Living High Fructose Corn Syrup Free on a Limited Budget

No doubt, if there is one concern that most families have, it's eating a healthy diet on a limited budget.  It is obviously more cost effective to be able to buy bulk items of processed food for cheap, than more expensive natural foods.  Agreed, to shop at a natural food store versus a bulk or surplus store is more expensive and deter's most people from doing that.  So in this post my goal to focus on small changes, and if you have children in your family, I'm sure you would agree that making sure they eat healthy is a top priority in your mind.  So lets just look at some of the top items that children mostly consume and changing those items so that they are not consuming large amounts of high fructose corn syrup.
Some of the most consumed products by children that contain high fructose corn syrup are soda(unfortunately), ketchup, jelly, bread and cookies.  So yes, 95% of the sodas contain high fructose corn syrup(non-diet).  My recommendation is to try Sierra Mist, which does not.  Heinz ketchup contains HFCS, so my recommendation is to get the organic Heinz, which does not.  Just about all your jelly's and jams contain HFCS, but Smuckers All Natural Grape Jelly does not contain HFCS.  I tried it myself, and the texture is a bit different, but the taste to me is the same.  Most cookies also contain HFCS, so if you are not a baker, a good replacement for Oreo's is a product called WhoNu, which does taste a little different, but I think it's still great with a glass of milk.  These changes might add another $2 to your usual purchase of the same products, but I am confident if you are able to lessen the amount of processed foods you buy, and visit your local farmers market and stock up on apples, oranges and carrots, you can get some good mileage from that.

So you want to talk SCIENCE?

There is so much out there in terms of research on high fructose corn syrup, but some of the basic studies that we should be aware of for our overall health I am going to talk about right now.  First, studies have shown that a diet high in HFCS causes the body to become resistant to a protein called Leptin.  This protein is an appetite regulator in our hypothalumus.  When this protein is supressed, our ability to control hunger is diminished.  This obviously can lead to overeating.  Secondly, our body uses glucose as an energy source in the body.  Fructose is instead processed in the liver and does not stimulate insulin secretion and results in an almost immediate form of a free fatty acid.  It is much more difficult for our bodies to break down fat into glucose to use for energy. So its ability to convert to fat is far greater than consuming sugar which is converted to glucose first.
Just when you take those two factors, and compare with the inconvenience of reading the label to find out which ketchup doesn't have HFCS, I just can't understand why someone would choose to take the risks.  Cost?  Yes, I can see that why choosing those products seem more appealing if they are cheaper.  If I may back track, I was watching a food documentary, and a family of 5 was talking about the difficult times right now, and how feeding a family was so much harder on a limited budget.  When money is brought into the picture, it becomes less about the health aspects, and more about being able to provide enough calories for your family to survive.  So however those calories come, the most you can get at the cheapest price is the one most people will choose.  So this family talked of going through the drive thru several times a week and order the dollar menu items, and both the parents and teenage daughters were all over weight to some extent.  The father had type 2 diabetes, and was spending about $250 a month on medication.  What do you think that $250 a month could do to the family's quality of eating each month if the father wasn't spending it on medication?  I know first hand, that I switched to a all natural diet a few months back, so that means only fruits, vegetables, beans,  brown rice, and sweet potatoes and on occasion, meat or poultry.  No bread, or anything processed.  I am still working on my family, but I will tell you that since I  have gone almost meatless, I go to the farmers market, and I can feed myself for about $30 a week.  PLUS, everything is natural!  I know I got off on a tangent here, but I know families can eat healthy for less than eating fast food.  You don't need meat at every meal, if you combine rice and beans, that is a complete protein!  I will talk more in a later blog about natural diets, but I just wanted to help you get on the path of natural versus processed.  High Fructose Corn Syrup is a natural product that is then processed!   Don't let them fool you.  Until next time, Health and Happiness.

You want Mercury with that???

Wow, just when you thought that high fructose corn syrup couldn't be anymore unhealthy for you, reports have been published that more than a third of the products scientist's have tested that contain high fructose corn syrup, report detectable levels of Mercury.  What is so scary is that it is a fact that Mercury when in contact with the brain, causes degeneration of the cells.  So even though these might not be high levels of Mercury, when you add up that a large percentage of the population who consume products with high fructose corn syrup at almost every meal, every snack throughout the day, that can add up to some significant levels that are ingested into the body. 
I know that they are going to debate that Mercury and the perservatives in vaccines doesn't cause autism and autistic like symptons, but no scientist can convince me that after my son recieved his 3 year old vaccine, we saw a completely different child for the next several weeks and months.  I have heard countless stories telling the exact same effect, and I don't believe any scientist is smarter than a mother's intuition(yes, I know, I'm the dad, but you get the point)
So what if I'm wrong, and Mercury doesn't have adverse effects on our brains, well number one, I would bet my life that I'm right, and secondly, is something as serious as this, even worth taking a risk on your child's health?  It can be as simple as buying the organic heinz ketchup rather than the regular kind, buying the Sierra Mist soda instead of Coke.  These little things too can add up and greatly diminish the amount of HFCS that your children ingest.
Food for thought!  Health and Happiness.

