Surprisingly, I've not met many people who heard about High Fructose Corn Syrup. In fact, I've only met a non-Malaysian, who minimally heard about this sweetener. Try this, when you walk along the valley of any supermarket, look out for some of the peanut butter products, cookies, candy bars, ice creams, frozen desserts, etc. Observe the ones which are imported and not locally processed. You will find this sweetener in one of the product lists.
The starchy portion of foods such as corn, potatoes and wheat, is made up of long chain glucose molecules. The reason starch does not taste sweet, is that these chains are too large to fit into the sweetness receptors on the tongue. By breaking these chains, however, we can change the way starch tastes. Place a cracker or white bread in your mouth, but don't chew it. At first, it may tastes bland. Moments later, when saliva breaks down the glucose chains, the food tastes sweeter. Don't believe? Try it then.
Food manufacturers started to use corn syrup almost a century ago. But, simple corn syrup has its limited usefulness. Corn syrup does not contains fructose, and the level of sweetness is much lower then table sugar. Close to half a century ago, scientists discovered a way to treat corn syrup with an enzyme called glucose isomerase, which managed to converts some of the glucose to fructose. But, the technique were expensive, until a couple of scientists reuse these enzymes by attaching them through a column which the corn syrup was poured. And yes, those scientists were Japanese, again (who introduced MSG to US and global market). This innovation allowed refiners to convert corn to glucose and fructose at a lower cost.
HFCS, has other qualities that make it appealing for food to beverage manufacturers. For instance, it dissolves more readily in other liquids then refined sugar or plain corn syrup. It doesn't spoil easily, so it prolongs the shell life of foods. HFCS also makes food more softer and chewier then sugar does. Well, corn refiners and food chemists may claimed that HFCS is no different then table sugar. Is that right?
Folks, do read through the list below for products which may contains HFCS.
- Beer
- Baby Foods
- Biscuits
- Breads
- Breakfast cereals
- Cakes
- Candy
- Canned fruits or vegetables
- Caramel coloring
- Carbonated beverages
- Cheese spread
- Chewing gum
- Coffee creamer
- Cordials
- Cookies
- Crackers
- Dessert toppings
- Doughnuts
- Frozen puddings and custards
- Fruit drinks and juices
- Ham
- Hot Dogs
- Ice cream
- Jams
- Jellies
- Ketchup
- Marmalade
- Mayonnaise
- Mustard
- Pancake
- Peanut Butter
- Pie
- Potato chips
- Powdered sugar
- Pretzels
- Salad dressings
- Sausage
- Wine
- Waffle
- Yeast
A serving of typical soft drink (16oz), lets say Coke or Pepsi, contains approximately 26g of HFCS. Folks, that is only ONE serving, and some people I see around me are gulping down soft drinks at least few cans per day. And that exclude fast food meal which usually accompanied with more soft drinks. If you would to tabulate the amount of fructose per day being consumed, fruits, ice creams, and more processed foods, easily total up to more then 40g in a single day.
Early humans ate very little fructose. It is estimated that we consume 5 to 7 times more fructose today then our primitive ancestors did. The species Homo Sapiens, have walked the earth for more then 130000 years. Remarkably, our genetic makeover has not changed much, but our diet sure have changed dramatically. Ask yourself, does a caveman knows how to bake lasagna or prepare fried chicken? Are there soft drinks and ice creams thousands of years ago?
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