with corn syrup. It actually
wasn't too hard. Today I slipped up and had some soda... I'm sorry
world. It is hard... and I promise I'll do some research this weekend
to figure out why I am doing this...

Soda, sure... but bread?

2006-07-03T08:37:00.000-07:00

So I was looking at the ingredients of bread, and sure enough, there
was HFCS in it. And this is the healthy whole grain stuff. Not white
fluff. And then I checked the ingredients in our local bakery's white
fluff... and no HFCS. I may need to allow bread in my diet, just
because it's kind of hard to pack a lunch with out it.
Also a bummer is the realization that every soda has HFCS as the
second ingredient, after carbonated water. I spent 5 minutes going
through the convenience store, looking at soda, saying dang, and
pissing off the guy outside waiting for me. I finally settled on some
LifeWater or some weird thing like that...
Yesterday I was playing capture the flag in a grocery store, and they
had starbursts out... those are definitely out. I didn't eat any.

Shoot.

2006-07-01T10:26:00.000-07:00

So I went home for lunch, and was about to make a sandwhich when I
realized the bread has corn syrup in it. That's right. Bread. Then I
realized what I ahd for breakfast... french toast. So it turns out I
slipped for my first meal. This isn't turning out very good.
So I had a tortilla wrap.
I was worried about yogurt, honestly. I thought I wouldn't be able to
eat any at all, and it's quite the handy lunch item. It turns out that
the cheaper yogurt we usually buy does have corn syrup, but if we go
for the more expensive stuff, it's HFCS free.
I'm going to have to look into a price per sweetness comparison of
sugar and HFCS.
Which leads to the question... how exactly does one measure sweetness?

And... GO!!!

2006-06-30T21:06:00.000-07:00

Starting now, I will no longer eat anything with corn syrup in it. I will not eat anything with corn syrup in it until August 1, 2006. I will keep this blog updated with how that goes, research I do on if what I'm doing has any scientific backing or if I'm just a loony, and eh, whatever else.
I think I'm going to start off avoiding Corn Syrup, even non-High Fructose. If my research reveals that there is a difference between the two health wise, I may just avoid High Fructose Corn Syrup, or HFCS, as I've learned to call it.

The ingredients

2006-06-24T11:18:00.000-07:00

I admit it. It's a rare day that I pay attention to the ingredients of anything. I usually figure it will take some of the joy out of eating it. I think that there is a definite joy in eating. The Last Angry Young Man just spent a week eating nothing but Monkey Chow. He was quoted in this Chicago Tribune article as saying, "Heading in I was convinced that, although I'd miss out on the pleasure element of food, I could handle it for a week. But it hit me harder than I thought. You know, before when people would say "chocolate makes me happy," I laughed at it as trivial and simplistic, but now I understand it better. It's not just something fat people say to justify eating."
So I rarely look at ingredients, so I can enjoy food. However, since I got this idea to give up High Fructose Corn Syrup for a month, I have taken to looking at the ingredients. Today I was eating some sour gummy worms (can't get enough), and saw that the top ingredient in them is corn syrup.
Now I don't know if I'll give up all corn syrup or just high fructose corn syrup, but the thought of giving up gummy worms is pretty sad.

The thinking behind " No More High Fructose Corn Syrup"

2006-06-14T17:08:00.000-07:00

So I'm not really sure why I'm doing this. It's not on a cool bet, like the guy who ate monkey food for a week. It's not to lose weight. I don't know anything really about High Fructose Corn Syrup, except that it's in everything... but I have a sneaking suspicion it's not good for you. SO I'm completely cutting it out of my diet for one month. That's right. I will not eat any High Fructose Corn Syrup.

This blog will be for keeping track of how it goes, what works, what doesn't work... what food I improvise, etc. I'll keep track of my weight, see if it affects that.

I'll also look into HFCS and see what research has been done on it. So check back often, and see what happens to me, in my month without HFCS.