High Fructose Corn Syrup

It is amazing what money will do for you. It corrupts you.

I was talking to a friend and he said he heard about one of the big food companies asked this guy to do tests on HFcorn syrup. So he did. Unfortunately the tests were not in their favor, so I think they asked him to come up with one in their favor, since he wouldn't, they fired him and got someone else to do it.

When the big companies put out reports you have to be extremely cautious in believing them. They get the reports from the people they want and have it written the way they want. They have the power and the money. The other side is not working for a big company and so is a lot more likely to contain the truth about things. Though, don't believe one thing you read, but get confirmation from it from other websites. I generally don't take something as being true unless I look it up and get 3 other websites or places to agree with it.

High Fructose Corn Syrup recently put out an article (well, they didn't, but someone high up) that they were changing the name. Because of all the bad conitations it has. Well, hopefully most people are not reading the labels and since it doesn't say HFC syrup, they will buy it, or so they hope. The pressure from the people has made a lot of the big companies come out with HFCS FREE products, ketchup, and lots of other things. I am hoping that now that some companies are changing names, that they will not go back to using HFCS and call it Corn Sugar.

Some companies it is now legal (you gotta find some way under the fence, right!) to call it corn sugar. So, be on the look out for things that have Corn Sugar as some of the companies will be switching.


What is wrong with HFCS? First off, it could have mercury. And mercury poisoning is not good, though I would believe that a LOT of americans have it. Did you know, we are just about the only place that uses it? It is because america grows the corn. Go back to the pilgrims, we were growing the corn the most over other countries. So we use it. Coca Cola in other countries uses sugar, but because HFCS is so cheap they use it here. Some of the ways to make HFCS is altering it using mercury. Not always, but there is no way to tell which ones have mercury and which don't.

The second reason. Fructose. I have become convinced, due to reading, that fructose is not good. Unfortunately a lot of people switch to Agave nectar because it is 'natural'. Well, its not really. It's basically maple syrup, except has fructose, and lots of it. Even more so than HFCS!

Whats bad about fructose? Well, studies have shown that fructose is sweeter, making you gain weight faster by it. Fructose is broken down much faster, and converted to fat.They have shown also that your risk of heart disease and cancer are higher when eating fructose. What about fruit, doesn't it have fructose? Well, yes. But in much smaller amounts and fruit has so many nutrients and vitamins. So, eating fructose in its natural form is fine, its when it is concentrated like in HFCS and in Agave nectar.

So, what should I use? Well, we use Sugar for a lot of things, which is mostly sucrose. For special diets we have xylitol. Which though expensive is one of my favorite and probably the best sweetener substitute. It is 1:1 with sugar which is why it is expensive. It was actually invented so to speak by the Fins in Finland. Right after World War 1 I think. They had a shortage of sugar and found that the sap of birch trees contains high amounts of xylitol, a sugar alcohol. Alcohol, I'll get drunk? No, sugar alcohol means your body absorbs the xylitol like the way it absorbs alcohol, instead of absorbing it like sugar. Xylitol is use in gum in america, but not much else. In Finland and a lot of europe it is much more popular.

The other sweetener I like is stevia. Some people don't like the flavor, but I love it. I put it on cereal and in baking things, but I am just about the only one who eats it. My mom and a lot of people don't like the sorta aftertaste, some what like licoruse. It is much cheaper than sugar though. And the ratio can be as high as 300stevia to 1 sugar! So, buying a small container is like buying 50 pounds of sugar.

I hate aspartame, it makes you fatter, slowing your metabolism. Along with other side affects. I am not totally against Splenda, but don't know as much about it. I would prefer splenda over aspartame.

Any questions that I might be able to answer? : )


English Vintner