Can you say "MOOOO" since we are now the industry's cattle

Let me explain....I was watching a couple really good documentaries on the food industry, and it was very alarming to learn how much our food industry has changed, and mostly in part do to the fast food industry.  50 years ago, thousands of different manufacturers and farmers supplied the food to our local markets and the food was fresh, and not "engineered."  Do to the heavy demand of production by the fast food industry, those thousands of suppliers have widdled down to just a few in each food sector.  A few poultry, a few beef, a few potato, and so on.  The reason is that these few suppliers have been able to, number one, use science to create or grow a product bigger and faster, secondly, our government provides subsidies to certain crops to help grow more at a lower cost.  This has allowed the supplier to produce more, sell it cheaper, and make more profit.  As an example, our "chicken farmers" now cram thousands of more chickens into the same size as before, feed them corn and antibiotics and instead of these chickens which use to fully mature in 9 weeks, now are able to grow to full size in 4 weeks.  Then sell them off to fast food joints, grocery stores, and the like for a bigger profit than before.  Take cattle: before they fed off the land and ate healthy.  Again, our "cattle farmers" feed them corn, steroids, antibiotics, and blow them up faster than a balloon.  So to cut to the chase, our food industry can produce a product faster, create it cheaper,create it ten fold,  and repeat the cycle over and over.  The end product, us, as a consumer, has created such a high demand for the convenience and cheapness of fast food, so we keep on encouraging the whole system day in and day out.  Fast food industries account for almost 90% of the beef, poultry, potato purchases.
So how are we the cattle?  Well, just like farmers feed the cattle the corn(which they were never designed to eat) so they become fat and meaty, our society pumps among other things, high fructose corn syrup into our diets.  Why? Because since the government subsidizes corn, it is cheaper for food manufacturers to use HFCS than using sugar.  And since our bodies are not able to metabolize high fructose corn syrup as easily as sugar, we get fatter and fatter.  Not to mention, HFCS does not spike insulin levels so we do not create a sense of "fullness" from ingesting it.  This allows us to eat more calories at a sitting, since that soda really didn't fill us up. So we fast forward the picture, our society continues to eat fast food, products enriched with HFCS, meat that is not as healthy since our cattle are fed the corn, and what happens to us?  We desire more food, we get type 2 diabetes, we get other cardiovascular diseases, and now we have to take hundreds of dollars a month on medication so we can keep eating the crap and still stay alive.   Who is winning in this picture?  Not YOU!  Its the cattle industry, the fast food industry, the pharmaceutical industry, its the healthcare industry and they so want you to keep killing yourself so they can keep you alive.  The pharmaceutical industry is a trillion dollar a year business, and the money that the lobbyist pump back into government and big business keeps this vicious cycle spinning.  So yes, just like cattle, our financial industry is going to keep fattening us up, because that is how they stay in business!!  So say it with me...."MOOOOO"
So Rome wasn't built in a day, and you don't have to go "cold turkey" but one thing you can do to help stop this cycle, is stop buying products that use high fructose corn syrup.  We can promote the products that don't and one by one, we can start to change the food industry.  Also maybe put some money back into the pockets of americans that can now go off of some prescription medications.  I've said my peace.  Health and Happiness!

Does High Fructose Corn Syrup Make Us Fat?

Well according to Princeton Univ in March of 2010, they conducted a study between two sets of rats, one group of rats was fed in addition to their normal diet, a water sugar drink, and the second set, the equal amount in high fructose corn syrup.  It was clear to their reports that the group of rats that were fed the high fructose corn syrup became obese and showed a much higher level of triglycerides in their blood stream.  A main determinant of diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
"In addition to causing significant weight gain in lab animals, long-term consumption of high-fructose corn syrup also led to abnormal increases in body fat, especially in the abdomen, and a rise in circulating blood fats called triglycerides. The researchers say the work sheds light on the factors contributing to obesity trends in the United States."
As we look at our population, the amount of people that add that soda to that meal, or that barbeque sauce to that chicken, it becomes pretty clear that HFCS is playing an important role in the obesity rates and diabetes levels that are plaguing our society.

Why Live High Fructose Corn Syrup Free?

Welcome to LiveHFCSfree blog, my name is Darren.  I am a father of 3 boys, currently all under the age of 13.  You can definitely consider me a cause oriented person, and after our middle child developed severe learning differences, all which require therapy, I have looked into every aspect of life with a magnify glass.  You really start to question why your child has certain disabilities or differences, and try to find out if they are nature or nuture.  Even though you really can't make it a difinitive answer, no doubt you can point out factors in our society that are sure not helping our children, if not, hurting them.
When I became interested in studying nutrition, this artificial sweetener (yes, artificial) called High Fructose Corn Syrup kept popping up in many conversations as something that is affecting the health of society, and being backed by scientific research that shows links to obesity, diabetes, and other cardiovascular diseases.  My goal is to help educate how this product is hurting our health, our childrens health, and possibly being linked to other neurological disorders that has great cause for concern. 
Back to my previous point, is HFCS an artificial sweetener?  Well, yes it is made from corn, and yes corn syrup is a natural product, but without scientist's, HFCS would not exist.  The process of HFCS is that scientists must first remove the sucrose from corn syrup that is done with mechanical equipment.  Once the sucrose is removed, large amounts of fructose is added to create that extra sweetness.  I will get more into the adverse effects of this type of sweetener, but adding the high amounts of fructose(yes fructose is in fruit) without the water content that is found in fruit, the fructose goes directly into the bloodstream and converted to fat, before the body has the chance to metabolize it for energy. 
I will leave you with this:  How many products in your house have HFCS?  If you have children, how much are they consuming on a daily basis?  Till next time, health and happiness.