Natural vs. Refined Sugars

-

Natural vs. refined sugars: What’s the difference?

If you can't lose weight or have trouble keeping it off, it's important to read this post. Your doing something wrong and understanding a little more about the foods your eating will help.


Sugar, in all forms, is a simple carbohydrate that the body converts into glucose and uses for energy. But the effect on the body and your overall health depends on the type of sugar you’re eating, either natural or refined.
We wanted to explore the difference between these sugar types as a follow-up to our post about whether sugar drives the growth of cancer, which has received several comments. We again turned to Julie Baker, Clinical Oncology Dietitian at our hospital outside Atlanta, for her expertise on the issue.

Understanding sugars
Natural sugars are found in fruit as fructose and in dairy products, such as milk and cheese, as lactose. Foods with natural sugar have an important role in the diet of cancer patients and anyone trying to prevent cancer because they provide essential nutrients that keep the body healthy and help prevent disease. 

Refined sugar comes from sugar cane or sugar beets, which are processed to extract the sugar. It is typically found as sucrose, which is the combination of glucose and fructose. We use white and brown sugars to sweeten cakes and cookies, coffee, cereal and even fruit. Food manufacturers add chemically produced sugar, typically high-fructose corn syrup, to foods and beverages, including crackers, flavored yogurt, tomato sauce and salad dressing. Low-fat foods are the worst offenders, as manufacturers use sugar to add flavor.

Most of the processed foods we eat add calories and sugar with little nutritional value. In contrast, fruit and unsweetened milk have vitamins and minerals. Milk also has protein and fruit has fiber, both of which keep you feeling full longer.

Metabolism matters
How the body metabolizes the sugar in fruit and milk differs from how it metabolizes the refined sugar added to processed foods. The body breaks down refined sugar rapidly, causing insulin and blood sugar levels to skyrocket. Because refined sugar is digested quickly, you don’t feel full after you’re done eating, no matter how many calories you consumed. The fiber in fruit slows down metabolism, as fruit in the gut expands to make you feel full. 

But there’s a caveat, Baker says. Once the sugar passes through the stomach and reaches the small intestine, it doesn’t matter if it came from an apple or a soft drink. 

“How much sugar is already in your blood will determine how the body uses the sugar,” Baker says. “If you already have a lot of sugar in your system, then what you just digested will form either fat or glycogen, the storage form of glucose that’s used for quick energy. It doesn’t matter if it’s junk food or fruit.”

Cancer connection
We eat more refined sugar today than our parents and grandparents did three decades ago, which has resulted in increasing obesity rates among adults and children. Obesity has been associated with certain cancers, including breast, prostate, uterine, colorectal and pancreatic. On the flip side, fruits high in antioxidants—blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, strawberries, and apples—may reduce your cancer risk. The fiber in fruit, found mainly in its skin, suppresses your appetite to prevent overeating and weight gain.

Baker recommends eating whole foods that are low in refined sugars. Whole foods refer to foods that are either unprocessed, such as fruit and vegetables, or minimally processed, such as whole grains.

As Baker puts it, “The big picture is being a healthy weight and making healthy food choices. It’s about eating a diet with whole foods, lean proteins, complex carbohydrates like quinoa rather than white bread, and non-starchy vegetables. Focus on making good food choices every day on a consistent basis, not on the one piece of cake you had as a treat.”

If you really want to lose the extra flab you can get help, I write 4 blogs and I’ve written two E-books. E-books are the easiest and cheapest way to learn about any subject without groping through hundreds of website looking for the material you want. 

My first e-book is “HowBadDoYouWantToLoseWeight” and it sells for $2.99 on most online bookstores like Amazon, BN.com, iBook, Kobo, and Gardner books in the U.K.

My second e-book is available in the same stores. And on smash words.com. If you use the smash word promotional code You can get my second book for $1.99 (PJ42H). Just type in the search line “getting to a healthy weight”.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

What's the Mediterranean Diet?

-
Image
The Mediterranean diet is based on the traditional foods eaten by people living in the Mediterranean region, especially Greece. It's loaded with healthy foods and research findings suggest following this diet may help reduce some of the risk factors for heart disease.  According to the Oldways Preservation & Exchange Trust, the Mediterranean diet was introduced in 1993 by Oldways, Harvard School of Public Health and the World Health Organization.  The diet includes: Olives and olive oil Whole grains, mostly in bread and cereal rather than pasta Very little red meat Fish and seafood Some cheese, but less milk Lots of vegetables and fruit Plenty of legumes and nuts A little red wine The Mediterranean diet is high in fiber and antioxidants from vegetables, legumes and nuts, far greater than the typical Western diet, and low in saturated fat. Very little red meat is eaten in this region, and milk consumption is limited as well, exc...
Read more

Changing Your Life To Lose Weight

-
Image
I can let you in on the ultimate secret for successfully making a change in your life. A century’s worth of psychological research reveals an interesting paradox in who we are. On the one hand, once we reach adulthood our basic personalities remain unchanged for the rest of our lives. We keep doing the same things—and feeling the same ways—over and over. But, on the other hand, every day we change our behavior drastically in response to different environments. Most of us are one person at work, for example, and another person at home. It is easier to change our environment than to change ourselves. So, if you want to change yourself, change your environment. Said differently: Whenever possible, don’t try to fight temptations – avoid them! The easiest way to make a change in your life is to modify the world around you in ways that will naturally drive you toward making, and maintaining, the change you want. There are many ways to change your environment, but let’s focus...
Read more

Cancer and High Protein Diets

-
On the Fox TV Network the other night, one of the big stories was about high protein diets. A new study has shown a link between the over consumption of animal protein and how it can stimulate the growth of cancer cells. It seems we all have cancer cells but they don’t normally grow, unless we consume too much animal fat, dairy or fats from processed foods. Before I continue I want to explain about the link to cancer. After all, Man has been eating red meat for millions of years, right. That's true but todays red meat is not the same. Most red meat that we buy in the supermarket comes from Steers that have been raised in feed lots on a grain diet that is full of hormones and other chemicals that shorten the growing time and put more fat on the animal. These hormones and other chemicals stay in the meat and what you're buying will contain the chemicals that the animal ate. Normally a grass feed Steer that lives on the range in big herds will take 18 to 20 months to grow to ...
Read more