Sugar in fruit- how should I feel about it?

yarwell

The sugars are not only different by name (clearly ;-p ) but also my molecular composition. Long chain (complex) sugars will take more (and different enzymes) processing than simple ones and seem to cause different responses from your body (I'm still researching a more detailed explanation - but I don't hold with an overly simplistic one).

A long chain complex "sugar" becomes starch or a carbohydrate. I think you're limited to 1,2 or 3 hexose groups for a sugar before it gets called something else like an oligo-saccharide.

Fruits contain fructose, glucose and sucrose in varying proportions. Fructose is metabolised differently to glucose in that it is processed by the liver a bit like alcohol is. Glucose or "blood sugar" on the other hand goes straight to the bloodstream.

Should sugar in fruit get a free pass because it comes with some fibre and minerals ? seems this is a political question rather than a science one. If you're the Orange Growers Union you'll say yes, if you make cookies that have as much fibre, mins and vits as the fruit then you'll have a different view.

yarwell

Commenting on my own post here as I had a thought: sugar is a carb, yes, but does MFP track it separately? I have a column for carbs in my diary, and a column for sugar - does my carb column also contain the values for sugar or are they separated out somehow?

I was thinking I would remove the sugar column from my diary but would my carb column be accurate?

Yes, the sugars are a subset of carbs you don't lose anything by not displaying the sugar column.

DamianaKitten

Sugar that occurs naturally in a fruit, so long as you are eating the whole fruit so you get the fiber too, is fine. It's sugar, honey, syrup, etc. that has been added to a food (like catsup, or ice cream) that is bad for you.

No.

The science behind your 'NO' is? ....... Your 'no' post on it;s own is not very helpful. Please explain what you mean, why and prove it.

Burden of proof actually falls to the person who I refuted. Their post of "too much added sugar is bad for you" is a bit misleading. Too much of anything can be bad for you. Vague posts about how horrible something is, is not very helpful.

tennisdude2004

I love these types of threads. The problem with them is though is that people talk about simple sugar as though its a food source being eaten in isolation - which it is not.

I think the thing to remember is sugar in itself is not particularly healthy (that's not to claim it is unhealthy), it's not essential or necessary, in fact about the only thing sugar does do is make things taste good.

Maybe the focus should not be on how much sugar we eat, but from what sources we get it.

There are a lot of studies done to show the negative effects of sugar in the body, however a large portion of these studies are flawed by the simple fact that the experiments are done based on consuming sugar in isolation and in much larger quantities than would be consumed in a normal diet.

Most people look at cutting simple sugar because they want to reduce their calorie intake and sugar is probably the easy option, after all it gives back very little nutritionally for the it's cost in calories.

If we didn't eat another bit of added simple sugar in our lives would we be less healthy - I think probably not.

DamianaKitten

Sugar that occurs naturally in a fruit, so long as you are eating the whole fruit so you get the fiber too, is fine. It's sugar, honey, syrup, etc. that has been added to a food (like catsup, or ice cream) that is bad for you.

No.

The science behind your 'NO' is? ....... Your 'no' post on it;s own is not very helpful. Please explain what you mean, why and prove it.

I think the poster was getting at the fact that really, refined sugar or added sugar is no more or less bad for you than natural sugar. There may be different kinds of sugar (glucose, fructose, sucrose etc) but they are all still sugar, sugar is a carb, so watch your overall carb intake and don't stress about the sugar as a separate macro.

Refined sugar isn't "bad" for you per se, it's just that foods that tend to contain it are not as nutritious. Yes fruit has sugar, but it also has a lot of good stuff like fibre and vitamins.

Edited to clarify a point..

Refined sugars don't break down as easily (from what I understand). However, that doesn't make them bad. Also, honey is not a refined sugar unless you're buying the honey flavored corn syrup found in most grocery stores.

Too much of anything can be bad for you.

Sugar is not inherently evil (refined or not).

Would I recommend eating 2000 cals/day of primarily sugar? No. I'd get sick if I tried. I also wouldn't get other nutrients that my body needs. But, ice cream on it's own is not bad for you. If it was all you ate every day, all day? Probably going to have a problem because your body would likely not be getting all the nutrients it needed to be healthy. Unless you have some super hybrid fortified ice cream. If you do, I want the recipe.

Shropshire1959

The sugars are not only different by name (clearly ;-p ) but also my molecular composition. Long chain (complex) sugars will take more (and different enzymes) processing than simple ones and seem to cause different responses from your body (I'm still researching a more detailed explanation - but I don't hold with an overly simplistic one).

A long chain complex "sugar" becomes starch or a carbohydrate. I think you're limited to 1,2 or 3 hexose groups for a sugar before it gets called something else like an oligo-saccharide.

Fruits contain fructose, glucose and sucrose in varying proportions. Fructose is metabolised differently to glucose in that it is processed by the liver a bit like alcohol is. Glucose or "blood sugar" on the other hand goes straight to the bloodstream.

Should sugar in fruit get a free pass because it comes with some fibre and minerals ? seems this is a political question rather than a science one. If you're the Orange Growers Union you'll say yes, if you make cookies that have as much fibre, mins and vits as the fruit then you'll have a different view.

Good post thanks.

neandermagnon

I love these types of threads. The problem with them is though is that people talk about simple sugar as though its a food source being eaten in isolation - which it is not.

I think the thing to remember is sugar in itself is not particularly healthy (that's not to claim it is unhealthy), it's not essential or necessary, in fact about the only thing sugar does do is make things taste good.

Maybe the focus should not be on how much sugar we eat, but from what sources we get it.

There are a lot of studies done to show the negative effects of sugar in the body, however a large portion of these studies are flawed by the simple fact that the experiments are done based on consuming sugar in isolation and in much larger quantities than would be consumed in a normal diet.

Most people look at cutting simple sugar because they want to reduce their calorie intake and sugar is probably the easy option, after all it gives back very little nutritionally for the it's cost in calories.

If we didn't eat another bit of added simple sugar in our lives would we be less healthy - I think probably not.

The problems arise when people get confused between "eat less sugar" and "never touch another molecule of sugar for the rest of your life"......... obesity is caused by eating too much. Eating vast quantities of sugar, e.g. family packs of candy on a daily basis, is going to make someone eat way more than they're burning off and therefore get obese (and yes I know it's technically possible to not get fat on a diet of candy, protein powder and vitamin pills but we all know that's not what happens in the real world.... people eat family packs of candy or doritos or whatever then 3 square meals on top of that, and end up in a massive calorie surplus).... someone doing this definitely needs to eat less sugar (or less fat and starch in the case of doritos). But the trouble arises when people interpret this advice as "sugar is bad, never eat sugar" and go to the opposite extreme of shunning all sources of simple sugar (or even all carbohydrates) and being afraid to eat a mango or a banana. Or they do the same with fat ("fat is bad, never eat fat"), and they're afraid to eat a slice of cheese or an egg yolk.

A lot of people seem to have a real difficulty with the concept of moderation, middle ground, a happy medium etc, and instead swing from extreme to extreme (in both their thinking and their behaviour).... if someone says to them "it's okay to eat a little candy as part of a balanced diet" they interpret this is "it's okay to stuff your face with candy all day long" and if someone says to them "eating too much sugar makes it hard to stay within your calories and if you're not tracking it can easily put you into a surplus" they interpret this as "sugar is the devil and shouldn't be touched with a ten foot barge pole and all foods containing sugar should be avoided at all times"........... if people would just learn how to get out of this dichotomous thinking, then debates like this wouldn't happen, the discussion would go more like "too much sugar makes it hard to stay within my calorie goal" "yeah I know... but fruit's a good source of micronutrients and it's filling and I need *some* sugar in my diet, although I can't get away with stuffing my face with mangoes all day long, so I'll just have one mango and some other kinds of fruit for variety, while staying within my calorie goal" "yeah, that's how I feel too. I'll just eat some sugar and be careful about portion control. And I like gummy bears so I'll have a few of them each day and log them and stay within my calorie goal. and I clean my teeth so it doesn't mess up my dental hygiene" "that's a good idea, I like to have a small bar of chocolate sometimes, but I log the calories and stay within my goal. It doesn't cause me any difficulty so long as I meet my protein goal for the day." etc etc etc ad extremely boring discussion.....

yarwell

The term "refined sugar" is broadly useless as a nutritional concept. "Raw sugar" is pretty well identical in composition, with a touch of molasses making up the difference.

I suspect the origin is in the agricultural influence of food policy - the dairy and fruit lobbies managed to engineer the concept of "non-milk extrinsic sugars" which can't be measured, let alone shown to be different to "added sugars" and can in fact be the same thing. To me these are all political terms, scientifically the sugars don't carry passports saying where they came from.

ktsmom430

You should feel good about it and you should eat fruit. A healthy diet should be about balance and not overeating anything. Fruit is a good food to eat. I always have fresh fruit in the house and I eat it every day.

tennisdude2004

I love these types of threads. The problem with them is though is that people talk about simple sugar as though its a food source being eaten in isolation - which it is not.

I think the thing to remember is sugar in itself is not particularly healthy (that's not to claim it is unhealthy), it's not essential or necessary, in fact about the only thing sugar does do is make things taste good.

Maybe the focus should not be on how much sugar we eat, but from what sources we get it.

There are a lot of studies done to show the negative effects of sugar in the body, however a large portion of these studies are flawed by the simple fact that the experiments are done based on consuming sugar in isolation and in much larger quantities than would be consumed in a normal diet.

Most people look at cutting simple sugar because they want to reduce their calorie intake and sugar is probably the easy option, after all it gives back very little nutritionally for the it's cost in calories.

If we didn't eat another bit of added simple sugar in our lives would we be less healthy - I think probably not.

The problems arise when people get confused between "eat less sugar" and "never touch another molecule of sugar for the rest of your life"......... obesity is caused by eating too much. Eating vast quantities of sugar, e.g. family packs of candy on a daily basis, is going to make someone eat way more than they're burning off and therefore get obese (and yes I know it's technically possible to not get fat on a diet of candy, protein powder and vitamin pills but we all know that's not what happens in the real world.... people eat family packs of candy or doritos or whatever then 3 square meals on top of that, and end up in a massive calorie surplus).... someone doing this definitely needs to eat less sugar (or less fat and starch in the case of doritos). But the trouble arises when people interpret this advice as "sugar is bad, never eat sugar" and go to the opposite extreme of shunning all sources of simple sugar (or even all carbohydrates) and being afraid to eat a mango or a banana. Or they do the same with fat ("fat is bad, never eat fat"), and they're afraid to eat a slice of cheese or an egg yolk.

A lot of people seem to have a real difficulty with the concept of moderation, middle ground, a happy medium etc, and instead swing from extreme to extreme (in both their thinking and their behaviour).... if someone says to them "it's okay to eat a little candy as part of a balanced diet" they interpret this is "it's okay to stuff your face with candy all day long" and if someone says to them "eating too much sugar makes it hard to stay within your calories and if you're not tracking it can easily put you into a surplus" they interpret this as "sugar is the devil and shouldn't be touched with a ten foot barge pole and all foods containing sugar should be avoided at all times"........... if people would just learn how to get out of this dichotomous thinking, then debates like this wouldn't happen, the discussion would go more like "too much sugar makes it hard to stay within my calorie goal" "yeah I know... but fruit's a good source of micronutrients and it's filling and I need *some* sugar in my diet, although I can't get away with stuffing my face with mangoes all day long, so I'll just have one mango and some other kinds of fruit for variety, while staying within my calorie goal" "yeah, that's how I feel too. I'll just eat some sugar and be careful about portion control. And I like gummy bears so I'll have a few of them each day and log them and stay within my calorie goal. and I clean my teeth so it doesn't mess up my dental hygiene" "that's a good idea, I like to have a small bar of chocolate sometimes, but I log the calories and stay within my goal. It doesn't cause me any difficulty so long as I meet my protein goal for the day." etc etc etc ad extremely boring discussion.....

Totally agree with you. Sadly there are extremists on both sides - the ones that want to shout down anyone who wants to reduce sugar intake and on the other side the ones who want to shout down anyone not agreeing sugar will kill you.

Conversations like your one above would be helpful.

It's the same as when people want to cut out added sugar (as best they can) and you have the extremist shouting down to people that the only way is moderation and on the other side people shouting down at people saying abstaining is the only way - rather than agreeing that both work and both don't work, it depends on the individual.

Anyway until we enter that utopian internet forum - lets debate on.

lisaabenjamin

The KISS principle: if it's natural (as in completely unprocessed) then it's okay but if it's processed then have just a little or steer clear. Unless of course you have a health issue.

Processed doesn't = BAD. There is no need to completely avoid processed foods/sugars unless you personally choose to, or you have been recommended to do so by a doctor.
Processed doesn't necessarily mean however that it's *as nutritious* as equivalent natural foods/sugars. Everything in moderation is fine and dandy!

tennisdude2004

The KISS principle: if it's natural (as in completely unprocessed) then it's okay but if it's processed then have just a little or steer clear. Unless of course you have a health issue.

Processed doesn't = BAD. There is no need to completely avoid processed foods/sugars unless you personally choose to, or you have been recommended to do so by a doctor.
Processed doesn't necessarily mean however that it's *as nutritious* as equivalent natural foods/sugars. Everything in moderation is fine and dandy!

Agree!

You are right processed doesn't necessarily = Bad

but on the flip side it doesn't mean that it = Good.

In moderation processed foods is nice, but personally I would not want it to make up a majority of my diet, as a lot of people eating cheap convenient western diets do.

In America the food producer do not have to label trans fats in their products for quantities of 0.5 grams and below. When the WHO recommend we restrict trans fat (man made) to 2 grams a day, eating a lot of processed foods can quickly get you up to and beyond the 2 grams.